A Motif of Open Social Transformation

I heard it first in 1998, from Meg Wheatley. And it’s really simple: “Participate, react, create, connect.”

Now twelve years later Meg writes, “I hold in my heart the vision of what’s possible if we could stop screaming accusations across our huge divides, if we could quiet down long enough to realize that, with the Gulf tragedy, nobody knows what to do, we’re in new territory, we’re lost.”

With closing concern, “I don’t think we have a choice here. We have to come together to find what’s needed for the Gulf, its people, and all its living beings. But will we make this choice? I have no idea.”

So then, a Sparking Agent: Geoff Livingston

From that simple motif–participate, react, create, connect–comes an idea, “As a society, we continue to experience great anger about this situation. While BP has taken responsibility, it’s clear they cannot resolve the matter. We cannot wait for corporations or the government to act. It’s been almost two months and the crisis is deepening.

“We will create a Citizen Effect: Find local charities to pair with a national fundraising drive and help fishermen to find a sustainable, environmentally friendly future. This would be the best outcome from the oil spill.”

Participate, react, create, connect: What to Expect on Our Gulf Mission

From Fractal Brand, to Scale: TEDxOilSpill

We have the template. We have the technology. Geoff and colleagues Beth Kanter and Kami Watson Huyse at Zoetica, masters of socionetics, use social technology for social good, appropriately leveraging personal networks, building capacity to scale. If Geoff, working with Citizen Effect’s May Yu and Dan Morrison is one brand of open leadership, who might become another? And, to what scale?

Of the thought leaders speaking at TEDxOilSpill on Monday, l ask:

How can we – ordinary people, citizen scientists, citizen journalists – participate, react, create, and connect in meaningful ways to mitigate the crisis in the Gulf, and to explore alternative energy futures?

Open leadership. It’s here, now. Choose an idea :)

BP MC252 Gulf of Mexico

I believe at least one of these three activities deserve your focused attention, even if only a moment:

In the Gulf: @geoffliving – Gulf Fact Finding Mission to Help Fisherman

In DC: @TEDxOilSpill – Thought Leader Summit at TEDxOilSpill, Wash DC, June 28, 2010.

In your home: @PlugthatWell – Invite your friends to play www.plugthatwell.com, then start a conversation.

Take a moment, check it out. Honor your reaction. If you are moved to share with a friend, please do so. Doing so is service to humanity.

Thanks,

-critt

Sparks and motifs from the
2010 H+ Summit @ Harvard.

With beginner’s mind, I’ve started exploring Humanity+ with new ears, new eyes, a new query of life.

Citizen scientists, reputation.
Moving beyond sociobiological speculation to DIY research.
An exponential rise
in consciousness.
Patterns of inquiry,
A calculus of opposites.

Empiricism vs. true scientific understanding.
The utility of sonification?
Let the data play.

=======

Special thanks to Russell Whitaker :)

Abandoned larvacean 'house'

There is no dearth of men who understand these things.

Keying thoughts…

ARE2010…
augmented reality event…
web world wide…
outernext…
outernext guidelines initiative…
digital enlightenment…
socializing technology…

See you at 2010 Humanity+ @ Harvard, next week?

Follow the Outernext Road

Clarifying the mention of a very early startup in my last post, I’m working with a core group of folks to create an open social platform at Outernext.com engaging communities in culture and technology. That may be a bit vague, but here’s what I mean by that.

Illustratively, culture constrains the advance of technology, and technology reciprocates by informing culture. Curious minds are asking questions: What follows, emerges from that two-way street of interaction? Who’s transforming, and what’s being tranformed? And, how’s that working for you?

The rules of engagement are changing, transforming the roles of engagement. Are you engaging?

Keying thought

Friend, advisor, Mark Safranski knows, better than anyone, my passion for the “portals, platforms and rule sets” which enable strategic conversations — conversations transformative to the structure of organizations in emerging markets. Keenly aware how strategic approach provides the requisite constraints and affordances of structure, Charlene Li cautions the traditional way of doing business, “You simply can’t “Six Sigma” your way into new markets”.

Setting initial conditions

Invited into a new startup, I’m heeding Charlene’s caution, using the framework she provides in Open Leadership to develop a mindful strategic approach. For now, I’ll refer to the startup as Open Social Engagement Strategy. As soon as we’ve worked out our tactical transparency, I’ll mention our startup by name, trademark ;)

Roles before rules

The operational realities of getting things done are constrained by time and responsibility. Who does what, and when, and for how long?

Then we can ask, “Who needs to be in the conversation?”

Next post: The Roles of Engagement

Poets, paupers, kings, and pawns

ladder of engagement… pyramid of engagement… posting recipes, ingredients (a.k.a strategic data)

Out of the frying pan, into the sandbox

Okay… inside joke… won’t do it again. I’ve been in complex adaptive systems grok-mode since 1998. From a variety of early adopter, early collaborator venues, I’ve been learning how to consider the potential scope of technological advances and how we might better anticipate their cultural, commercial and policy implications: You know, humanity’s transformation and the emerging new rule sets.

I’m in a very early startup stage with a group of kindred spirits who, likewise, recognize technology is now evolving faster than people’s understanding of all its ramifications, and believe, as well, that each of us would benefit from open dialog about this social transformation.

The grande dame of organizational leadership: Margaret Wheatley

In the summer of 1998, I participated in a week long seminar with Meg Wheatley, exploring complex system failures, and New Science Organizational Development. Two take aways: 1) Organizations don’t change, but rather people do. 2) Meet people at the level of their identity.

My thinking forever shifted.

Transformation requires open leadership

There’s a book for that, @Charlene Li’s Open Leadership, How Social Technology Can Transform the Way You Lead. I read the Advance Reading Copy over the weekend. That “very early startup stage” I mentioned? I’m using material directly from the text– especially audits and assessments–to guide the call for critical inputs to our open strategy. I’ll blog more about this as the week goes by. Shifting, in progress ;)

A new strategy of engagement emerges

As Meg said, “Meet people at the level of their identity.” Though some men “worry more that the world of web 2.0 — and what comes after — will distract, not add, from the skill of leaders, make them more, rather than less, remote,” following optimistic women might shift your point of view :)

Though I’ve used Twitter several years, and for many different reasons, I’m now developing a more mindful strategic approach. Let’s call it my Open Social Engagement Strategy. And, let’s use the framework, language, and supporting data supplied by Beth, Charlene, and Marta.

Engaging women, you know?