“Business agility” is almost impossible to achieve without the application of genuine Open patterns and practices. The Open Leadership Network (OLN) is the community and certification body that enables real business agility, through the teaching of Open leadership skills, and the application of Open Social Technologies. The courses offered here have one thing in common: they all teach Invitation-Based Change™ and a specific, core dimension of the eight Open Business Agility patterns.
Inside the Open Leadership Network, leading is defined as the act of participating in any decision-making that affects the group as a whole. We define leadership as that set or group of individuals that participates in this kind of high-impact decision making.
In practical terms, this includes formally authorized executives, directors, and managers. It also includes many informal influencers: members of the group who have gained enough respect and enough informal authority to participate directly or indirectly in the shaping and finalization of leadership decisions.
Open Leadership is leadership that applies Open leadership patterns and practices in service to achieving improved outcomes and genuine business agility.
We hold that Open Leadership and Open patterns and practices are essential to the achievement of genuine and lasting business agility. Business agility is impossible to achieve without Open Leadership and the application of Open patterns and practices.
All of our courses offer certifications in at least one dimension of Open Leadership. Open Leadership is a deep and wide domain area. And an essential one.
Open Leadership and Invitation-Based Change™ are the primary areas of focus of the Open Leadership Network.
Invitation-Based Change™
Invitation-Based Change™ (IBC) is the act of using any pattern, practice or method that leverages the power of leadership invitation to motivate, engage and inspire the workforce during periods of substantial organizational change.
Open Social Technologies
Open social technologies create Open structures and include ways-of-working frameworks, meeting designs, interaction protocols, and more. All of these enabling Open social technologies share a set of core characteristics that make genuine and lasting business agility possible:
They are invitation-based… not imposition-based
They promote the distribution of clear decision rights, not the imposition of totally centralized decision-making
They are designed to be modular and combinable, rather than monolithic and inflexible. Open social technologies invite recombination and design innovation
They align on the idea that organizations are complex and adaptive living systems, rather than machines
They are published under an open license, not a closed one
Open Business Agility Patterns and Practices
Open patterns and practices are those methods that engage the attention and energy of your workforce and improve employee engagement scores. Employee engagement is correlated with positive business outcomes. Employee engagement is absolutely essential to any success you may have in achieving transformational change. Here are the eight Open Business Agility patterns and practices:
Examples of Open Social Technology
Examples of Open Social Technologies include:
Inviting Leadership. A leadership approach that favors invitations over delegations. Developed by Daniel Mezick and documented in the book of the same name. More information here.
Open Coaching, based on The Agile Open Practitioner book. A transformation coaching framework for professional coaches, Scrum Masters and facilitators developing Invitation-Based Change in organizations. Developed by Heidi Araya.
Open Space Technology. An invitational, all-hands meeting ceremony and method discovered and developed by Harrison Owen. Click here for details.
Agendashift. An engagement model for enterprise change. Developed by Mike Burrows. More details here
OpenSpace Agility. An engagement model and plan for Agile transformation that combines the use of Open Space Technology with the principles of the Agile Manifesto. Developed by Daniel Mezick. Click here for details.
No Limits Self Management. A complete framework for implementing enterprise-wide self-management at scale. Developed by Doug Kirkpatrick and documented in the book The No-Limits Enterprise: Organizational Self-Management in the New World of Work.
Prime/OS. The invitation-based engagement model template for introducing any kind of change into any organization. The foundation upon which OpenSpace Agility and OpenSpace Beta are built upon. Developed by Daniel Mezick. More information here
Inviting Vision. A method for defining enterprise-wide vision statements and executing on them. Incorporates concepts and principles from the Inviting Leadership in a clearly defined set of practices and procedures. Developed by Darren Terrell.
The Open Leadership Network is the worldwide certificating body for all of these Open Social Technologies.
