leading from behind: reconciling my discomfort with notions of "leadership" through Open Space Technology & Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit
My interest was piqued by the idea of Open Space Technology (OST) when Anne first introduced the concept to our class. Typically applied in large conference settings, the desired outcome of OST is self-organizing adults operating within a loosely structured form of chaos. The primary principles that help govern a productive learning environment within OST are quite similar in scope to Inuit notions of leadership found in Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit (IQ), a traditional code of ethics that guides Inuit behavior and value systems. Both of these frameworks provide a lens through which to analyze notions of leadership; an area that has been of particular interest to me throughout the semester.
This is especially related to the ways in which I consciously and unconsciously express leadership in my role as coordinator and group facilitator, while fleshing out my discomfort with finding myself in rather commanding roles.
In the following sections, I will illuminate the connections between these two distinct yet similar considerations of leadership as they communicate a set of my own best practices as coordinator and facilitator for the Pangnirtung Field School. The primary principles that signify leadership and are shared between OST and IQ include a) a higher common purpose, b) a willingness to work together and c) a basic level of maturity and self-mastery.
The 2012 Jane Glassco Arctic Fellows released a publication titled “Sapiliqtailimaniq: Becoming Resourceful, Resilient, Rooted Leaders”, which explores the theme of leadership as expressed by northern Indigenous leaders. Unsurprisingly, the researchers found that northern leaders expressed a nagging discomfort with the term “leader” and were unlikely to identify themselves as such (“Becoming”, 2012). The researchers decided to reframe their research question to extend the notion of leader as someone who “contributes positively to their community” and someone who reveals a deep investment to social cohesion (“Becoming”, 2012). For Inuit, expressed leadership is realized when one embodies the IQ principle pijitsirarniq: the concept of serving, which requires a high measure of maturity and wisdom (Arnakak, 2002).
Likewise, OST proponent and conference facilitator Michael Linfield has outlined that a level of personal maturity and self-mastery is required of those participating in OST-style conferences insofar as the flow in a largely unstructured environment requires that the facilitator is “not fixed in their opinions of how things should be done” (Linfield, 1995). Relatedly, one’s ability to be adaptable and resilient in the face of abrupt change is held in high regard to the Inuit I know.
OST’s second and third principles require the participant’s inherent willingness to work together and sharing a higher common purpose. In both cases, the facilitator may strive to regard difference of opinion as a positive force that contributes to horizontal cohesion of the group. In IQ, these principles combine in the form of piliriqqatigiingniq, the concept of collaborative relationships and working together for a common purpose (Arnakak, 2002). Both of these ideas privilege the wellbeing of the larger group over individual thriving, wherein leadership is a shared endeavor. Both OST and IQ demand a basis of respectful relationships in order for consensus building among the group to emerge.
Concept of Self-Organizing in Pangnirtung
* To use as a guiding framework in designing the Group Guidelines in Week Two
Pijitsirarniq: Concept of Serving
The alignment of hearts & minds creates horizontal cohesion.
What is the collective intention of our group?
What is our common higher purpose?
What components will help bind the social fabric of our group?
Key here is the understanding that each person has a contribution to make and is valued contributor to the community
Piliriqatigiigniq: Concept of Collaborative Relationships & Working Together for a Common Purpose
Takes the form of shared leadership
Key here is the importance of the group over the individual
Value strong relationship & consensus
Aajiiqatigiingniq: Consensus-Decision Making
Strong communication skills
Strong belief in shared goals
Think & act collaboratively
OST’s “Law of Two Feet” dictates that you are personally responsible for your own experience (Lindfield, 1995). No authority figure is going to tell you what to do, and certainly not I. This is not my desired mode of operation. I may ask for your help when I need it, and I may even make a strong suggestion for you to do something if I feel you haven’t pulled your own weight, but it’s rare that it comes to this.
Under this framework, there is no one to blame if things are not going as well as you’d like them to. The choice and the power to change things is entirely yours, and as a group, each of us are invested in maintaining the strength of overall cohesion within the group, because is one person isn’t happy then we’re all along for the same ride.
Lindfield highlights an important idea about what happens to the role of the facilitator in an OST setting once other people become comfortable taking the reigns and that is what he deems as “holding the space” (Lindfield, 1995). This is something that really resonated with my role as coordinator. Even in my perceivably “off” moments or in times of apparent lull in responsibility, I am always required to be fully present because new challenges enter can arise in a heartbeat. I see now, however, that peace of mind and preventative burn-out requires that I relinquish control even more than I have in the past, allowing things to happen around me without feeling compelled to solve problems as they’re presented to me.
This I see now is the job of the group as a collective unit, and can be addressed in the circle. It is in both my own and the larger group’s best interest to turn the responsibility back on them so a consensus may be achieved. This also echoes the ethic of non-interference that Inuit exercise with adults as well as children. Though sometimes rendered overly permissive by Western standards, the ethic maintains “respect for every human being's independence” which often regards “instructing, coercing or attempting to persuade another person as undesirable behaviour” (“Aboriginal”, 2012).
