Apply today - accepting applications for the fall 2010 cohort

Become an instrument of innovation, renewal, health and wholeness for the world through the OSR Master's Program.

The OSR Master's Program delivers an innovative curriculum that prepares adult learners to design and lead systemic organizational change.

Apply today!  Accepting applications for the fall of 2010.

For more info contact:  Paula Brekke, brekkep@seattleu.edu

Power and Love: How to Create New Social Realities - OSR Annual Conference

Adam Kahane and Jeff Barnum, author and illustrator of Power and Love will be featured as Plenary Leaders at the OSR Annual Conference, Saturday, June 19.

Why do some groups of people manage to solve complex problems, while others stumble or fall?

The two methods most frequently employed to solve our toughest social problems—either relying on violence and aggression, or submitting to endless negotiation and compromise—are fundamentally flawed. This is because the seemingly contradictory drives behind these approaches—power, the capacity to achieve one's purpose, and love, the will to unite with others—are actually complementary.  As Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. put it, “Power without love is reckless and abusive, and love without power is sentimental and anemic.” Is there another way?

For the last twenty years Adam Kahane, Jeff Barnum, and their colleagues at Reos Partners have pioneered a form of “social creativity” around the world that has enabled businesses, organizations, and governments to make progress on tough and vital challenges: food security, health care, economic development, judicial reform, peace making, child protection, climate change.  In this extraordinary event they will draw on their experience to describe their approach, their learning, and the results they’ve achieved.

Join us for an amazing day of learning featuring Adam and Jeff and over 20 workshop presenters featuring theater, music, poetry, visual art and more.

osr-nw.org/conference

Experience Adam Kahane and Jeff Barnum, plenary leaders at the annual conference

The Arts and Change: Creative Frames for Organizations

Organization Annual Conference

Saturday, June 19, 2010

Seattle University, Student Center

Using the writing and illustrations from the new book, Power and Love: A Theory and Practice of Social Change, Adam Kahane, author, and Jeff Barnum, illustrator, will illuminate how we can structure and shape our organizations through the arts. Adam and Jeff are members of Reos Partners, an international organization dedicated to supporting and building capacity for innovative collective action in complex social systems.

Read about Reos Partners Projects

Register today!

Reserve your place today for the annual conference!

Tickets are now on sale! 

The Arts and Change: Creative Frames for Organizations

Saturday, June 19, 2010

Seattle University

Plan to attend the 5th annual OSR conference featuring the theme of the arts and organizational change. Over 20 workshop presenters will represent theater, music, poetry, visual arts and more to explore the emerging field of the arts in the design and leadership of change.

Registration price of $99 includes a fabulous days of learning and a copy of Jeff Kahane's new book, Power and Love and continental breakfast and lunch.

More information

Help plan the 2010 OSR annual conference

Are you searching for a way to reconnect with your OSR cohort and other Alumni? Join a wonderful team of grads to design and prepare for the annual 2010 Alumni Conference. Additionally we are looking for help with the new Alumni Communications group.

Activities for both groups will begin in January with a traditional OSR greeting and check-in. Teams will be gathered for the Alumni Conference by OSR 13 grad Steve Byers, while Ron McEnulty OSR 14 grad, will gather the new Alumni Communications group.  Please respond to either or both chairs for additional information on these activities at:

Steven Byers phone 360 259-0340 (mobile)
Ron McEnulty  phone 425-213-4322

Both groups would enjoy your participation and willingness to serve these OSR alumni programs.

Conference resources and downloads

Conference program for downloading, .pdf 2.87MB
Workshop handouts for downloading, .pdf 6.2MB

Four rules to a simple life

By David Baum

This text is the basis of Baum's keynote for the 2009 Annual Conference, minus the juggling and fire-eating that are difficult to recreate on a Web page.

The psychiatrist Scott Peck wrote, "The paradox of life is that we are all trapped inside of a box, and the instructions on how to get out of the box are written on the outside of the box." Life can be a complicated process and figuring out a way through is often tough and confusing.

In a way, we are all looking for the “owners manual,” fumbling around in complexity wishing we could make things clearer and more direct. It doesn’t need to be this way. Angeles Arrien, a cross-cultural anthropologist, has spent a lifetime studying this subject and created four rules that can be found in many cultures world wide. I have found them invaluable, and know that whenever I am in a self-made pickle it is because I have violated one of them.

They are not complex. There is a reason for this. What Gandhi called, “means to ends consistency.” He advised that one's journey must match the destination. Thus, if you wanted a simple life, then a complicated process contradicts the goal. A simple life means you must use simple rules. But be warned. Simple does not mean easy. It just means clear, and without equivocation.