IGNITER

We were fortunate enough to have Duane Nikull of Adobe do a Duane’s World episode on the OpenEverything Retreat at Hollyhock.  Another fun perspective.

Enjoy.

Yesterday’s, NYTimes article on Union Square Ventures (USV) entitled “A New Kind Of Venture Capital Firm” is an interesting read and I’m glad to see the media beginning to pick up on this.

I’ve been following USV for a whlie now and actually interviewed Brad Burnham in preparation for a session at the Open Everything Retreat on Investing in Open. They seem to have a knack for investing in webtech ventures like Twitter and Wesabe that have models that can be deeply disruptive to the systems they are taking on and where the question of how they are going to make money from them is far from answered. And now they’re turning more of their attention to conventionally ‘social’ issues including education and the environment.

Coming off my latest exploration of the social venture capital sector, I’m looking forward to seeing USV coming into this space – and I don’t think it’s much of a stretch. Investments like Twitter and Wesabe are not too dissimilar from making investments in social change and innovation. Both are venturing toward systems level change – and come with a high degree of complex ambiguity.

At the same time, we are beginning to see a new mode of organization taking shape that challenges how ventures are built and therefore how we invest in them. Where all of these things come together is where I’m betting we are going to find some deep innovations on the new kind of venture capital firm I think USV and others are all working their way towards.

In the meatime, if you’ve encountered – or are thinking of – any innovations in this area please pop them in the comments or over in the public wiki on ‘Investing and Open‘. I’m playing with some ideas myself and will be adding them in there and here on this blog as they develop.

Reflections at Hollyhock

It’s been almost a week since the OpenEverything retreat and the reverberations continue. Heading into it, not having any roots in the open-source community, I was technically the biggest noob on the convening team. At the same time, what drew me into the meme and the event was a sense that something bigger was going on and that that something was rooted in a set of ideals and a drive for the practical that resonated with my core and my life experiences.

On the other side of the event I’m more clear than ever that ‘open’ is not something new but rather is reflective of a powerful shift in our culture, driven by technology and circumstance, that is fundamentally restructuring the systems of our society. A shift that is also at play in the social change and ecological sustainability movements as much as it is in the Open movement.

David Eaves talks about ‘open’ as a social movement which it certainly is. What excites me is that at it’s core it’s also part of the movement of our society toward a more just a sustainable state – a movement that’s based on a common set of ideals that transcends meme, sector, or method. A movement that works the tensions between ideals and practical. A movement of people that recognize themselves as interdependent parts of everything from their project to their community to humanity etc.

This is what has me so interested and where I hope people rally – around the thing that is unifying – the thing that represents the change in course our society so desparately needs. For me, this is coming out through contributions to the wiki – Open Organizations and Investing and Open – and a continuation of my work ‘venturing on the frontiers’ (which I’ll be sharing more on this site in the weeks to come.

And what about you? Do you feel this shift underway? How’s it showing up? How’s it changing you? What does it mean for you, for us, for humanity?

Well the OpenEverything Retreat turned out to be great event with over 30 participants and some great output. The Investing in Open Session brought together Helen King from the Shuttleworth Foundation, Joel Solomon from Renewal Partners, and Paul Biondich from OpenMRS. For the highlights check out the notes from the session and for those who want to dig a little deeper and contribute to the conversation there’s now a open exploration on Investing and Open in the Mapping Open section of the OpenEverything wiki.

Dive in and help shape this space.

The OpenEverything retreat is coming up and in prep I’ve setup a wiki to begin exploring attributes and examples of Open Organizations and practices for/what’s different with Investing in Open.

Have some thoughts? Jump in here.

So what does ‘open’ mean for ‘venturing’ and venturing on ‘the frontiers’.

From some prior definitions, venturing is process of creating and evolving a venture, where a venture is an agreement among people to do things in service of a purpose and according to a set of values. More simply it’s about the process of organizing resources (social, financial, and human capital) toward realizing a certain intent.

If ‘open’ really is about a new mode of organization, then it is central to the process of venturing. It will inevitably impact every venture, the leadership and culture required, and the way in which we go about it.

Where strategy has been a dominant management driver in the past 3 decades, design will require greater attention. Conventionally, the control of financial and intellectual capital allowed organizations to directly control action and influence outcomes. In open, social and human capital are more dominant factors. They are also inherently less controllable which means we have to pay more attention to the design of systems versus control of action to influence outcomes and fulfil the organization’s purpose.

If this shift to ‘open’ is truly a product of the evolution of our society, as I believe it is, then this is inescapably important.

Furthermore, ventures that are themselves focused on the evolution of our society toward a just and sustainable state have to pay particular attention to open. These frontiers are necessarily about dealing at the edges of our current systems and structures – the turbulent space where ‘open’ is most effective.

Pulling this together – venturing on the frontiers requires a focus on:

• social and human capital
• a shift in culture, values, mindset, and leadership
• systems design

That said, this doesn’t mean it’s time to throw the baby out with the bathwater. Strategy is still a useful tool, and we are still in the midst of a culture dominated by the conventional mode of organization. What it does mean though is that the compatibility of our underlying organizational culture, values, mindset, and leadership will determine the ability to make the most of convention in context of where we are going.