Most of the work is invisible
If you attend an Open Space, you mostly see the facilitator in the first half hour. After that, the facilitator seems to disappear. That is no accident. Most of the work already happened in the weeks before.
Together with the client I look for the burning question: one participants want to answer themselves. And we agree the givens: what has already been decided, what is not up for discussion, where the boundaries are.
In the Open Space community this is a firm rule: an Open Space has a theme, and is bounded by givens. That sounds like the opposite of freedom. It is the condition for it. People who know where the boundaries are dare to use the space between them. People who don’t, wait.
Who asks the question: the sponsor
Every Open Space has a sponsor: the person or organisation standing behind the urgent question and the invitation. Often that is the organiser, but not always. If the organiser is not the sponsor, it has to be clear beforehand who is. With a specific theme, it works best when the sponsor briefly introduces the question to the group. After that, the facilitator opens the space.
Opening the space
On the day, everything starts in a large circle. In my training I practised exactly that moment: opening the space, known in the community as walking the circle: in the tradition of the method, the facilitator walks around the circle. I explain the central question, the four principles and the Law of Two Feet. Then I invite anyone who wants to raise something to come to the centre.
What happens next is not something I can arrange. Someone stands up, writes a question on a sheet and says out loud why it matters. A second person follows. At the LeSS conference in Amsterdam, in 2025, with around 100 participants, the board was full within ten minutes.
Doing as little as possible
An old rule from the community puts it sharply: every time the facilitator does something for the group, that is something the group no longer does for itself. I take that rule literally. I do not steer the content. I do not rescue a session that goes quiet. I do not summarise what a group can summarise itself.
“The role of the facilitator is to do the opening (as short as possible) and then get out of the way.”From the proceedings of the Virtual Open Space on Open Space 2015
What I do is hold the space: physically, in time, and in the atmosphere. I keep the agreements on time and place. The community calls the ideal being fully present and at the same time invisible.
What the facilitator does for the rest of the day
After the opening you might wonder what the facilitator still does. Mainly this: I guard that the principles are respected. That does not mean the whole day is positive and cheerful. A good Open Space carries tension. Topics that people disagree on come to the table. That is exactly the value: in ordinary meetings they stay in the corridors.
What I watch closely is power. An Open Space has no hierarchy, but between people there is always an informal one: leadership, experience, whoever speaks loudest. That is not wrong. An Open Space is a self-regulating system. I name what I observe, but that does not mean I intervene.
Closing, and what comes after
An Open Space closes in the same circle where the day opened. What the group discussed is then in the harvest. What happens with it, I already discuss during preparation, because otherwise the day stays a good moment without a sequel.
I do not always manage that. After at least one engagement I never heard what happened with the outcome. I wrote about that in what an Open Space actually produces.
Why this matters when you look for a facilitator
A good Open Space depends less on what the facilitator does on the day, and more on what happened before it. So do not only ask how someone runs a day. Ask how they find the question and the givens with you.
How I go about it: the approach in five steps and the shapes an Open Space can take.