- Interview by Jason Sayer
- Photographs by Freddie Ardley
Nick Osborne
Nick Osborne provides online resources in self-management, self-organisation and self-organising systems to help people work in new ways to cope with the challenges of today’s fast-changing world.
What do you do?
I help organisations run without managers. I have created a Learning Platform for Self-Organisation to help people understand and develop their abilities work together in new ways. I am also a partner with HolacracyOne which teaches a self-management practice, and am a partner with Evolution at Work which helps people to develop and thrive in self-organising environments. I work in schools too, with Learning Edge, teaching students about how their brains work and helping them to learn how to learn.
Why do you do it?
Our current efforts to figure out solutions to issues such as climate change, economic disparity and political polarisation aren’t working. It’s time for an upgrade in how we work, think, decide and live together.
How did you come to be doing what you’re doing?
I spent many years researching and experimenting with alternatives and different tools, methods and approaches to problem solving: from Edward de Bono’s thinking tools to Formal Consensus decision-making. I’ve also been involved in setting up ecovillages and have an MSc in Management Development and Social Responsibility. These provide me with a hefty toolkit I can use.
What’s the biggest challenge you face in trying to do your job?
Developing my own mental, emotional, linguistic and spiritual agility and flexibility to be able to authentically connect with people who see and experience the world in different ways. They say, ‘If you are going to be a bridge, then expect to be walked on’, and I feel like I have been walked on a lot!