In Memoriam
Harrison Owen is President of H.H.Owen and Co. His academic background and training centered on the nature and function of myth, ritual and culture. In the middle ’60s, he left academe to work with a variety of organizations including small West African villages, urban (American and African) community organizations, Peace Corps, Regional Medical Programs, National Institutes of Health, and Veterans Administration. Along the way he discovered that his study of myth, ritual and culture had direct application to these social systems. In 1979 he created H.H.Owen and Company in order to explore the culture of organizations in transformation as a theorist and practicing consultant. Harrison convened the First International Symposium on Organization Transformation, and is the originator of Open Space Technology. He is the author of Spirit: Transformation and Development in Organizations, Leadership Is, Riding the Tiger, Open Space Technology: A Users Guide (Second Edition. Berrett-Koehler), The Millennium Organization, Tales From Open Space (editor), Expanding Our Now: The Story of Open Space Technology (Berrett-Koehler), The Spirit of Leadership (Berrett-Koehler), The Power of Spirit: How Organizations Transform (Berrett- Koehler) and The Practice of Peace (Human Systems Dynamics Institute).
Client Engagements and Presentations: Owens/Corning Fiberglas, Procter and Gamble, Dupont, Eastern Virginia Medical Authority, Shell/Netherlands, Shell Tankers (Dutch), Shell/Canada, The French Ministry of Telecommunications (PTT), The US Forest Service, The US Internal Revenue Service, Jonathan Corporation, The US Army, Ikea (Sweden), Statoil (Norway), SAS Airlines, Young Presidents Organization, City University Business School (London), Gronigen University Business School (Holland), Taj Hotel Group (India), Congresso De Desarrollo Organizacional (Mexico), PepsiCola (Venezuela), National Education Association, Toronto-Dominion Bank (Canada), American Management Systems, American Society of Training and Development, Scott Paper, TELCEL/Venezuela, The American Society of Association Executives, The Presbyterian Church (USA), The Accor Hotel Group (France), Ermetek Corp (South Africa), The Union of International Associations (Belgium), Rockport Shoes, Corporate Express, The World Bank, AT&T, IBM, USWEST, The Organization Development Network, Lucent Technologies, Park-Davis Pharmaceuticals, Phillip Morris, and The Bank of Montreal. To read more about Harrison, visit his personal site.
Academy Articles by Harrison Owen
- Learning for Free
- Endings and New Beginnings: A Different Kind of Plant Closing
- Sustaining Spirit with Structure
- How is the Spirit?
- A Transformative Moment …Now
- The Business of Business is Learning
