Appreciative Inquiry
By Jeannette Butterworth.
From Mountain Views, March 2004.
Based on (among other sources) Appreciative Inquiry, by David Cooperrider and Diana Whitney.During 2003 and 2004, CPC conducted a strategic planning process based on the concept of Appreciative Inquiry, guided by Asheville consultant Judy Futch. The process involved more than forty interviews and resulted in a strategic plan which will be approved by the Board this spring.
Appreciative Inquiry (AI) is a valuable technique that grassroots organizations can use to create a planning process that includes the voices of many people, and incorporates a wide range of perspectives and experiences. More than just a tool, Appreciative Inquiry is a perspective, a way of building on the positive aspects of a person, an organization or a situation to create an even more positive future.
Appreciative Inquiry assumes that organizations are like living, breathing organisms that are healthiest when they are focused on their positive life-giving aspects. Every human system has something that works right—things that give it life when it is vital, effective, and successful. AI begins by identifying these positive elements and connecting to them in ways that heighten energy, sharpen vision, and inspire action for change.
Appreciative Inquiry is also based on the premise that groups, organizations, and even communities grow in the direction of what they persistently ask questions about (i.e., where they focus their energy). So an organization which inquires into problems will keep finding problems, but an organization which attempts to appreciate what is best in itself will discover more and more that is good. It can then use these discoveries to build a new future where its best qualities become common practice.
The appreciative approach involves four phases:
1. The discovery phase asks the question, ‘What gives life to the organization?’ and explores people’s stories of what the organization looks like at its best. The discovery phase has four steps: A. Choose a positive topic as the focus of inquiry, for instance, identifying the ‘compelling future’ of the organization. B. Create questions to explore people’s most positive experiences; for example: “Tell me a story that highlights your best experience with this organization. What made that the best? What attitudes or values were demonstrated that made it memorable for you?” C. Board members, staff, or volunteers use these questions to conduct structured interviews with a broad range of the organization’s stakeholders—participants, donors, foundations, volunteers, board and staff members, etc. D. When the interviewers come back together, they share the stories they heard and identify common themes.
2. The dreaming phase creates a vision of what might be. This phase is often a large group conversation where the interviewers are encouraged to envision the organization as if the peak moments discovered in the ‘discovery’ phase were the norm rather than the exception. The goal is to create a shared vision of the future: an inspiring, provocative picture of what the organization could be, at its best.
3. In the design phase, a small team is empowered to go away and design innovative ways to create the future that was defined during the dreaming phase. Their task is to determine what should be, and often involves creating specific goals and objectives that make the larger plan more concrete.
4. The delivery phase wraps up the process by determining how to adjust, create, or improvise the organization’s current direction, to work towards the future that has been dreamed and designed. During this final phase, the changes are actually put into practice, and the organization’s ideal future begins to become a reality.
Copyright © 2004 Center for Participatory Change
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