Product Overview

In our lives, problems pose as our greatest opportunities. In this context, appreciative inquiry creates an environment that promotes dialogue and excites imagination. The conversations that take place one-to-one, in small groups, and in larger circles serve to build trust and strengthen relationships allowing for the disruption of old patterns of thinking. This opens the way for new insights, new hope and therefore new possibilities. We are better able to reach for these new possibilities when we are mindful of the successes we have had and of the strengths in our system. The best of our past gives us new confidence permitting us to be bold in our aspirations. This article illustrates the ideas and approach of appreciative inquiry and demonstrates that our biggest challenge as well as opportunity lies in developing a platform for co-creating a new plane of understanding, a more interesting place, where individual passion and collective commitment, fuelled by a bold and expanded image of what is possible join forces in pursuit of the ideal.

Learning Objectives

Describes the technique of appreciative inquiry. Discusses a positive model of managing change in organizations. Provides examples of applications of appreciative inquiry. Discusses the strengths and weaknesses of appreciative inquiry.