Why do so many change programmes fail, and why do well-meant initiatives end up in a drawer after a few months? And how do you make sure people get energy from change instead of switching off?
More control or tighter deadlines rarely help. The answer often lies in how you approach the change. That’s where appreciative inquiry comes in: an approach that starts with the team’s strengths and only then turns to the problem. And it works.
Change without resistance
In many organisations change is still seen as something difficult. Something that “has to happen”, that you have to “bring people along” with, and that inevitably meets resistance. So what happens if you start the change with what already goes well? If you discover together where the energy is, what people are proud of and what they want to build on together?
That’s what appreciative inquiry does. It connects people, makes them stronger and gets them moving by building on what works, without pointing at what’s wrong.
What is appreciative inquiry?
Appreciative inquiry (in Dutch: waarderend onderzoek) is a positive, whole-system approach to organisational development. You look for what is valuable in a team or organisation and grow what works. The ambition and the strength of the system take centre stage, instead of the problem and the analysis of the complaint.
You can see it in the questions you ask. You leave the usual ones aside:
- What’s going wrong?
- Who’s responsible?
- How do we fix this?
Instead, you ask:
- When did it work?
- What gave you energy?
- What do we want to see more of together?
That shift makes a world of difference to how people take part, think and feel.
Why does this approach work?
Appreciative inquiry works because it sparks ownership, engagement and connection. People take part because they feel seen, because they’re allowed to dream and because they set the course together.
The approach gets the whole system moving, from the shop floor to management. When people talk to each other about their successes, their core values and their picture of the future, something remarkable happens: they rediscover what they share.
That brings more energy and enjoyment at work, better collaboration, concrete actions people stand behind, and behaviour that changes for good.
When do you use appreciative inquiry?
Appreciative inquiry works particularly well in situations like these:
- there’s friction in the team, and you don’t want yet another conflict analysis;
- a new manager is starting and there’s a need for a fresh look at how things are done;
- an organisation wants to know what its mission really means for behaviour on the shop floor;
- collaboration is sluggish, and nobody fancies yet another away day that leads nowhere;
- employees aren’t taking ownership and you want to turn that around in a positive way.
That doesn’t make it a “soft” or non-committal approach. You involve people in change without getting bogged down in resistance or meeting fatigue.
A five-step cycle to hold on to
Appreciative inquiry has a clear structure. We use a five-step cycle (in Dutch, the five V’s):
- Discover. What works well? What gives energy? When was this team at its best?
- Dream. What would it look like if we could make that success the norm?
- Design. What’s needed to turn that picture of the future into reality?
- Deliver. Small, concrete actions that people own.
- Embed. Build the new behaviour into structures, meetings and culture, so it sticks.
With this structure you talk about the future together, and you shape it together too.
From vision to behaviour
Many organisations have a mission and vision on paper and struggle with what they mean for how people work, meet, make decisions and behave. Appreciative inquiry helps with that translation. It makes shared values concrete and turns them into visible behaviour.
It doesn’t produce new rules or new policy. It produces agreements on behaviour that the team made itself and carries itself. That’s where the strength of lasting change lies. We often run this kind of programme as team development, or as part of culture development.
“But we’ve tried so much already…”
You hear it a lot. Teams are tired of change, or sceptical about yet another new approach. In education, for example, more than six in ten teachers want a period of calm before the next round of innovation. That’s exactly when appreciative inquiry works. Taking part feels safe, because you start from positive experiences. It inspires, because people get to say what they dream of. And it’s results-focused, because it ends in action people stand behind.
Above all, people do it themselves. The consultant facilitates; the team leads.
See for yourself how it works
Reading about it is a start. The value is in doing it: having different conversations from the ones you’re used to, and looking for strength where you’d otherwise find frustration.
In our programmes we use it in two ways. In a SOAR session we link appreciative inquiry to strategy: what are our Strengths, where are our Opportunities, what are our Aspirations and which Results do we want to achieve? That works well with management teams, change teams or project groups that want to sharpen their course. And sometimes a programme starts with an introduction to the principles and methods, for HR, team coaches and managers looking for a fresh, active way to work on culture, collaboration and change. Both are part of a larger programme; we don’t offer them separately. How we build sessions like these into a programme is described under workshops and development programmes. Arrange a meeting if you want to know what would suit you.
Appreciative inquiry is no miracle cure. It is a strong alternative to the way we often deal with change. It invites people to take ownership, share their perspectives and build together on what works.