I’ve enjoyed posting about the assumptions of Appreciative Inquiry. In this video, I explain how I utilized this method at the Old Hickory Church of Christ. During the time of my research, we were looking for a way to connect with a younger generation. With a lot of tension in the area at the time between generations over things like worship styles, I was concerned with how we could find an innovative method that would not be met with some resistance.
Appreciative Inquiry helped me to discern what changes I could implement, and how to do this in a way that I knew everyone would support. If you’d like to learn about how the method works, this is from some of my personal experience. In the video I share:
- Some background about the context where I was doing research.
- The way I went about using Appreciative Inquiry among some of the members to discern what areas were safe for innovation.
- How I created anticipation about the new Faith Village Program.
- How in my absence the congregation took ownership of the vision and grew the program into an excellent community-focused ministry.
Here is the primary book from which I learned about this method and how it can lead to positive changes and renewed missional efforts at churches. Though I used the first edition (Well worth the price for which you can purchase it used), this second edition has a lot of exciting updates, especially in terms of case studies and missional components:
Other posts about Appreciative Inquiry you may enjoy:
- Introduction to Appreciative Inquiry
- #1 – In every organization, some things work well
- #2 – What we focus on becomes our reality
- #3 – Asking questions influences the group being questioned
- #4 – People are more confident moving forward when they can bring along parts of the past
- #5 – When we bring parts of the past into the future, they should be the best parts
- #6 – It is important to value differences
- #7 – Organizations are like plants. They grow toward what gives them life
- #8 – The language we use creates our reality
- #9 – In a change process, outcomes should be useful
- #10 – In a change process, all steps should be collaborative
- Appreciative Inquiry and Congregational Change: A Case Study
- Dr. Jason Bybee’s use of Appreciative Inquiry in learning about how Discipleship works