[MUSIC] As we wrap up this course on leading positive change through appreciative

inquiry, I'd like to shift our focus back to you as the individual leader, the person
trying on appreciative inquiry, adapting it in your daily work. And, particularly, I want
to shift from the idea of doing AI or adapting the four d cycle to work with people. I
want to talk about shifting from there to being AI. To really embracing some of the
fundamental ideas yourself, as an individual. Now we've talked about positive change
and let me start there for a moment. Why positive change? Isn't all change positive?
Isn't all change improving? It certainly is intended that way. Our colleagues at the
University of Michigan in their Positive Organization Scholarship Center, similar to
what I told you about the positive psychology movement, they've been changing their
questions over the last decade or so as well. So in studying organizations, instead of
just studying when organizations fail, they're trying to study when organizations
succeed. When change efforts are effective, why are they effective. And one of the
perspectives that they've come up with is this idea that for a long time mostly what
we’ve talked about in change cases, change management, change literature is the
move from what they call negative to normal. Decreasing a deficit from the norm. So
we have standards, we have goals that we've set for effectiveness, for efficiency, for
health, and so on. And so when we see that things are not at that level, then it's like a
deviance in the negative direction, a deviance away from the norm. So change is
about bringing things back. This is essential what continuous improvement is.
Continuous improvement is setting a target, the norm, what you want to achieve day-
to-day, on a daily basis. And then figuring out where you are, creating a metric so
that you can decrease this gap or continually improve toward this target. Now, one
thing that they tell you in continuous improvement is never change that target. Once
you've set it, you can't keep doing this because then you lose credibility with people.
It's like they're chasing target they can never reach. But what our colleagues at the
University of Michigan have pointed out is that the target you've set is the norm, it's
what you're hoping for on a consistent basis. Positive change is about moving in the
other direction. Positive deviants, deviating from the norm in the direction of the
exceptional. From affective to excellent, from good to great. From health, which
typically is defined as the absence of disease, to wellness, sustainable wellness. So
it's this idea that from the middle to the right is what we're really focusing on when we
talk about positive change. So what we've talked about in the course is that the
dynamic of changing from, let's say minus two to zero, is different from changing zero
to plus five. Instead of assuming that the dynamic is the same, that we use the same
tools that we would apply to restoration of something, eliminating disease for
example, that we would use the same tools to creating enduring health. No, they're
different sets of tools. There are different sets of approaches for the leader. Fixing
problems is not the same as elevating and leveraging strengths. There is a place to
fix problems, there's a role for that, but there's also a role for elevating strengths. And
to assume that if we just keep fixing problems we're going to get to the strength or
the positive end of the spectrum, is false. We're not. That's what we're seeing with
these strength based change theories and methods like appreciative inquiry. They're
helping us get to new places that just fixing problems hasn't been able to deal with.
So what are these dynamics? The positive deviance, deviating away from the norm
in the positive direction. This appreciative space we might call it, we've talked about
these at different points in the course. Balanced inquiry with advocacy, that in your
talk, in your daily conversations around work or around the family, there's a balance
between statement and question, between assertion and inquiry. There's this,
remember this imbalance ratio. Three, four, five times more affirming and elevating of
hope and positivity over disconfirming working in the deficit, despair language and
arena. It doesn't mean that you ignore the deficit it simply means that you work as
leader to create an environment where you are talking, asking questions that are
imbalanced three, four, five times as many positive anticipatory ideal future
orientation over negative. Connecting people to their positive core. So again, having
ways to discuss and explore strengths frequently on a periodic basis, helps create
the space for moving from the norm to the more positive dimensions. And then
finally, all of these things contribute to this idea you remember about the PEA, the
positive emotional attractor. We want to engage, we want to ask questions. We want
to create conversations with our people that invoke a positive emotional attractor. So
that the parasympathetic response triggers in and all this knowledge we now have
about the impact of positive emotions can come to bare. Now let's bring it down to
the personal level. What are some of the implications? This isn't in any prioritized
order. These are just different practical implications. Appreciative leaders see what
there is to value or appreciate in the situation. You intentionally look for, where's the
good here? Or where is there a potential for real value still, in the situation? You ask
intentionally positive questions. We've driven this point, I hope, firmly home by this
point in the course, that the way we frame our questions is fateful. Questions set
change in motion. So asking the intentionally positive question and orienting it toward
that topic, where we ideally really want to go, will ensure that the change begins to
head in that direction. Appreciative leaders engage and empower their people by
connecting them to their strengths. Not by telling them what their strengths are but by
engaging in conversation to explore, to surface, and in many cases reconfirm what
are best practices, what are strengths that are helping us when we are at our best.
Appreciative leaders connect stakeholders through storytelling. Again, whatever mix
of people you bring together around some issue or around an affirmative topic, you
begin the interaction, you begin the connection through storytelling. Do not start by
asking people what they wish for in the future or by asking them what they think
about the current situation, engage them, invite them to tell stories first. Then you can
probe into the stories for meaning, for underlying criteria of success and so on. You
can enliven your meetings by sharing positive stories. You can start meetings as a
way of checking in and getting people focused or refocused on the agenda that you
want to work on. You can enliven that by just going around the table and asking for
very quick short stories that are positive stories. Funniest thing you've seen at work,
the best thing you've seen at work since the last time we met. You don't analyze the
stories, they’re not long but they do two things, they create that PEA, which then you
can leverage in your meeting and they help people connect with each other, to get in
the room, in the moment now, as opposed to carrying something from wherever they
were prior to the meeting. And again this ratio, appreciative leaders create through
their questions the way they stage conversations, the way they run meetings. They
create at least a four to one imbalance of hope versus despair, in dialogue. An
imbalance of positive future orientation over negative future orientation. An
imbalance of excitement and enthusiasm in the dialogue over despair or deficit
orientation. [MUSIC]