Where to Learn More

The following short sampler of available materials on appreciative inquiry represents the cream of the crop from one reader’s perspective.

For reasons already mentioned, I think Whitney and Trosten-Bloom’s The Power of Appreciative Inquiry: A Practical Guide to Positive Change is currently the most important item in the AI bibliography. And anyone who wonders whether an appreciative approach is appropriate in religious, spiritual settings needs to read Susan Starr Paddock’s Appreciative Inquiry in the Catholic Church and have their fears allayed.

The most recent edition of Sue Hammond’s The Thin Book is an engaging nontechnical booklet that quickly and clearly introduces and sets the AI context for newcomers. If you need a brief introductory text—for a class or board of directors, for instance—you might want to use Cooperrider and Whitney’s even shorter 40-page summary, simply titled Appreciative Inquiry. It’s the best of many short versions.

As noted above, Watkins and Mohr’s book, Appreciative Inquiry: Change at the Speed of Imagination, was the first thorough textbook about AI. A perfect companion volume for a college or graduate course would be the new edition of Lessons from the Field, a book that quickly sold out its first edition and is now back in print. Lessons is a collaborative collection of stories and resources, including the essays by Mac Odell and Gregorio Banaga, Jr., mentioned above. The book surveys a number of the most successful AI projects here and abroad and has the largest AI bibliography in print.

Anyone wishing to swim in deeper water can turn to Appreciative Inquiry: Rethinking Human Organization toward a Positive Theory of Change. This dense anthology collects 18 essays exploring theoretical aspects of the discipline—heavy slogging if you haven’t been in a graduate seminar recently but important for the serious student. It includes Cooperrider and Srivastva’s historic 1987 essay, "Appreciative Inquiry in Organizational Life," which challenged the tenets of traditional organization development. "Positive Image, Positive Action: The Affirmative Basis of Organizing," which may be Cooperrider’s most important theoretical essay, and Gervase Bushe’s provocative "Five Theories of Change Embedded in Appreciative Inquiry" are included as well.

Two more recent books are helpful for leaders who have already been introduced to the discipline: The Appreciative Organization is a collaborative project shared by six of AI’s wisest elders. An Encyclopedia of Positive Questions, Vol. 1 is the first in a series, it is hoped, as people everywhere learn to craft powerful appreciative questions; questions for volume two are being solicited.

AI Practitioner: The International Newsletter of AI Best Practices, a quarterly, is the first periodical to be published about the discipline and is available only on the Web by subscription. Equally important, and free, is the AI listserv.³² The first Web site devoted to AI and religious leadership is www.clergyleadership.org. Founded by Rob Voyle, it includes some valuable resources (for example, appreciative evaluation tools) that can be downloaded.

Case Western Reserve University and Benedictine University offer graduate degrees in AI. The Taos Institute schedules ongoing workshops and publishes books about AI, three of which are included below. Another valuable resource is the Appreciative Inquiry Commons (online at ai.cwru.edu), a worldwide portal devoted to the fullest sharing of academic resources and practical tools on appreciative inquiry and the rapidly growing discipline of positive change.

32. ailist@business.utah.edu