Week 2 Reflections: Meeting people where they are
Since listening to Cheri from Accountability Lab speak on the incredible work that they do, I have been doing a lot of thinking about what it really means to meet people where they are and how this looks/feels in different contexts.
For my futures project, I hope to use a method called Appreciate Inquiry to uncover the key underpinnings that drive positive change. Sharp, Dewar and Barrie (2016) explain provide a nice summary of the Appreciative Inquiry approach to deliberation:
“Appreciative inquiry (AI) is part of the extended family of action research approaches. It is a developmental process rooted in the idea that our realities or social worlds are created by the language, interactions and relationships amongst us, including non-verbal communication and actions. AI relies on the idea that in every society, organisation, family or group, something works, at least some of the time. An appreciative approach aims to discover what gives life to a system, what energises people and what they most care about, to produce both shared knowledge and motivation for action. The deliberately affirmative assumptions of AI about people, organisations and relationships are a stark contrast to more traditional forms of research that seek to analyse or diagnose problems (Ludema, Cooperrider and Barrett, 2001).”
Research tends to show that Appreciative Inquiry’s generativity allows for people to feel personal and collective power (Whitney & Bloom, XXX) and makes them more likely to see possibilities for positive alternative futures that did not occur to them before (Busche, 2007). If Appreciative Inquiry as an approach is as others claim, then it may be considered that if applied correctly, it meets people where they are emotionally. But is this enough? Should I also be thinking more about meeting people where they are physically, like in the image that Cheri showed of the women sitting under a tree?
A final note/food for thought
I’ve been thinking a bit about non-traditional forms of communication, deliberation and advocacy this week too. Whereas I feel like it could be a powerful and accessible way of reaching people, I also wonder whether it always works? Are some people more likely to be sceptical of non-traditional approaches than others? What can be done to address this- perhaps ensuring there’s end to end transparency?
I had not heard of this methodology before . One bit of the quote resonated for me in particular, “in every society, organisation, family or group, something works, at least some of the time.” I been thinking about this idea a lot and how negative behaviors/outcomes tends to discount positives more easily than the other way round. I’ve been working on actively find opportunities to use ‘and’ instead of ‘but’ when analyzing the positives and negatives of things we discuss/read about in this course, as well as every day life. It helps me to notice and recognize what is working, what progress we’ve made, what hope there is. But I had not thought about this in the framework of research and building the narrative for the future, so thank you.
Hi Maryam!
I’ve been reading back through the blogs and the methodology that you discuss is something that is so relevant to where my project is at right now. I’m really stuck on your final note. How can we almost “legitimize” (in a way) a newer non-traditional approach in the eyes of the public? (for an example). Is this something that comes with time? or is the a way to expedite the adoption rate?
In any way, thank you for sharing such a cool methodology!