Ask and You Shall Receive

We’ve all heard the scripture reference “Ask and you shall receive”. It turns out this works for credit unions as well. In 2003, Harvard business shared an interesting article on a organization theory called Appreciative Inquiry (AI).

It’s a simple concept, really: The positive questions you ask will determine the successful solutions you find.

It’s simple, but so incredibly salient.  

AI attempts to use a structured inquiry process that starts with asking positive questions and then envisions a positive future. In doing this, organizations, people and plans can capitalize on existing potential.

Contrast this with the ever-present strategy of “problem-solving”. Often times, organizational development and strategic planning can be focused on asking questions like: “what do we need to fix?” or “what are our problems?”

AI is different. It asks “what can we do better that we’re already doing?” and “what are our current successes and how can we improve them?”

Asking different questions results in finding different answers.

The AI model has four steps:

1. DISCOVER: The identification of organizational processes that work well.
2. DREAM: The envisioning of processes that would work well in the future.
3. DESIGN:  Planning and prioritizing processes that would work well.
4. DESTINY: The implementation of the proposed design.

AI proves to us that what we ask for we get. If we ask how to be different, we will find those answers. If we ask how to serve the overlooked, we will find ways to do so. It also tells us if we spend our time focusing on all we’ve done wrong in our organization, that’s what will come to the surface.

Behind our closed conference doors, what questions have we been asking?  

And is our current consumer awareness crisis, shrinking margins, and blurred cu value proposition in some ways a reflection of us asking the wrong questions and receiving the wrong answer?

Have we accidentally sought and found a few wrong answers:

·         In our service approach?

·         In our lending?

·         In the members we pursue and recruit?

·         In the marketing strategies we employ?

·         In the look, feel, and experience of the brands we’ve built?

What if we asked a completely different set of questions, focusing on our current successes?  What would our outcome be?

As we move into 2012 planning and preparation, let’s bring to the table the right questions. And let’s appreciatively inquire with our members-owners, too. 

Most importantly, let’s remember to dream big and dream positively.