Joris Claeys posted in Association for Appreciative Inquiry-Philippines

David Cooperrider on appreciative inquiry as sustainable design factory!

David Cooperider, co-founder of Appreciative inquiry, invented the change management method known as appreciative inquiry (AI), an effective process to create group decisions that lead to actions for the highest possible good.

"The number one sustainability opportunity to affect every single issue, from clean streams and air to international relations, is the energy industry. We have the opportunity over the next 30 years to completely transition away from a fossil fuel economy, and that is the opportunity of a civilization.

And what I want to say at the end of my career is that we took part, we’re on track as a human family to eradicate grinding poverty within a decade or two and complete the transition to a clean renewable energy economy. An economy where we’ve combined the capacity of a smart grid and the internet with renewable energy, where every home and neighborhood could be a producer of energy, and where our energy costs would go down. Because right now, we are working against a tidal wave. Our energy costs will continue to skyrocket, and if we don’t make this transition in an effective way, the impact on our weather systems, on our international crises, on our military expenditures, on our economy.... We are in a contained depression, and it will get worse, because all the costs of our natural resources will go up and up.

We’re in an explosive, exciting, important time of exponential technological innovation, and now we need exponential social innovation to increase our capacity to collaborate and manage issues and transitions across system boundaries and industry boundaries. Our current energy debates, whether they be about coal or fracking, are missing the point. We need to think longer term. We need a grand strategy for America."