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[00:00:00] Announcer: This is the Build A Vibrant Culture Podcast, your source for the strategies, systems, and smarts you need to turn possibility into purpose. Every week we dive into dynamic conversations as our host, Nicole Greer, interviews leadership and business experts. They're here to shed light on practical solutions to the challenges of personal and professional development. Now, here's your host, a professional speaker, coach and consultant Nicole Greer.
[00:00:33] Nicole: Welcome everybody to the Build A Vibrant Culture podcast. My name is Nicole Greer and they call me the Vibrant Coach. And today I don't have one, but two amazing ladies that are going to be joining me today. First I have Cheri Torres, if you roll your Rs, everybody. Okay. 'Cause she's married apparently to some amazing Latin man. We'll find out more about that. And then Jacqueline Stavros, with a heavy emphasis on the V are both here today. And look what they sent me in the mail. _Conversations Worth Having_, which is all about using Appreciative Inquiry to fuel productive and meaningful engagement. So they're going to explain all that.
[00:01:09] But let me tell you a little bit about why these ladies are qualified to teach us how to build a vibrant culture. Cheri is a PhD and co-founder and executive officer for CWH Institute, which stands for Conversations Worth Having. Write that down. And she helps individuals and teams and entire systems unlock their potential through the power of communication with decades of experience in education, business, and community development. Cheri specializes in professional development and whole system --don't miss this-- culture change using Appreciative Inquiry, one of the most widely adopted approaches for positive transformation. So we're going to talk all about that. Let me tell you about Jacqueline who goes by Jackie with a heavy emphasis on the V Stavros. She a passion for working with others to create purpose and meaningful results for positive change. So please don't miss that, twice in a row we're talking about positive change. She is recognized for her creation of SOAR, capital S-O-A-R, a positive approach to strategic thinking, planning, conversations, and leading. She is a professor and management consultant in the College of Business and Information Technology at Lawrence Technological University up in Michigan. In my old stomping grounds from when I was 18 years old, that's where she's at. She teaches one of the most popular courses on Principles of Management, where the students learn how to best manage themselves and others. 'Cause hello. You can't manage the business if you're not managing yourself. All right, so I have these two amazing women here. I'm so glad you're here. Welcome to the show.
[00:02:44] Cheri Torres: Thank you. It's a joy to be here.
[00:02:47] Jackie Stavros: I love your energy. Thank you, Nicole.
[00:02:49] Nicole: Oh, you're welcome. Listen, because here's what I know. This whole thing about building a culture is about energy and number two, about positive energy. So my first question for you ladies would be, could you please explain what Appreciative Inquiry is? It's in the subtitle, but I want everybody on my podcast to understand what Appreciative Inquiry is.
[00:03:10] Jackie Stavros: It's the other AI, it's the human AI. Yes. And it's really discovering the best of what was, what is and what's possible. So it's a strength-based approach to leading self and others, that focuses What's working well on your team? What's working well in the organization?
[00:03:30] Nicole: Mmm. I love that definition. I watched some video a hundred years ago about David Cooperrider, who is the gentleman who kind of put Appreciative Inquiry on the map. Do I have that right, ladies? Correct me if I'm wrong.
[00:03:41] Jackie Stavros: Yes,
[00:03:42] Nicole: Okay. And he was talking about how he went into like a hotel and was talking. Do you know that story? Will you kind of give us a story of Appreciative Inquiry?
[00:03:53] Jackie Stavros: So I met David, he was my professor back in 1995 and yes, long, long time ago in my dissertation chair. And the two stories he told is, um, he went into first the Cleveland Clinic to do a discovery on what was going on and what was going on well and focusing on the people. So the Cleveland Clinic was actually his first time where from that setting, the Appreciative Inquiry principles came to life through his dissertation, through his research. What's very interesting, attached to the Cleveland Clinic was a hotel back then, I think it was maybe a one or two star hotel, and they wanted to, if the Cleveland Clinic is a world class organization, how do we create that world class hotel? And what they did that was unique is they took the people who worked at the hotel to a five star hotel in Chicago, they put 'them on like a limo bus, took 'them from Cleveland to Chicago so that they could experience what is a five star hotel, what is it like, and so that they could be served by the people at the hotel. So that's the story of the hotel. That is now a beautiful hotel connected to the hospital. So, um, the outcome of his research on Appreciative Inquiry started with his dissertation at the clinic. And that's the hotel story.
[00:05:23] Nicole: Hmm. And as I remember it, they were very inspired by this activity and like, how did people go from one star to five star and it is all about what's possible instead of what's wrong around here ?Why are we a one star? Which is flipping the conversation and that's the kind of conversations that are worth having. Do I have my story right?
[00:05:41] Jackie Stavros: Yeah. Yes.
[00:05:42] Cheri Torres: You do.
[00:05:43] Nicole: Awesome. All right. Well here's the thing. You've got a quote in here, right in the preface, and it says, "Sometimes the greatest adventure is simply a conversation." And here's what I know. Every business, every organization, every culture, all stems from the quality of the conversations. So how did you come up with this idea of quote unquote Conversations Worth Having?
[00:06:03] Cheri Torres: Well, Jackie and I, when we first met, discovered that both of us were interested in bringing Appreciative Inquiry to the general public. That was back in 2005, and we decided to write a book together. At that time, Appreciative Inquiry was really this four D process for Discovery, Dream, Design and Destiny. And it was a way of organizations having conversations for positive change. And so we wrote dynamic relationships, trying to map human behavior to the four Ds, which people don't operate that way. So we published the book and it sold well, but it didn't really do what we wanted. And fast forward, about 10 years and Jackie said, let's do a second edition. And we both realized we couldn't do that book as a second edition because our thinking had grown from the four Ds to Appreciative Inquiry practices. And to make a long story short, Kohler publishers was very interested in publishing a book for the general public on Appreciative Inquiry. They liked what we sent them, but they felt it was too academic to reach the general public. And so our editor, who was also president of the company, said you more than two practices. I'd prefer you have one, 'cause people won't do more than two practices. You need some sort of a two by two grid to help people understand what it is you're talking about. And after many tries, you know, we knew the practices were going to be asking questions and using a positive frame. But it wasn't until Steve Piersante, our editor kept pushing back on us saying, Nope, that's not it. That's not it. That's not it. And we were like, tell us what it is.
[00:08:04] Nicole: Yeah if you'll just tell us, we can get on with the book.
[00:08:06] Cheri Torres: Right. And he said, I don't know what it is. I just know when it's not it. We kept trying to make it about relationships, and then finally at some point it surfaced on us. It was about our conversations that generate our relationships.
[00:08:21] Nicole: Oh.
[00:08:22] Cheri Torres: And then when we landed on that, Steve was like, that's it. Go forward.
[00:08:28] Jackie Stavros: Go write it.
[00:08:28] Cheri Torres: Go ahead and write the book. So that's how it emerged. And it wasn't until the book was published and I was working with a client about three months later, and I knew this cognitively, but suddenly in the middle of working, I was like, oh my goodness, everything is conversation. Everything.
[00:08:48] Nicole: 100%.
[00:08:49] Cheri Torres: Conversations in our heads, conversations between people, it's all conversation. And that's when I realized, oh my goodness, if we can be intentional with our conversations, we can change everything really rapidly. So that's how it emerged.
[00:09:07] Nicole: Okay. That's fantastic. So a conversation. I've got a little coaching certificate that I've used a lot of years, and we always used to tease apart like what's the difference between discussion, dialogue, conversation, a coaching conversation. There's all these little different pieces and parts. So talk a little bit more about what a conversation is. I know people are going, we know what a conversation is, but let's level set right there.
[00:09:33] Jackie Stavros: Sure. So Nicole, yeah, you have lots of certifications. That's quite impressive on your website.
[00:09:39] Nicole: I mean, you know, like, I just love to learn. I know you two are nerdy too, and you love it too.
[00:09:44] Cheri Torres: Yes, we do.
[00:09:45] Nicole: It's all good.
[00:09:46] Jackie Stavros: So let's start with the debate. The debate is, I have a point, you have a point, and a winner comes out of a debate. We've all seen debates. And then a discussion is we come together and we have a decision we have to make and we have an agenda, and we're going to be really focused on this discussion. Dialogue is a type of conversation that we may not have an agenda. We're not here to debate, but we're here to have a conversation. We're hoping that in this conversation, that it's definitely two ways and the outcome is we surface assumptions, you and I create a shared understanding, maybe it's about creating a possibility, and we're also trying to build trust in a conversation. As Cheri said, you're constantly in conversation in your mind, while you're driving to work, when you're on your smartphones. And right now we're having a conversation.
[00:10:44] Nicole: Mm. Yeah. And I think the best thing you said is this thing of a shared understanding. We're trying to get two brains on the same page, or to understand things in a way that can move things what? Forward. Absolutely. Yeah. All right. Well, on page 61, in the book, you have two simple appreciative practices, right? And so one is this thing of asking a generative question. Do I have that right?
[00:11:10] Jackie Stavros: Yes.
[00:11:11] Nicole: Okay. All right. So one of the things that, that I talk about all the time on the podcast, ladies, is I encourage people, you need to go get a little coaching certificate. I mean, that will change your leadership overnight, I think. But the language we used in my first coaching program was powerful questions. So will you share a little bit about the practice and what a generative question is?
[00:11:32] Cheri Torres: Sure. A generative question. The simplest way to say what it is, is that it comes from a place of genuine curiosity. That idea of before jumping to conclusions, before making up a story based upon a few facts, just pause, take a breath, and get curious. What don't I know about whatever's happening here? And to ask questions that do one of four things: they surface assumptions, whatever is invisible. So when we're talking, we've got lots of stuff going on behind us and underneath us and unconsciously driving us. And if we can surface what those things are, it helps us gain clarity and widen our view. And a generative question in general widens our view. So by asking questions like could you tell me more about that please? Or, when you say that, what exactly do you mean? And a group might even say, what assumptions are we making that aren't clear for us right here? Are there rules we're following that we don't intend to be following or we don't need to? The second thing a generative question does is it creates shared understanding, like asking people how do you see it? What would you like to have happen? If the best of all worlds could happen, you know, what would it look like for you? And you can also create shared understanding around a problem or an issue. So what exactly is the issue we're looking at? Is that the problem or is that a symptom? What are the outcomes? What's the result of what's happening? How does it ripple out? And then once you have shared understanding and everything up on the table, a generative question helps to generate new knowledge. So how did you do that at your last organization? How do we bring in or just in the dialogue back and forth, suddenly everybody goes, oh, oh. And all of a sudden new information drops in. And then the fourth thing that a generative question does is it creates possibilities. So before diving into solve a problem, asking questions that really widen the screen and create divergent thinking so that you have a lot more options for creating resolution as you move forward together.
[00:14:01] Nicole: Mm. So good. And I'm just sitting here thinking, what if every meeting that happened today on Monday was full of generative questions? We would have a whole new business week ahead of us that we wouldn't have otherwise. Right?
[00:14:14] Cheri Torres: Yes, but can just one thing there also?
[00:14:17] Nicole: Please!
[00:14:18] Cheri Torres: When you said that, what triggered for me is a generative question also generates energy, vibrancy, life. Because it invites people in and triggers this I'm included, you want my opinion, you care about me. And suddenly people have access to their full potential.
[00:14:39] Nicole: Hmm. So please don't miss that, everybody, generative questions taps the full potential of your people. And here's something I often say, I don't know what you ladies will think about this, but I'll be working with a team doing training and I'm like we talk about the business all the time, but the truth of the matter is if the aliens come down and took everybody out of the building, nothing gets done today. You know, we need the humans, right? And the humans having conversations worth having! Okay. So could you tell us a story maybe about an organization that's embraced this idea of asking a lot of generative questions? What changed for them? How did it affect everything?
[00:15:17] Jackie Stavros: Um, I'll share one. And it's also, it's also in, I believe, chapter six in the book, Scaling Up Great Conversations. But it's a story about Eric. And Eric was charge of a team. He was transplanted from Germany to Michigan and in there they had silos and they had the holding company in Germany, and they told Eric his job is to create more business and be close to the automotive firms, the OEMs in the Detroit area. And so Eric decided not to wait for marching orders and he began to ask his staff questions. What is a peak experience? What is this culture like? What do you value about each other? And what are your wishes? And he just began to talk to his people and then he pulled them together. We were about 30 people for a conversation worth having. And the design team here, they came up for a set of values for how they were going to operate. They understood the strengths of not just each division, but the silos broke down, of the technology center and how they, they came up with how they were going to work together and they didn't wait for the corporate headquarters in Germany to tell them what to do in Plymouth. Matter of fact, the CEO from Germany came to visit and said, imagine what it would be like if we could have the whole organization operating this way, asking questions and being curious and learning from each other.
[00:16:53] Nicole: Yeah. So please don't miss that. You don't have to wait on the CEO to decide to have a conversation worth having. You could start doing this stuff today, and then the CEO will show up on your door, promote you, you'll make more money. All those things could happen. I'm just saying. Okay. Yeah. So he started asking these questions. And the thing I love about Appreciative Inquiry is the first word, appreciative. So I think that we should stop for a moment, maybe talk about that word because the questions that Eric was asking was helping each of these employees appreciate, have gratitude? Maybe we could say that word? For like what they were experiencing and who they worked with. How important do you find the appreciative versus the opposite? What is the opposite of appreciative?
[00:17:38] Cheri Torres: Depreciative.
[00:17:39] Jackie Stavros: Depreciative.
[00:17:40] Nicole: Depreciative, right.
[00:17:41] Cheri Torres: Yeah.
[00:17:43] So one, of the things to think about the word appreciative is that it's about adding value or valuing what is creating more value. And so asking generative questions that actually create value or value what's going on, value a person, a situation, an opportunity. We actually have a two by two grid where the conversations that are above the horizontal line we call those appreciative conversations, and below the line are depreciative conversations. And the depreciative conversations tend to devalue people, devalue situations. The questions that are asked typically have an agenda or judgment in them. There are destructive conversations where you're just making statements that don't do anybody any value at all. And so, so we really encourage this. You know, we're all going to have conversations along the continuum between Appreciative and Depreciative, but if we can have like 80% of our conversations above the line, we're going to end up with a lot more energy, creativity, connections, strong relationships and positive outcomes that will be successful.
[00:19:05] Nicole: Yeah. And we've all worked with the guy who constantly is bringing things down below the line, haven't we? Or the gal, right? For sure. Yeah. Okay. So you guys also talk about how positive framing draws people into the engagement and inspires engagement. So, one of the examples you have is a positive frame. Our employees feel valued and each of them collaborates with a high productive team. So you give people actually phrases to put right in their mouth to use in their conversations, don't you?
[00:19:35] Jackie Stavros: Mm-hmm.
[00:19:35] Nicole: Some people are like, well, how do I do this? You guys give them the list of questions right here. And so tell us a little bit about how training or working with a team looks like to get them in the practice of doing this. Because just like you stated, there's so many people that have what I would call bad habits in their communication style. Could be that they have a lack of emotional intelligence, could be that they've not been to Communication 101, different things like that. So how do you guys work with the team to help them begin to have Conversations Worth Having?
[00:20:08] Jackie Stavros: So if you think about when we bring them together, whether we spend a day with a team and an organization, sometimes it's just two and a half hours. And then we have on-demand programs. We really teach them the art of what is a conversation, the question you asked. The other important thing is teaching them how to tune in. How to make it very intentional. Tuning in. Cheri mentioned the pause, the breathe and getting curious, that really sets you up to use the two practices, which are, then we teach them what is a question, what does it mean to be generative questions. We have them practice scenarios. When it's with a company, they actually tell us the scenarios of ahead of time. It's great. They'll tell us all the problems they're having with their organization, and we will take those problems and those challenges, and we teach them through positive framing, how to flip it into a conversation worth having. So we practice generative questions, positive framing, and the flip. And the flip is, how do you name it, flip it, frame it, whatever the issue, the problem. How do you flip it to the positive and how do you frame it?
[00:21:16] And we also teach them the importance of hanging and naming it long enough so that they're dealing not with the symptoms, but what everybody thinks is the problem. Everybody knows what the problem is so that they're agreeing and there's a lot of times, there's lots of different positive frames that you end up with. So through the training, we work on the practices, tuning in, and then we also do a module on giving feedback. That's something we have to do. We have to, we're required to do it in sometimes performance reviews at your six months, yearly. But how about on an everyday basis? How do I tell you, Nicole, what resonates? What are you doing well in your job? And then how might you do better, feedforward. And bringing you into that conversation?
[00:22:03] Nicole: I love a Marshall Goldsmith reference, feedforward. All right, everybody go look that up, but not right now. Keep listening, but go look up Marshall Goldsmith feedforward. Okay, so, their model that she just kind of went through quickly, I don't want you guys to miss it, is name it, flip it, frame it, and you can find that on page 84 in their book.
[00:22:21] So, when you sit down with teams, you have them name what is a problem, a complaint, a challenge, or a thing that you don't want, and then you have them flip it to a positive opposite. So can you tell us a story of how maybe you worked with a team? They named a problem, they flipped it, and then they framed it, name it, flip it, frame it, everybody write that down.
[00:22:42] Cheri Torres: And I want to introduce in this name it, flip it, frame it also something to really support those conversations. We use something called an opportunity tree. And then I'll give you an example. Typical problem solving, if you think of the trunk of the tree as the issue or the problem you're facing and all the leaves on the tree or the fruit, that's what's visible. That's what you can see or sense in the organization. So working with a hospital around patient satisfaction. And this was a hospital that had grown significantly by acquiring other hospitals and they had grown so fast that the culture of the original hospital didn't have a chance to catch up to the other cultures. And so patient satisfaction was tanking.
[00:23:37] And the traditional, going into a nurse management meeting and saying, you need to do something about this. What are you doing? What are the problems? All that did was create this defensiveness. Yeah. And angst. And it shut down the creativity. It shut down the connection between the vice president and the nurse managers. They defensive. They were, we just don't have enough staff. And people typically when there's a problem and they get thrown an attack, will respond back we need more people or we need more money. That's always the quick solution. So at any rate, what happened with this organization is they looked at the trunk of the tree being poor satisfaction. And then looking at all the leaves of what was on the tree, you know, patients were unhappy, nurses were stressed, morale was low. Those were all the things that they were seeing. And when that flipped, we created the opportunity tree. And on that trunk was written high patient satisfaction. And if there was high patient satisfaction, what would we see? And not only patients were satisfied, but healing was improved, quality of care was improved, morale was improved, the nurses were happier, et cetera. And so if you look at that from the problem to the flip, so name it, flip it. Name it was patient dissatisfaction. Flip it was patient satisfaction. But what they were really after because the patient satisfaction was being measured by scores. What they wanted were all the leaves on the trees. So when they framed it, they framed it around high quality care resulting in patient joy and satisfaction. And so when the senior VP came in and said, tell me about some times when patients receive really high quality care and they're super satisfied. And of course, nurse managers were first like, what? This is a new question.
[00:25:58] Nicole: Right. Instead of, what are you doing wrong? What? What happens when we do it right? Yes. Don't miss that everybody.
[00:26:04] Cheri Torres: And then at the end of that meeting the VP said, over this next week, go collect stories, just observe what's going on when things are going well, and come back with another story. And they came back for the next meeting, she said everybody was just buzzing. Smiles on faces, which she hadn't seen in months and months. So much energy. And she filled the whiteboard with ideas, of what people could do based upon not just guesses, but what was working. And she thought, all right, well, let's see if this really is effective. We'll see what happens when the scores come out. And the next quarter when the patient satisfaction was being measured, every single unit had improved and one unit was a hundred percent satisfied.
[00:26:55] Nicole: Wow.
[00:26:56] Cheri Torres: It can be that easy.
[00:26:58] Nicole: Yeah, just paying attention to what you're doing with this thing right here. That's so good.
[00:27:04] Announcer: Are you ready to build your vibrant culture? Bring Nicole Greer to speak to your leadership team, conference or organization to help them with their strategies, systems, and smarts to increase clarity, accountability, energy, and results. Your organization will get LIT from within. Email her at nicole@vibrantculture.com and be sure to check out Nicole's TEDx talk at vibrantculture.com.
[00:27:33] Nicole: All right. Now you all also talk about that there are five AI principles. There's the constructionist principle. Simultaneity principle. That's your SAT
[00:27:44] Jackie Stavros: That's a hard one.
[00:27:45] Nicole: word for the day. All right. Poetic principle, anticipatory principle, and positive principle. All right. So will you talk a little bit about these five principles? And they can be found on page 92 in their book when you're talking about what's fueling your conversations. So how do we begin doing this? What principles do we need to have at play?
[00:28:04] Jackie Stavros: So these are the principles that came out of the David Cooperrider's dissertation. So there's like a whole book on this. Um, we just have a chapter on this. So
[00:28:12] Nicole: Okay, that's all we need..
[00:28:15] Jackie Stavros: So the social constructionist is a very powerful principle, and it's our words create our reality. So think about the words you choose because you will live into that reality. So if you think you can, you can. And if you think you can't, you can't. So that's the social construction.
[00:28:32] Nicole: So good. That's exactly right.
[00:28:34] Jackie Stavros: Um, the simulteneity principle is the moment I make a comment or ask you a question, I'm impacting the next moment for us. So the simulteneity is really important. I used to be a lifeguard and when I said to the kids, don't run on the deck, they ran faster. That's what the brain heard was run. And if I learn to say. Walk on the deck and try this with your kids walk, they start walking without realizing that they're walking. So your words impact the next moment. Um, poetic. Poetic is really important. There are three of us on this conversation, and poetic means we can have three different understandings of a moment, a word or a situation. So the poetic principle is that there's multiple perspectives, so you need to go listen and hear the multiple perspectives. The anticipatory one is a favorite one, and the anticipatory one is you anticipating what you want to see happen, what you hope will happen. And there's a lot of research on the anticipatory in education and actually sports. So if we went golfing and I said. Don't hit the ball in the woods. I am triggering you to hit the ball in the woods. But if you could anticipate where you want the ball to go, where you want the hockey puck to go, where you want something to go, you start to move in that direction with the anticipatory. So it's looking at the future of what you want to see happen. And then of course the positive principle, and there's a lot of research that the more positive the image, the positive actions, the positive results. So that's a very powerful principle, the positive principle, which is the final one.
[00:30:24] Nicole: Hmm. So good. And so I'm kind of hearing in this whole thing that as we approach our conversations, there's a lot of vision work going on in here. Can you connect that? In my brain, I'm like, the leader needs to come into the conversation with a vision of how they want the conversation to go down, which is down this positive track, this appreciative track. So how does vision play a part in all this?
[00:30:49] Cheri Torres: I would start by saying it would be helpful if the leader came in holding that vision really lightly. And engaging a group in helping to clarify the vision of where is it that we're trying to go to together? Rather than where do I want us to go? And I just want to emphasize, 'cause I think this is a key part of the visioning, emphasize the social constructionist principle. That social constructionism is really this notion that all our social systems are created by us making meaning together. So all the structures in our organizations, we created them. But then we forget we create them, and then they keep us in boxes sometimes. If we created them, we can reinvent or redesign different structures that to support us as we go. So that whole piece of visioning is engaging the whole, like either a whole team, a whole department, or even a whole organization is where are we trying to go together and for what purpose?
[00:32:09] Not just what's the widget that we produce or the service that we offer, but what's the kind of evolutionary purpose? How are we serving life going forward. And as we serve that life, it also serves our life. There's this movement in organizations now, this notion of, it's not just about us, but it's about us in relationship to the whole. Because the conversations we have internally about our vision automatically impact the rest of the system. And so if we want to make decisions that ultimately support our ongoing vision of a thriving organization or a thriving community, we have to be seeing and helping to fuel a thriving ecosystem that we are part of. And so it's this joining of individual visions with team visions, with department that are all aligned and moving towards life and flourishing.
[00:33:13] Nicole: Yeah. So I heard you say like, the personal mission of the person can serve the mission of the organization and as I'm on mission, 'cause I like the word mission a lot, mission, purpose, those are equal signs to me. Are they equal signs to y'all? Mission and purpose? No.
[00:33:30] Jackie Stavros: Not.
[00:33:30] Nicole: Tell me the difference in your mind. Teach me! Uh, I,
[00:33:34] Jackie Stavros: I okay.
[00:33:35] Nicole: a personal mission and purpose and I think mine is the same, but teach me.
[00:33:39] Jackie Stavros: Okay. I thought like you did until I read an article in 2020 that was based on 2016 literature. So that's the professor. I'm a strategy professor. So mission is what you do and who you do it for. It's what you're doing right now. So organizations have mission statements and you have a mission statement. This is what I do and who I did it for. You want to be clear. Purpose is why you do it, why you get up in the morning, why you are excited to be on this podcast. It fuels the ability to you for you to serve on your mission. So purpose is, you know, the why do I do what I do?
[00:34:22] Nicole: Okay.
[00:34:22] Cheri Torres: And think also that purpose is, it's your ultimate why, but it doesn't change over time. Your mission as things evolve, may change. You may move from making, like the company that originally made drill bits and the competition was pushing in on them, and their mission was to create these metal drill bits. And they could only take that so far. And when they began to look at what's their purpose, what's our why? Somebody said, well, we're in the business of making holes. And somebody else went, oh, what about lasers? And so the whole mission changed in terms of how they did what they did. But the purpose didn't change.
[00:35:10] Nicole: Oh, that's so good. That's so good. I love that story about our purpose is to make holes. That's so fantastic. Yeah. And the mission was to switch from drill bits to the laser. So do you have another story that might illustrate that for me?
[00:35:25] Jackie Stavros: Here's a popular one. What organization? This is their purpose. We create community. That's why they do what we do. And their mission is they produce mobility. They produce cars. That's Toyota. Okay, so if I was just to tell you what their purpose is, you're like, I don't know, lots of organizations want to create community. But Toyota is very clear that this is why we do what we do, and Disney World is about happiness. That's their why. But Disney has lots of product lines, not just their amusement parks. So maybe those popular organizations people are more familiar with, they really get purpose and mission.
[00:36:08] Nicole: Mm-hmm. that's so good. And you know, what's crazy to me is that I don't think a lot of people stop and slow down to figure out the purpose or the why. They have a business idea, but maybe never got underneath what that purpose is. So I love what you ladies are talking about. Absolutely. Okay. So in the book you talk about what's fueling the conversations. We talked about the five principles, and then you teach people how to scale up and have great conversations. So earlier, I want to go back just a minute. You said this thing about pausing, taking a breath. So how do people scale up? How do they get their conversations going the right direction? What are some practical things that our listeners could actually start doing today?
[00:36:51] Cheri Torres: Well, I think scaling up conversations goes towards the original Appreciative Inquiry methodology for whole systems change, which is bringing people together and in paired interviews, discovering the best of who we are, where in the organization, no matter what we're trying to change. So for instance, if we're trying to create leadership at every level, we might interview people to ask, you know, when are they at their best when they are a leader? And what divisions or departments or teams have the best shared leadership? So you go in and you study positive deviance. Where are we doing this really well and what can we learn from that to bring forward? So when we're trying to solve a problem or create something, instead of guessing or making assumptions about what's going to work, we go inquire into it, so that we are then dreaming and designing going forward based upon tangible, solid reality and people's experiences that they can bring forward. And then the dream is based upon what we're discovering, what is it that we could be, where do we want to go together? And again, those are conversations led by generative questions. And then the the third one is designing. Okay, given where we want to go, what are all the opportunities for us to be able to achieve those outcomes. And people come up with ideas and because they come up with the ideas, they own them, they're passionate about wanting to make them happen. So when there's whole system change, you don't have to get buy-in, people own it. They have shared ownership of where you're going. So they bring their passion, enthusiasm, the connection with people. And then it's just about moving forward into deploying those ideas and living into the destiny of continually using generative questions and focusing on where we're going to learn and keep evolving forward.
[00:38:58] And Jackie, this might be a good place for you to also bring in SOAR, 'cause that's part of that original AI.
[00:39:03] Nicole: Tell us about that.
[00:39:05] Jackie Stavros: Mm-hmm.
[00:39:05] Cheri Torres: SOAR is such a practical, simple strategy.
[00:39:09] Jackie Stavros: I'd love to, and then I want to make a comment on your website, Nicole. So SOAR operating system is Appreciative Inquiry. And that came out of my research, my dissertation. So imagine when we pull people together for strategic conversations, that the way we're going to start this conversation is the s stands for what are the strengths. So it might be at the team level, the organization level. What are the opportunities, what are all these possibilities? And then we're going to ask people what are their aspirations? What are their dreams? What do they believe in? 'Cause you can't do everything. Time is finite, money is finite, and so is resources.
[00:39:48] So having the strengths, the opportunities and aspirations, you want to look for what are the measurable and meaningful results that we want? And then you begin to design the three to five strategic initiatives that will help you reach the results based on the aspirations, based on those opportunities you identified and leverage those strengths. And that's simply, SOAR is just a framework for strategic thinking, planning, and leading.
[00:40:15] Nicole: I absolutely love it. And what, uh, you were talking about earlier, Cheri was the Appreciative Inquiry five D cycle. Do I have that right?
[00:40:23] Cheri Torres: Yes.
[00:40:24] Nicole: And that could be found on page 117 of the you're going to buy, called
[00:40:27] Jackie Stavros: Man, she knows these pages.
[00:40:28] Nicole: _Conversations Worth Having_. Yeah, I mean, I'm learning right along with everybody else here, so that's fantastic. I love that you give people, I love a little recipe to think through. Right? So the five Ds and then now we have SOAR. Okay. So that's fantastic. Absolutely. And so when people go in to do their strategic planning, you just said they need to figure out what their strengths are, the opportunities, their aspirations, and then figure out what results you want based on those three. Did I get that right?
[00:40:56] Jackie Stavros: Yep.
[00:40:57] Nicole: Okay. Very good. Very good. All right. So that's how you scale up your great conversations is by working through the five Ds and working through SOAR together. Yes?
[00:41:05] Cheri Torres: Yes.
[00:41:06] Nicole: Okay, all right. Fantastic. And so we ask the generative questions. That's the first practice. Just for my clarity, what's the second practice?
[00:41:15] Jackie Stavros: Positive framing.
[00:41:17] Nicole: Positive framing. Okay.
[00:41:18] Jackie Stavros: Which has the flipping technique within it. Mm-hmm.
[00:41:21] Nicole: All right. So the flip it and the frame it. Okay. Very good. What was your comment about the website?
[00:41:26] Jackie Stavros: Oh, so I was looking at your website and it's very clear what your mission is, of the podcast. The purpose of your podcast, it says you give people strategy, systems and smarts they need to turn their dreams into reality. And then why you do this is you're trying to help them turn their dreams into reality and practical solutions. So on your website, it's really clear, this is your mission and for whom, and this is why the podcast is here for people. So that's how you can begin to say, does my statement have mission and purpose? Sometimes it's within it and sometimes they're separate.
[00:42:05] Nicole: Oh. And look at that, just flowed from me like a river. Look at that. Sat down, wrote that website. That's so good. Well, I want to give people one more set of tips here before we close out the podcast, but you have in here five classic questions for Appreciative Inquiry and I love something that just kind of gets me started. This is on page 123. The first three questions focused on the best of what is, the next question focuses on what might be, and the final question helps transition to what can be, so this really helps people get the positive flip and the frame going. Is that correct?
[00:42:36] Cheri Torres: Yes.
[00:42:37] Nicole: Will you guys talk about these five classic questions?
[00:42:40] Cheri Torres: So they're, yes, they're the classic questions that elicit story. One of the foundations, the grounding under Appreciative Inquiry is you're not going after bullet points. You're going after the story, the experience of what people have gone through because as they share a story, you're going to get a lot richer information and data than just a bullet point. And the story also enables people to relate, because as someone's sharing a story, their mirror neurons start to go off so they can feel the feelings and they can have the senses, and they also then start to say, oh, I've had that experience too.
[00:43:24] And you begin to get this shared depth of understanding around what it means to have strong teams or what it means to have the agility throughout the organization to respond to ambiguity and uncertainty in the world. And when it becomes palpable, then we can look at how do we move this through the organization? What does this look like? And you can get very clear on what do we need to do to set this up throughout the organization? What structures, processes, ways of being, how do we run our meetings, et cetera, so that we run through the fabric of our culture the way we want to be. And we do it with intention. And then as you, you get very clear on what's it going to look like when we do that. And then you start into the practical, those people that want to get to, like, what are we going to do and how are we going to do it?
[00:44:23] Nicole: That's right.
[00:44:24] Cheri Torres: They have to be patient at the beginning because you want divergence first. So you really have a deep understanding of possibility. But then you get into that practical, okay, what're we going to do? What are the nodes where we could have the greatest impact with the least amount of effort that will help create this change for us? And who wants to do what? And typically then people choose what they're excited to make happen. And then that's that question of how are we going to do it? Designing the way forward, prototyping and experimenting into the future. And as you think about that, and if you think about your experience of hearing that, my guess is most of your listeners can sense the excitement that people would have in the discovery and the hope that we can create what we really want. We could co-create this, and what do I want to do to help make that happen? And suddenly you have the whole person, each whole person fully in to help create this amazing, functional organization doing its mission, serving its purpose and leadership can kind of get out of the way.
[00:45:37] Nicole: Oh, and isn't that a great idea? Yeah, yeah. I'll tell you, I was in a room full of people just the other day and it was the point in the process where the people were going to take over. And leadership was watching the team take over, and one of the leaders turned to me and said, oh, I'm so glad we got out of their way. 'Cause they were holding them back, you know, because the leaders were like, we're, we're waiting for the leader to tell us what to do.
[00:46:02] Cheri Torres: Exactly.
[00:46:03] Nicole: Because that's how you play follow the leader from childhood, right? And it's like as soon as the leader got out of way, all these other leaders emerged, it was fantastic. Yeah. Oh, I love what you're saying. Okay.
[00:46:14] Well people are probably listening and going, well, this sounds magical, but you guys say in chapter seven, it's not magic, it's science. And you just a minute ago alluded to the fact of this fancy thing called mirror neurons. So you can't just throw out something like mirror neurons and let us just gloss right over it. Tell us about the science behind this. People are probably thinking, okay, I need to sit around and be more positive. I can do that. Well, that's not the thing. There's a whole formula. She's giving you SOAR, she's giving you the five Ds, she's giving you the frame it, flip it, all that stuff. So what's the science? Tell us real quick in, in simple terms, what the science is, what happens inside a person's brain when this is all going on.
[00:46:52] Jackie Stavros: Go ahead, Cheri, you love talking about the brain. She does. I gotta let her say this.
[00:46:58] Nicole: Look at Jackie. She's like, that's her thing. I love that.
[00:47:02] Cheri Torres: So the way our brain works is that when we feel threatened in any way, and if you take your hands and you put them back here, your thumbs are pointing down. If you are back
[00:47:18] Nicole: We're all doing it. If you're watching on YouTube. Mm-hmm.
[00:47:22] Cheri Torres: If your thumbs are pointing down, your body and your mind are in protect. And so that's the back of your brain. It takes all of the nutrients and the oxygen, and it pumps that effort into keeping you safe. Which means, if you think about a negative conversation you've had where you felt kind of threatened everything pulls in, your breathing gets shallow, your muscles get tight and tense, and that's what's happening with the biochemistry of your nervous system. The unfortunate thing is when that happens, you get some disconnection between the executive functioning, the prefrontal cortex, the neocortex, which means you lose access to emotional intelligence, connection, creativity, short-term memory, critical thinking skills, all those things that typically, in the moment, you need access to, you don't have it.
[00:48:23] Jackie Stavros: It's gone.
[00:48:24] Cheri Torres: So if a leader is hammering, like if we go back to the hospital example where the vice president is hammering on them about what are they doing wrong. Their brains are actually shutting down. On the flip side, when you have a conversation worth having where you are valuing people, you're adding value, you're curious about where they're coming from. People are being included and invited in. It creates, everybody's all about psychological safety these days. That's what Conversations Worth Having creates. It creates the body mindset that feels safe. And think of a conversation you've been in where you were just excited and felt included. Your body relaxes, your ideas come back. You've got access to your full brain then. Emotional intelligence, you can connect with people, you can mirror with them as they're speaking, you see and feel what they see and feel. You have access to creativity. Those are all the things we want and need in our organizations. And so it's not just fluffy. Oh, I can be positive. And it's not even about being positive. It's about valuing and adding value. Sometimes it adds value to open up what looks like a nest of snakes.
[00:49:45] Nicole: A hot mess. Yeah.
[00:49:46] Cheri Torres: Yes, but we need to open it up enough to see it and understand it so that we can move forward from it. So it is adding value, not about being positive, and it's about making sure your conversations allow full access of the human beings that you're with, which means above the line conversations.
[00:50:10] Nicole: I love it. I love it. Okay. So, uh, this is all going on in your brain, and so you might as well work with your brain instead of shut it down. So let's have a conversation worth having. Let's use Appreciative Inquiry to fuel productive and meaningful engagement. And so the final chapter says you can do this anytime, any place in any situation. All right. I want to hear about that. So, invite our listeners into the next time, place, and situation. You know, how do they start doing this? What would you suggest?
[00:50:40] Jackie Stavros: Well, if you read the last chapter, it's truly a summary of the whole book. And it really pulls out in one simple chapter that before jumping into these two practices, the importance of tuning in, asking yourself, where am I? Am I above in that appreciative space or below in that depreciative? And if you're below, as Cheri said, you tune in by pausing and breathing. Just those acts begin to bring you up to in the line so that you can use the two practices of generative questions and positive framing. And you know, you could ask it as soon as you learn two or three generative questions, you can be in a heated moment and just ask, Hey, what's going on here? To two people who are arguing, tell me what you think. Tell me what you think. How might we work together? Generative questions can flip a situation. The power of inquiry is asking questions that value the person or the situation no matter what's going on.
[00:51:43] Nicole: Hmm. All right, so you have gotten the download, people, but what you need to help you out is to go get this book. All right. So _Conversations Worth Having: Using Appreciative Inquiry to Fuel Productive and Meaningful Engagement_ by Jackie Stavros and Cheri Torres. Are you married to an amazing Latin gorgeous man? Is that what's going on
[00:52:02] Cheri Torres: I,
[00:52:02] Nicole: here? Yeah. She's a lucky woman in so many ways. She hangs out with Jackie. She's got a great husband. Awesome, awesome. Okay.
[00:52:10] Jackie Stavros: She does.
[00:52:11] Nicole: So tell us where we can find you ladies if we want to know more. If we want to have you come into our organization and help us build a vibrant culture full of great conversations, how would we get ahold of you ladies?
[00:52:21] Cheri Torres: So the simplest way to do that is to go to our website, which is ConversationsWorthHaving.today, or the short phrase CWH.today. And there's a wealth of information on there. You can download a free conversation toolkit, we have some self-guided offers there. We have a CWH Foundations course and an on-demand bootcamp. And then of course, we can come into organizations where we customize all the training so that we help your culture move in the direction you want to move in.
[00:52:54] Jackie Stavros: The only other thing I would suggest, if you don't have time to read, it's also on an audio book and there's so many stories so you can listen if you don't have time to read.
[00:53:04] Nicole: Yeah, get in your Toyota and listen. That's what you have to do. Okay, create community with these two ladies. That's absolutely right. And they're also on the Instagram, so go over there. CWH Today on Instagram. Also, Jackie is definitely, and Cheri's definitely on the LinkedIn. Go there. Just type in their name, they'll pop right up. They've been on lots of podcasts. So if you go to their website, again, ConversationsWorthHaving.today/podcast, you can listen to more from different podcasters. And of course their book is available on the Amazon, _Conversations Worth Having_. So take a look at that. And you're offering a discount, right? For our listeners. Will you share that real quick?
[00:53:43] Cheri Torres: Sure. We're offering a 30% discount on our foundations course, which is pretty inexpensive to begin with, but with discount, you can have it for $34. And basically, it's a 30 minute self-guided foundations in Conversations Worth Having in short five minute, five or six minute videos. Easily accessible.
[00:54:06] Nicole: All right. And the code for that is none other than VIBRANTCULTURE, so stick in to get your discount. And ladies, it's been such a pleasure. I've learned so much from you. I'm grateful for my book. And I'm going to take a look at the course and I'm going to get myself learned up. So be a lifelong learner, like Nicole Greer, everybody. And of course, like Cheri Torres and Jackie Stavros. Thank you so much for being on the Build A Vibrant Culture podcast.
[00:54:30] Cheri Torres: Thank you so much for having us, Nicole.
[00:54:32] Jackie Stavros: Yeah, thank you.
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