Using Appreciative Inquiry to explore the professional practice of a lecturer in higher education - Moving towards life-centric practice

Oct 15, 2026

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This paper presents a strategy for exploring a lecturer’s life-centric professional practice in higher education, sparked by the absence of positive, uplifting stories in everyday teaching experiences. Employing an appreciative approach supported by a critical friend, past life-giving experiences are revisited and transformed into provocative propositions. These propositions form a personalised action plan for future practice, outlining the journey and the heartfelt discoveries.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages15

Reading Time38 min

AccessFree to download

Introduction

Appreciative Inquiry as a positive intervention

Underpinning principles and generative metaphors

Methodology: Appreciative Inquiry

Australian Journal of Adult Learning Volume 50, Number 2, July 2010 Using Appreciative Inquiry to explore the professional practice of a lecturer in higher education: Moving towards life-centric practice David Giles University of Waikato, Hamilton, New Zealand Susie Kung Manukau Institute of Technology, Auckland, New Zealand This paper reports on a strategy for exploring the life-centric practice of a lecturer in Higher Education. The initiative for this inquiry arose out of the realisation that there did not appear tobe positive, heart-lifting stories in a lecturer’s current teaching experiences. Using an appreciative eye and supported by a critical friend, life-giving experiences were ‘stalked’from the past. The hope in this endeavour was to find greater meaning in the lecturer’s best professional practice. Using an Appreciative Inquiry approach, this endeavour rejuvenated the lecturer’s professional practice. As life-centric stories were recalled, provocative propositions were constructed that became the basis of a personalised action plan for future professional practice. This paper outlines the nature of the journey and the heartfelt discoveries. Moving towards life-centric practice 309 Introduction On an educator’s personal journey towards greater congruency and authenticity, the workplace can be challenging and, at times, life-less (Bhindi & Duignan 1997, Brook 2009, Gibbs 2006) . In these times, educators can lose their sense of purpose and feel an alienation from colleagues and students. Moreover, this negative, problem-centered way of being can engender deficit-based thinking on the part of the educator. What possibilities exist if the lense shifts from seeing oneself as a problem to be solved to seeing oneself as a complex miracle to be appreciated? How would this influence the nature of an inquiry into an individual’s professional practice and what opportunities might exist for understanding one’s future practice (Giles & Alderson 2008, Whitney & Trosten-Bloom 2003)? These thought-provoking questions target particular life-giving momentsin an individual’s professional practice as the basis for an alternative way of looking. English, Fenwick and Parsons (2003) suggest that the use of Appreciative Inquiry (AI) offers a way of effecting a positive vision for professional practice. Cooperrider and others (Cooperrider & Srivastva 1987, Hammond 1998, Hammond & Royal 1998, Ryan Soven Smither William & Vanbuskirk 1999, Whitney & TrostenBloom 2003) maintain that the process of appreciative inquiry itself is intervention, that is, an inquiry into human activity and systems change the inquirers. It is as if,‘The seeds of change—that is, the things people think and talk about, the things people discover and learn, and the things that inform dialogue and inspire images of the future—are implicit in the very first questions we ask’(Cooperrider Sorenson Whitney & Yaegar 2000: 18) . In other words, our way of being and our professional practice is influenced the moment questions are asked and questions are sought. In contrast, problemcentred constructions of reality can lead to a greater sense of hopelessness. Bushe and Coetzer (1995: 5) suggest that ‘the theories 310 David Giles and Susie Kung we hold …have a powerful effect on the nature of social reality. Not only do we see what we believe, but the very act of believing it creates it’. For this reason, AI is targeted at appreciating what it is about the social world that is positive, while exploring the possibilities of making the essence of these experiences happen again in the future. Underpinning Appreciative Inquiry is the challenge to systematically consider positive stories of professional practice (Hammond & Royal 1998). In this way,‘every new affirmative projection of the future is a consequence of an appreciative understanding of the pastor present’(Bushe & Coetzer 1995). Hammond (1998) suggests that, if anything is brought from the past, it o

FAQs

What problem motivates the inquiry in this paper?

The initiative arises from a perceived lack of positive, heart-lifting stories in the lecturer’s current teaching experiences.

How does Appreciative Inquiry shape the exploration of professional practice?

It uses an appreciative eye to revisit and recall life-giving experiences, then builds provocative propositions that guide future action through a personalised plan.

What role does a critical friend play in the approach?

A critical friend supports the appreciative process, helping the inquiry move from recalled experiences toward deliberate contemplation and future-oriented propositions.

Oct 15, 2026

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