This account explores the experience of an action inquiry approach to develop a coaching culture within a public service organisation. We position action inquiry as a fresh interpretation of action learning that draws on a variety of roots and traditions and focuses on the nurturing of the collective capacity to lead through everyday interactions. Working with an initial core group of staff, we expanded our reach through an iterative process to intentionally bring more people into the work. We show how we adapted our original plans to respond to the COVID pandemic, the use of stories to propel inquiry and playback insights into the inquiry process, how we deepened inquiry in some settings and how ultimately being online was an opportunity to connect people across a system that we had not anticipated. We share insights into the commissioning process and of the importance of internal sponsorship. It concludes with a striking, participant-led call to approach scaling differently by supporting the co-creation of local implementation strategies and sponsor confidence in the case to use this approach in more circumstances, where participants in action inquiry explore, rather than assume, what the organisation and its staff need.

The main purpose of this book is to enable qualitative and interpretive researchers to adopt reflexive practices, to make conscious choices that reflect an understanding of the academic debates that underpin the position they may take, and to consider the issues and implications that follow from those choices. Rooted in academic conversations about reflexivity, it suggests that researchers are often interested in reflexivity for one of twomain reasons; perhaps to compensate for ‘skew’ or bias in our perspectives that ‘causes us to see things in a certain individual way that may be atypical’ (2) or perhaps through a concern to speak authentically from our own experience and generate resonance amongst others. The author emphasises that reflexivity is very much a personal project whilst the literature reviewed is largely concerned with how reflexivity is used in the service of research, as a way of providing an account of how insights have been developed. How researchers will understand and apply reflexivity will depend on their ontological and epistemological commitments, the aims of their study and the claims they wish to make. The book opens with a compelling story that made me enthusiastic about what might be in store. Very quickly I began to see that the value of this book would lie in the questions that it prompted me to ask of myself and the work in which I am engaged.

This paper explores the thinking and practice of 'action inquiry' an embedded learning practice that can help navigate complexity when practising change together. The paper uses examples from social contexts where there are concerns about community wellbeing and health care. These are drawn from collaborative or collective leadership development programmes within public services that seek to bring new attention to the qualities of how people think, converse and interact, as part of their collective professional practice. This treats social action as a relational and dialogical practice, something that we do together as professionals by engaging in reflective inquiry and action. The paper suggests that action inquiry offers a prospect of rekindling the links between 'action learning' and collaborative leadership by developing a co-mission and a mutual commitment to a new type of learning partnership. Action inquiry can be wrapped around and enmeshed within initiatives and programmes that work with complexity, anywhere where effective social action will depend on the quality of relationships that can be developed. This research was funded by two separate Scottish Government commissions, where the author was a learning partner. The paper also draws on the further reflections of some of the practitioners most centrally involved.

This book has an important ambition. It seeks to discuss the pitfalls and challenges of action learning and action research, to demystify them and better understand why they have been misunderstood...

This chapter explores the contribution of the Action Learning and Action Research Association World Congress 2015 to our learning. It draws on the experience of carrying out appreciative action research and summarizes our understanding of the poetic principle of appreciative inquiry (AI), in particular the role of playful provocation as part of an appreciative, dialogical and collaborative change methodology. The poetic principle of AI makes language central to the process of inquiry and means that the language of inquiry has important outcomes in and of itself. The concept of poetics is closely linked to play, expressed through language and other forms of symbolic representation. The use of imagery, metaphor and stories helps to deepen inquiry and enables people to articulate tacit, intuitive and unconscious knowledge.

This chapter explores the contribution of the Action Learning and Action Research Association World Congress 2015 to our learning. It draws on the experience of carrying out appreciative action research and summarizes our understanding of the poetic principle of appreciative inquiry (AI), in particular the role of playful provocation as part of an appreciative, dialogical and collaborative change methodology. The poetic principle of AI makes language central to the process of inquiry and means that the language of inquiry has important outcomes in and of itself. The concept of poetics is closely linked to play, expressed through language and other forms of symbolic representation. The use of imagery, metaphor and stories helps to deepen inquiry and enables people to articulate tacit, intuitive and unconscious knowledge.

Leadership is key to quality improvement in nursing homes. This article reports on the initial analysis of the transformational My Home Life Leadership Support program for nursing home managers being implemented in Scotland. It analyses learning from a multimethod participatory descriptive study. Contribution analysis theory informed the evaluation. Evidence-Based Practice, Relationship-Centered Care, Appreciative Inquiry, and Caring Conversations informed the intervention to develop transformational leadership. Data generation methods included baseline and postintervention questionnaires to describe culture change within the study population, together with more in-depth qualitative data generated from group discussions throughout the leadership support program. Qualitative data analysis was an iterative collaborative process with participants to generate themes about the impact of the program on themselves and their practice. Data showed positive changes in managers' perceptions of their self-awareness, leadership communication and relationship skills, and development of positive cultures. This model offers lessons for those interested in ways to approach the emotional, educational, and cultural dynamics of change in other human service contexts.

This paper develops understanding of appreciative action research that generates curiosity and motivation as a better platform for collaborative change. Blending theory and practice it draws on the example of the My Home Life leadership programme in Scotland that explores the concepts and approaches of ‘Caring Conversations’ and ‘playful provocation’ in care homes for older people. The paper shows how they expand notions of appreciation and help people to deepen inquiry, explore values, acknowledge and express emotion without dispute or judgement, articulate tacit knowledge and give voice to things previously thought to be ‘unsayable’. We explore how these generative approaches act as a powerful positive ‘disruption’ that brings existing relationships to life, supports a positive attitude to risk-taking and helps to devise new approaches to the local design and testing of approaches to problems. Ultimately these approaches play an important part in developing understanding of how to do appreciative action research to enhance relationships and more strengths or assets-based and collaborative ways of working and so, to develop new possibilities for changing social systems and a more future-making orientation to action research.

Boyatsis, R., and A. McKee. 2005. Resonant Leadership: Renewing Yourself and Connecting with Others Through Mindfulness, Hope and Compassion. Cambridge: Harvard Business School Press. Dotlich, D., and C. Cairo. 1999. Action Coaching: How to Leverage Individual Performance for Company Success. San Francisco, CA: Jossey Bass. Dotlich, D., and J. Noe. 1998. Action Learning: How the World’s Top Companies Are Re-Creating Their Leaders and Themselves. San Francisco, CA: Jossey Bass. Ibarra, H. 2015. Act Like a Leader, Think Like a Leader. Cambridge: Harvard Business School Press.