Developed with Kentucky Community & Technical College System (KCTCS)
 Kentucky Community & Technical College System (KCTCS) has embraced the Appreciative Inquiry (AI) process as a planning tool for moving our organization forward. Appreciative Inquiry is the study and exploration of what gives life to human systems when they function at their best. Within KCTCS , individuals from each college and the System Office (SO) have been trained to facilitate activities using the appreciative process; AI has been successfully used with the 2010-16 KCTCS Strategic Planning Process; KCTCS leadership, including the President’s Leadership Team and the KCTCS Board of Regents, have been trained in the Appreciative Inquiry 5-D (Define, Discover, Dream, Design, Deliver) Process. Collectively, hundreds of KCTCS employees have participated in Appreciative Inquiry activities.
In an effort to immerse Appreciative Inquiry as a planning tool across KCTCS, an opportunity is being created for SO managers and supervisors. As a group that is critical to the overall success of KCTCS becoming AI, employees are invited to enhance their core interpersonal skills, learn additional techniques to manage change and innovation, increase the positive impact they have on KCTCS, and investigate new methods to manage performance. Two Programs: Creating our Future Together with Inquiry-Based Management Creating our Future Together with Appreciative Inquiry Programs Includes: Two days of on-site introduction to Appreciative Inquiry and 6 months of coaching. Coaching will be provided to teams in the form of 30 minute live webinar sessions that are scheduled bi-weekly. These coaching session will enable teams to increase the practice of Appreciative Inquiry in their daily work. |
| Program Facilitator: Cheri Torres |
 What might be possible if community and organization members were fully engaged and using their strengths to collectively achieve shared visions?
This is the question that motivates Cheri Torres and has her focused on collaboration. Given current global challenges, Cheri uses strengths-based organizational design practices to help clients respond effectively to increasing levels of complexity in their environments and growing demand for innovation and change. Her strategy is to expand collaborative capacity in communities and organizations using Appreciative Inquiry, Sociotechnical Systems Design, and Experiential Learning. She does this by partnering with her clients to intentionally design workplace environments, multi-stakeholder conversations, organizational systems and individual and team training to maximize value for all stakeholders. Her experience has taught her that systems and events that are intentionally designed for collaboration elicit our inherent collaborative capacity, regardless of our differences in background, views, or values. Expanding that capacity through lessons and intentional practice leads to increasing competence in thinking and working together with joy and creativity, resulting in sustainable innovation and ever-evolving excellence. |
