Putting Into Practice

In the explanations with each verse, we have included sample triggering questions. These are refined versions of the general questions associated with each step, taken from actual applications of CHRIIS in our experience.

It is important to construct these triggering questions yourself to best match your context—the organization, its circumstances, the group(s) or area(s) on which you are focusing, where you see opportunities, and so on. And it is important that this construction be a shared part of the inquiry. In other words, those participating in the inquiry need to agree on the questions that drive it. Otherwise, it is easy for the inquiry to be devalued and dismissed.

A few other things to keep in mind as you use CHRIIS or a similar tool follow:

As stated before, we cannot create the future using a single way of knowing, like science. It is important that we bring together multiple ways of knowing, essentially by asking different questions and using a suite of different methods. The questions and methods together form powerful systems of inquiry.

The specific ways of knowing and methods fostered by CHRIIS were chosen based on our concrete experience. For example, I (first author) once worked with an organization that sought to integrate scientific research and policy development. Their practice suggested the two could be connected directly: use the implications of research findings to specify policy. The result seemed myopic, perhaps arrogant. I heard members say essentially, "those who resist policies supported by science are idiots.” But the policies themselves appeared to suffer from under-conceptualization and political naivete. Hence our view expressed in CHRIIS is that policy making relies on a different and equally valid way of knowing, and that one can get more productively from science to policy making through design.

In another case, from our interactions with clients we assumed that all organizational members agreed on the basic purpose of the inquiry, and we skipped the Release Assumptions step. Then when we reached Innovate Actions, we realized there was little support for the Imagined Ideals. Constraints we thought were recognized as artificial were very real, and we had erred in skipping the step.

We do not mean to say that the linear CHRIIS order is sacrosanct, though. CHRIIS relations are actually multi-way, and an iterative approach with placeholders in steps would make sense. For example, imagining ideals can help us release assumptions. Think about the steps, and the various ways of knowing, being in conversation with one another.

We also do not mean to suggest that skilled facilitation is required or that multiple ways of knowing need involve experts in each. Rather, our intention is to suggest self- or co-facilitation of thinking in different ways for different purposes and bringing these different ways together in a single, powerful inquiry. 

That inquiry is best seen as a continuing cycle guiding the organization’s evolution. Iterations of the cycle might result in significant changes or in “small wins,” and iterations can build on one another (see the figure below, which suggests a braiding of the cycles). The investment is large, though, so watch out for cynicism and a feeling of being worn out rather than energized if outcomes are perceived as insignificant.

Lastly, we would add that, while this is not the primary intended application, CHRIIS has also been effective for us at an individual level, in helping people achieve personal change. For example, below are triggering questions used in a graduate program that helped individuals through a career change.

Challenge Identity: Name five groups to which you belong. How would it alter your sense of identity if the least important of these became the most important?

Honor Values: What do you bring to the table? What stops you? What is your greatest fear? Where do you find great beauty?

Release Assumptions: What did you assume was preventing change in a past situation from which you walked out?

Imagine Ideals: What accomplishments over the next five years would lead you to experience great joy?

Innovate Actions: What will you do to bring one of these about?

Sustain Transformation: How will you help each other in this cohort persevere throughout the program?