Evaluating appreciative inquiry as an organizational transformation tool: An assessment from Nepal

Abstract

Two women's health projects in Nepal are examined for impacts from using Appreciative Inquiry (AI) as an organizational transformation and team building tool. This paper describes AI, and then looks at its use in Nepal to help improve access, quality of care, and utilization of essential obstetric care (EOC) by pregnant women. AI is ostensibly designed to assist hospital, health post, and health project staff improve their attitudes towards work and their service to clients. Typical accounts of AI impacts are told in "success stories," analogous to storytelling and mini-case studies in anthropology. The focus here, however, is on issues of evaluating AI, itself. Some AI practitioners eschew attempts at "rigorous" evaluation of their own work and maintain that AI is fundamentally "different" and not amenable to objective (especially quantitative) measurement. The results of the AI assessment on the two health projects are discussed in light of the ongoing debate about the nature of development in general, and the place of AI, the issue of evaluating AI, the use of logical frameworks ("log-frames"), "problem solving" approaches, and both quantitative and qualitative measures. The evaluation-of-AI literature (very scant) is reviewed, and one promising new methodology that combines AI with log-frame indicators is described. Copyright © 2008 by the Society for Applied Anthropology.