n the December 2011 issue of Convene, we introduced you to Appreciative Inquiry (AI), the change-leadership meth- odology pioneered by David Cooperrider — and to Cooper-
rider’s vision for using this strengths-based approach to revolutionize the meetings industry. “We are on the eve of the meetings industry’s finest hour,” Cooper-
rider — a professor of social entrepreneurship at the Weatherhead School of Management at Case Western Reserve University — told Susan Sarfati, CAE, in that interview. But, he added, we can’t get there without changing the way conferences are designed. “Why,” he asked, “would we bring thousands of participants together and not engage their strategic and creative minds and imagination for some significant advancement of opportunities for their organization?” Instead of the traditional conference format of downloading infor-
mation (Conference 1.0), or a version of that with some dialogue and networking sprinkled in (Conference 2.0), Cooperrider proposed that planners embrace a new model, Conference 3.0, for their large-group meetings — tapping into all the attendees’ talents with a process for them to work collectively on tasks with strategic and creative value. Meeting takeaways — actionable steps to move an industry or field for- ward — would then be the culmination of this effort, rather than high- lights of education sessions. Cooperrider’s invitation resonated with Convene reader Robert S.
Collier, president and CEO of the Council of Michigan Foundations (CMF), who promptly began to overhaul CMF’s upcoming 40th Annual Conference. “When I read the article,” Collier told Convene, “I said, ‘This is exactly what we should be doing — what was suggested in this article about creating a Conference 3.0 experience — because I’ve trained my staff on Appreciative Inquiry.’” After hearing from Collier, we decided to delve a little deeper into the
Conference 3.0 model. First, we asked Collier to describe how he wove AI methodology into his conference (see p. 68). And then we went back to the source, and asked Cooperrider to walk us through a few successful AI Summits he spearheaded. Here, in his own words, he shares how two such events yielded powerful results: a three-day summit for 250 lead- ers in the dairy industry — farmers, processors, retailers, distributors, students, NGOs, academics, consultants, and others — on industry sus- tainability, held in 2008; and Sustainable Cleveland 2019: Building an Economic Engine to Empower a Green City on a Blue Lake, which began in 2009 with more than 700 business leaders and civic entrepreneurs, and is now held annually. He starts us off with Pre-Summit Work (right).