John Loty’s discovery of AI

John Loty of John Loty & Associates “discovered” Appreciative Inquiry in 2004.(Download background of John Loty)

This came about whilst he was working with Marie Jasinski and others, demonstrating role play online in the context of a Virtual (online) Conference about Organisational Development. Marie mentioned to John that the keynote speaker for the virtual conference about OD was David Cooperrider PhD and that Thiagi had said that we would benefit watching and listening to the keynote…which was later that evening.

Both Marie and John were members of  ISPI and Thiagi was then the International President, so a recommendation from him was taken very seriously.

John recalls that he was so impressed by that keynote address by David Cooperrider PhD that he exclaimed out loud (to his computer) – “This will even work in Russia”. John has had an abiding interest in Russia, even though back then he had never been there.

His interest in Russia and the Ukraine arises from the fact that that is where his parents came from.

In 2005 John with help from many ISPI folk (especially Nigel Wilson then head of the Australian Centra (now SabaCentra) business) and the Sydney Chapter of ISPI, hosted Australia’s first Appreciative Inquiry Online Conference. Both Thiagi and David Cooperider PhD and many AI pioneers and luminaries presented during that 3 day introduction of AI to the broader Australian public.

The rest (as they say) is history. John (through the company John Loty & Associates Pty Ltd) commissioned the creation of this website and continues to sponsor it.

One of John’s dreams is to be involved in ‘sparking’ or assisting some larger scale Appreciative Inquiry initiatives along the lines of the 2009 City of Cleveland (Blue City on a Green Lake) initiative. Download the Cleveland City Workbook here (it is over 10Mb).