Epilogue: A Conversation between Keimei and Her Nephew Evan

In chapter 6, Highlighting Invisible Strengths, we introduce the concept of Appreciative Intelligence and how developing your Appreciative Intelligence can enhance your abilities in invisible leadership. One activity suggested in Thatchenkery and Metzker’s book is to talk with a child in order to practice reframing conversations for positive possibilities.1 The thought behind this activity is to practice changing the way we talk in conversations such as what a child wants to be when he or she grows up. The activity provides ways to encourage creativity and innovation in the conversation by not limiting what the child comes up with for his or her future. Instead, the conversation allows for the child to think through all possibilities and to then support him or her in coming up with concrete ideas of his or her own for accomplishing these potential goals. By practicing with a child, you are more patient and tolerant of ideas that may seem unrealistic or without tactical structure for implementation. The idea is that by learning to leverage this patience and by taking a facilitator role versus a directing role, it provides you with the ability to do the same in your workplace or in any other context. Rather than immediately shooting down ideas, it helps you to consider ideas first, and then ask questions to support the development of the idea further to lead to concrete actions or to a concept that could be actionable.