Methodology
A recurring cycle of inquiry, not a linear process.
Every research practice requires a method — a set of commitments about how to enter an environment, what to pay attention to, and how to move from observation to understanding to action. This one has five stages. They are not sequential steps to be completed in order. They are orientations that recur throughout any serious engagement with an organization.
The method described here is rooted in ethnographic practice — the tradition of studying human communities from the inside, over time, with sustained attention to what people actually do rather than what they say they do. Applied to organizations, this means resisting the pull toward premature diagnosis, toward the comfort of familiar frameworks, and toward solutions that arrive before the problem is fully understood.
01
Observation
Seeing what others overlook.
02
Inquiry
Asking questions that reveal underlying assumptions.
03
Synthesis
Connecting observations into meaningful patterns.
04
Design
Developing intentional responses grounded in evidence.
05
Steward
Creating the conditions for lasting adaptation.
