Humble Inquiry: A Way of Being, or a Method?

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It was Graham Long, the former CEO of The Wayside Chapel, who used to say that:

“People are not problems to be solved, but people to be met.”

I think about that line often, especially when working alongside front line leaders across the community sector and particularly when I reflect on my time at Lifeline, both supporting people in crisis and leading the teams who held those conversations every day.

There’s real energy right now around finding better ways (methods) to work with the people we serve: trauma-informed practice, strengths-based approaches, person-centred care. These shifts matter. Any movement away from fear, blame and punitive responses is a step in the right direction. But I’ve come to believe there’s a deeper question beneath all this good work: what does a new method actually achieve (no matter how good), if we haven’t first explored the worldview it rests on?

I want to explore that question through a conversation I had recently with someone I’ve worked alongside.

A Story About Humble Inquiry

This colleague had been reading Edgar Schein’s Humble Inquiry and was keen to bring it into how they led their team.

Schein describes humble inquiry as:

“…the fine art of drawing someone out, of asking questions to which you do not already know the answer, of building a relationship based on curiosity and interest in the other person.” (p.2)

On a first read, it sounds simple enough: ask more open questions, listen more, tell less, build the relationship. And it could be that simple, if we treat humble inquiry as a method, a new technique to add to the toolkit.

But I don’t think that’s what Schein is pointing us toward. What if humble inquiry wasn’t seen as a method, but instead as ‘a way of being’ that requires us to genuinely accept people, along with their ideas, their fallibilities and their failings.

Why This Is Harder Than It Sounds

The community sector is full of well-meaning systems built to fix things: intake forms, risk assessments, case plans, KPIs. There’s nothing wrong with any of these on their own. But when our underlying worldview is about fixing rather than ‘meeting‘, we drag humble inquiry into it. We turn it into a process. We look for a script. We measure how often we’re “doing” it.

That’s what a fixing worldview does to good ideas. It’s what has happened to plenty of well-intentioned frameworks before this one: they start as an invitation to be more human, and slowly become another box to tick.

So why is it so hard to simply be with people, rather than fix them?

Because making our reason for being about someone else is genuinely difficult. Fixing feels productive. It feels like progress. Meeting people, on the other hand, means sitting with the uncomfortable truth that someone might be hurting, and that there’s nothing we can do to make that go away right now. That doesn’t feel as good.

During my time at Lifeline, I saw this tension every day, not just in conversations with people seeking support, but in how I led the team. The pull toward fixing was, and is, strong. It takes real discipline to stay with someone’s story rather than rush toward a solution.

If you find yourself reaching for humble inquiry as a technique to fix someone, there’s a good chance your worldview is still leaning toward fixing.

I Tried Humble Inquiry, But It Wasn’t Working

My colleague told me about a recent, difficult conversation with someone they support. They said:

“I tried Humble Inquiry, but it just wasn’t working, so in the end I just had to tell them what to do. They weren’t getting it. Sometimes you have to revert to telling.”

There’s truth in that. There are times when telling, not asking, is genuinely what’s needed. And there are times when asking open questions can feel frustrating for someone who came looking for answers.

But humble inquiry isn’t a formula that tells us exactly when to ask and when to tell. That call has a lot to do with the worldview we’re standing in when we make it.

Schein calls humble inquiry:

“…the gentle art of asking instead of telling.”

He also points to what gets in the way:

“The main problem: a culture that values task accomplishment more than relationship building.” (p.55)

Our sector knows this tension well. Targets, throughput, case closures, they all matter. But when task accomplishment outranks relationship, humble inquiry doesn’t stand a chance, no matter how many training days we run on it.

Where I’ve Landed

I’ll admit that, for a long time, my approach to leadership and helping people was grounded in fixing. It took years of sitting with my own discomfort, including during my time at Lifeline, before I saw what that worldview was doing to the people around the teams I led and to me.

I’d like to think my worldview now is more humanising, more willing to sit with people rather than ‘solve them’. I’m not against frameworks, tools or checklists. We need them, and there are good people who build them well. It’s simply that when a fixing worldview is left unexamined, it turns even our best intentions, humble inquiry included, into another thing we do to people, rather than a way we choose to be with them.

Dolphyn… the Y that calls us into community.

The Irony of Fixing: How Reductionism Can Break What It Tries to Repair

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Working in the community sector, especially in mental health and suicide prevention, I am regularly reminded of Graham Long’s words, former CEO of The Wayside Chapel, who lived by the principle that “people are not problems to be solved, but people to be met.”

While it is common to hear people suggest “I’m broken”, they don’t often ‘break’ in predictable ways, and they cannot simply be repaired with tools, checklists, or quick fixes. Yet the temptation to “fix” people is strong, especially when we care deeply and want to lessen pain, distress, or risk.

I often think of my good mate Brian. He’s a talented tinkerer. If a machine isn’t working properly, Brian is the person you want by your side. He can analyse, adjust, and repair nearly anything mechanical. I once took him a second-hand lawnmower that barely sputtered. After a few hours with Brian, it ran like new.

But as much as I value Brian’s skill, I would never want him, or anyone, to try to “fix” me when I’m not quite right.

Because I am human, when I’m not feeling quite right, I need space to feel, to struggle, to learn, to grow. We need time to make sense of our own emotions, our own pain, our own stories. We are not objects to be tinkered with. We are beings to be understood, accompanied, and met.

In mental health and suicide prevention, this distinction matters deeply. People don’t reach out to us because they need fixing; they often do so because they’re seeking connection.

Pain Is Part of Being Human

In our sector, we hear constant messages about fixing, helping, preventing, and intervening. These all have their place. But so do pain, suffering, confusion and grief. These experiences are part of being human, part of how people develop resilience, meaning and identity.

As Harold Kushner writes:

“It may be that instead of giving us a friendly world that would never challenge us and therefore never make us strong, God gave us a world that would inevitably break our hearts, and compensated for that by planting in our souls the gift of resilience.”

(Kushner 2007, p.55)

When someone is amid pain, a parent grieving a child, a person facing a frightening diagnosis, someone carrying the weight of trauma, it can be hard to see suffering as any kind of “gift”. And yet, pain often shapes us in ways comfort never could.

Nonetheless, the urge to fix persists. We aim to remove pain because we don’t want people to suffer. However, sometimes, in our haste to fix, we may unintentionally silence, minimise, or override the very experiences people need to share.

The Trap of Reductionism

Another reason we try to fix people is because our systems are built on reductionism. We break problems into parts, identify causes, and apply solutions. This works well for machines, but it may not work so well for people.

Sidney Dekker describes this clearly:

“Newton and Descartes’ ideas have pretty much set the agenda for how we, in the West, think about science, about truth, about cause and effect… much of the thinking and work we do in safety and accident prevention is modelled after their ideas.”

(Dekker 2011, p.53)

Reductionism assumes that once we identify the broken part, we can fix it. But people are not just parts. They are stories, relationships, histories, cultures, emotions, and contexts. When we treat people as objects, we dehumanise them, even when our intentions are good.

Responding Differently

If we recognise that pain can build resilience and that reductionism dehumanises, then the question becomes: how do we respond differently?

  • Notice the cues of reductionism – when we start talking about people as problems, cases or risks, we may already be slipping into objectifying them.
  • Prioritise relationship over repair – compassion, empathy, listening and presence are far more powerful than solutions.
  • Be conscious of binary thinking – pain is not “bad”; growth is not “good”. Life is rarely that simple.
  • Honour the humanity in every interaction – in mental health and suicide prevention, our greatest tool is connection, not expertise.

Please Don’t Try to Fix Me

If you ever feel I’m not running quite right, I would welcome your time, your compassion, your presence and your conversation. But please don’t try to fix me.

I’m not a machine. Neither are the people we serve.

We are human beings, messy, complex, resilient, vulnerable, and capable of extraordinary growth when we are met, not repaired.

 

Author: Robert Sams Email: robert@dolphyn.com.au Web: www.dolphyn.com.au

References:

Dekker, S. (2011). Drift Into Failure: From Hunting Broken Parts to Understanding Complex Systems. Ashgate Publishing.

Kushner, H. S. (2007). Overcoming Life’s Disappointments. Anchor Books.

The Power in Helping

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One of the profound lessons from my time working in mental health and suicide prevention is that helping is never just an act of kindness or support. Helping is also an exchange of power, sometimes subtle, sometimes obvious, but always present. Whether we are the one offering help or the one seeking it, we step into a relational space shaped by influence, vulnerability, expectation, and meaning. Helping is not simply something we do; it is something we enact with another person, and in doing so, power moves between us.

Being helped can feel comforting, relieving, and deeply human. It can also feel exposing, disorienting, or even shame‑inducing. Offering help can feel purposeful and generous, but if we are not attentive, it can slip into rescuing, directing, or controlling. Helping is everywhere in our lives, yet we rarely pause to consider the power differential that sits quietly beneath it.

Edgar Schein’s work has been foundational in supporting my understanding of this dynamic. In his book Helping (2011), Schein writes:

“Helping situations are intrinsically unbalanced and role ambiguous. Emotionally and socially, when you ask for help you are putting yourself ‘one down’.” (p. 31)

Anyone who has ever reached out in a moment of struggle knows this feeling. Asking for help can be an act of vulnerability; a step into a space where the other person’s response can either restore dignity or unintentionally diminish it.

Schein also names the corresponding “one upness” of the helper:

“Being thrust into the role of helper is immediately a gain in status and power – literally if I help someone who has fallen, or symbolically if I am a counsellor, consultant, or coach who is being asked to provide wisdom and expertise to solve a problem.” (p. 32)

Have you ever felt “one up” when offering help?

Can you recognise the power that exists when you are the one with something to give?

Schein’s reflections remind us that every helping relationship begins in a state of imbalance:

“…at the beginning, every helping relationship is a state of imbalance. The client is one down and therefore vulnerable; the helper is one up and therefore powerful.” (p. 35)

This imbalance is not inherently negative; it is simply real. The question is whether we recognise it and how we choose to work within it. When we ignore the power we hold, helping can easily become directive or paternalistic. When we acknowledge it, helping becomes a shared act of humanity, a space where dignity and agency are protected.

In counselling and community work, the ethical use of power is not about providing answers or solutions. It is about creating space for the other person’s voice, meaning, and agency to emerge. Helping becomes less about doing and more about being with. It is about stepping into relationship, recognising the power we hold, and choosing to use it with humility, curiosity, and grace. It is about resisting the seductive pull of certainty and instead honouring the other person’s capacity to make sense of their own world.

Helping is one of the most ordinary things we do, yet one of the most profound. When we approach it with awareness of power; how it moves, how it shapes, how it can heal or harm, helping becomes a quiet act of leadership. The kind that strengthens relationships, builds trust, and reminds us that we are all, at different moments, both the helper and the helped.

Reflective Questions:

  • What are your experiences of the power in helping?
  • Can you think of some ways that you can be more mindful of the power that you might have, and what this might do in your relationships when offering help?
  • How does this play out in your world?

Author: Robert Sams Website: www.dolphyn.com.au Email: robert@dolphyn.com.au Phone: 0424 037 112

Dolphyn… the Y that calls us into community.

Coming Together: Why Community Matters in Mental Health and Recovery

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In every community, there are people quietly navigating challenges with mental health, addiction, and the complex emotions that accompany them – shame, isolation, fear, and hope.

What often makes the difference is not a single intervention or program, but the presence of community: people coming together, listening, sharing stories, and reminding one another that recovery is not a solitary act.

At Dolphyn, we believe that the best way to support people through life’s challenges is to create spaces where meaning is made with others, not for them. This is the essence of social sensemaking: understanding risk, wellbeing, and life itself through relationship and dialogue.

When it comes to alcohol addiction and mental health, this communal approach is not just helpful, it’s transformative.

Who are some of the community organisations that are there to support people in our communities in these moments?

Hello Sunday Morning: Changing the Conversation About Alcohol

Founded in Australia in 2010, Hello Sunday Morning began as a personal experiment by Chris Raine to take a break from drinking and share the experience online. What started as one person’s story has grown into a global movement that helps thousands of people rethink their relationship with alcohol.

Through its digital platform Daybreak, Hello Sunday Morning connects people who want to change their drinking habits with a supportive online community. Members share reflections, challenges, and encouragement, creating a space where change happens through conversation and connection, not judgment.

The organisation’s philosophy is simple but powerful:

“We believe that changing your relationship with alcohol starts with understanding yourself and connecting with others.”

This is community in action, people learning from one another, finding meaning in shared experience, and supporting each other through the ups and downs of change.

SMART Recovery Australia: Practical Tools, Shared Strength

SMART Recovery Australia takes a similar community‑based approach, offering mutual‑aid meetings and programs where people support one another in managing addictive behaviours, including alcohol, drugs, gambling, and more.

SMART stands for Self‑Management and Recovery Training, and its model is grounded in evidence‑based psychology. But what makes it powerful is not just the tools: it’s the people.

Each meeting is a space where participants share experiences, learn practical strategies, and build confidence together. Facilitators guide the process, but the wisdom comes from the group itself.

SMART Recovery’s approach recognises that recovery is not about perfection or heroism; it’s about collective learning and shared accountability.
It’s about people discovering that they are not alone, that others have walked similar paths and are willing to walk beside them.

Community as a Protective Factor

Both Hello Sunday Morning and SMART Recovery Australia show that community is not a backdrop to recovery, it is the method.

When people come together, they create conditions that support healing that no policy alone can replicate.

They build trust, reduce stigma, and remind one another that change is possible.

In the language of Social Sensemaking, this is how we make sense of risk and life, socially, collectively, and compassionately.

Recovery is not a technical process; it’s a relational one. It happens in the spaces between people – in conversation, in shared vulnerability, and in the courage to be seen.

The Work Ahead

As we continue to face rising rates of anxiety, depression, and addiction across Australia, the challenge is not just to expand services but to strengthen communities. To create environments where people feel safe to speak, to listen, and to belong.

Organisations like Hello Sunday Morning and SMART Recovery Australia remind us that the most powerful form of support is often the simplest: being together.

At Dolphyn, this is the heart of our work, helping people and organisations rediscover the Y that calls us into community. Because when we come together, we don’t just manage risk.

We make sense of life – together.