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Conversation-based Assessment™ (CBA)

CBA is an approach that aligns peoples’ desire for a high-involvement culture with the processes of assessment and learning. CBA’s engage participants in a process that has two major goals:

• To gather information and reveal current organizational conditions;
• To foster individual accountability for learning and development. 

Any scheduled or informal conversation has a potential to be “learningful” and action-oriented.  In short, CBA goes beyond the typical organizational assessment aimed at gathering information and prescribing a diagnosis.  This approach engages people personally in organizational learning and development.  It is a participative alternative to the various anonymous assessment methods (quantitative e-mail surveys, anonymous written response surveys, etc.) common in organizations today. 

The structure of CBAs depends on specific and desired outcomes. Planning meetings with the sponsor(s) always begin a CBA.  These meetings establish the purpose, goals, scope, and time lines of the assessment.  In general, the process is as follows:

CBA is characterized by the emphasis on language used by participants, and what that language reveals about current organizational conditions.  Effective textual analysis is central to delivering results to clients.  This interpretive analysis should be done as a small group effort with 3 or 4 (no more than 4) people providing insight into the interpretation.  A key goal of CBA is to have a high degree of buy-in to the interpretation and recommendations on the part of participants who must implement them.