1Opening & Consent3 min▾
"Thank you for making time. This is a 45-minute conversation about your work and AI, before the program starts. There are no right answers – I am interested in your experience, in your words.
Before we begin, I want to name that I am wearing two hats today. I will be your program facilitator, and I am also the researcher on this study. If you would rather not answer something, or would rather I did not record a particular part, please say so. It will not affect the program or your standing at North East Water. Anything reported is de-identified and aggregated.
Can I confirm you are still comfortable being recorded, and do you have any questions before we start?"
Before we begin, I want to name that I am wearing two hats today. I will be your program facilitator, and I am also the researcher on this study. If you would rather not answer something, or would rather I did not record a particular part, please say so. It will not affect the program or your standing at North East Water. Anything reported is de-identified and aggregated.
Can I confirm you are still comfortable being recorded, and do you have any questions before we start?"
Capture
Consent confirmed
Dual role acknowledged
Nervous/guarded
Open/relaxed
2Role & Work Context5 minSQ1SQ5▾
Walk me through a typical week in your role – what are you actually doing day to day?
- What parts take the most thought or judgement?
- What parts feel routine or repetitive?
- Who do you rely on – and who relies on you – to get your work done?
- What has changed about this role in the last year or two?
Capture
Mostly routine
High judgement
Relies on others
Role changed recently
Inherited processes
3AI Exposure & Use6 minSQ1SQ2▾
Tell me about the last time you used an AI tool at work. Walk me through what you were trying to do and what happened.
- What did you notice about the result – what was useful, what was not?
- Was there a moment AI showed you something about your work you had not seen before?
- Have you used AI for something you did not tell anyone about?
- Have you changed how you work because of AI? What does that look like?
- Have you seen other people here use AI well, or badly?
v0.3.1 · Relational Mediator
"Has AI changed any of your relationships at work – how you work with someone, or how you understand them?"
Why ↓
Surfaces AI operating at the relational level – bridging understanding between people, not just completing tasks. Listen for stories of AI creating connection or distance.
Capture
Visibility moment
Secret AI use
Changed how they work
AI changed a relationship
Noticed others' AI use
Registers
Competence
Identity
Authority
Legitimacy
Relevance
4The Invisible Work8 minSQ1 primary▾
What is something about your work that is hard to explain to someone new – the kind of thing you only learn by doing it for a while?
- If you had to hand your role over in a week, what would be hardest for your replacement?
- Is there a workaround or informal practice you use that is not written down?
- Are there judgement calls you make that a procedure would not capture?
- Where does actual decision-making happen – is that the same as where it is supposed to?
- Is there a part of your work you would find uncomfortable to see made visible?
v0.3.2 · Systemic Patterns
"If someone from outside spent a week watching how this organisation actually works – not what the org chart says, but what really happens – what would they notice that people inside have stopped seeing?"
Why ↓
Surfaces the organisational water the participant swims in (SHAPE Ch.3). Patterns described as unchangeable facts rather than choices. Difficulty answering is itself data about systemic awareness.
v0.3.1 · Pre-Existing Dysfunction
"Is there a problem in how work gets done here that you have been hoping AI might help solve – something that existed before AI arrived?"
Why ↓
Captures pre-existing conditions that shape AI adoption. Decision paralysis, communication failures, knowledge silos. The emotional weight attached signals which register AI adoption will be filtered through.
Capture
Tacit knowledge
Hidden workaround
Process variation
Role assumption
Informal authority
Uncomfortable if visible
Pre-existing problem
Systemic pattern
Org dynamics
Decision gap
Silo
Power mismatch
Weak containment
Strong containment
5Interpretation – Registers10 minSQ2 primary▾
Go where the energy is. Depth on 3–4 registers is better than surface coverage of all 5.
Competence
- When AI does part of a task well, how does that sit with you – more capable, less capable, or something else?
- What would it mean if AI turned out to be better than you at something you value?
- [v0.3.2] Has there been a moment with AI that cost you something – energy, confidence, time, a sense of how you used to do things?
Identity
- What do you most want to be known for in your work? Does AI sit with that, or against it?
Authority
- Who has the say over how AI is used in your area? Does that match who should?
- Do you feel you have permission to experiment? Where does that come from?
- [v0.3.1] When your team uses AI for shared work, who decides how? Negotiated, assumed, or imposed?
Legitimacy
- Is using AI something that "belongs" in your role, or do you have to justify it?
- Have you held back from using AI because of how it might look?
Relevance
- What makes your expertise valuable – what stays the same and what changes if AI becomes common?
v0.3.1 · Narrative Baseline
"If you were describing AI to someone who had never encountered it – maybe a family member – what would you tell them? Has that description changed over the last year?"
Why ↓
Captures the participant's operating narrative about AI – the story that filters all their experiences. "What would you tell someone else" produces more authentic narratives than "what do you think." A narrative shift maps directly to Shaping Arc movement.
Capture
Registers – depth
Competence deep
Identity deep
Authority deep
Legitimacy deep
Relevance deep
Signals
Emotional cost
Narrative surfaced
Contradiction
Hedging
Energy shift
Pronoun shift
Disowned competence
Disowned authority
Strong emotion
Team authority gap
Psychodynamic
DEP Dependency · PAIR Pairing · FF Fight-flight · SPLIT Splitting · PROJ Projection
DEP
PAIR
FF
SPLIT
PROJ
Competence & Identity
Authority & Legitimacy
Relevance & Narrative
6Response & Experimentation7 minSQ3▾
What do you find yourself doing – or not doing – as AI becomes more present in the organisation?
- What have you tried? What stopped you trying something?
- Have you ever said you would use AI and then quietly not done it?
- What are you quietly worried about – about AI, the program, or what it might reveal?
- Is there anything you feel you should already be doing with AI that you are not?
- What would make you want to stop using AI?
v0.3.2 · Insight-to-Action Gap
"Is there something you know AI could help you with – you can see it clearly – but you haven't done it? What's in the way?"
Why ↓
The central question of the PhD (Gray 2026): why does knowing not lead to doing? The nature of the barrier – technical, relational, organisational, or psychological – reveals which organisational dynamics are operating.
v0.3.1 · Siloing Risk
"Since you started using AI more, are there conversations you used to have with colleagues that you no longer need to have? What were those about – and do you miss them?"
Why ↓
Surfaces lost touchpoints – the invisible cost of individual AI adoption. "Do you miss them" probes whether the participant even recognises what was lost. AI burying what was previously visible.
Capture
Response patterns
Adaptive: Trying, experimenting · Defensive: Avoiding, dismissing · Sophisticated avoidance: Enthusiastic words, no action · Shaped isolation: High capability, withdrawing from collaboration
Adaptive
Defensive
Avoidance
Sophisticated avoidance
Shaped isolation
Insight-action gap
Lost conversations
New conversations
7Organisational Conditions5 minSQ4▾
How does North East Water – leaders, team, systems – make it easier or harder to try new ways of working?
- Where do people here actually learn new tools – training, watching a colleague, trial and error?
- Have your leaders said anything about AI? What have they said – and what have they not said?
- If you found something useful, how would it travel to other people here?
- What kind of setting works for you – training, working session, one-on-one, pilot?
v0.3.2 · Containment
"When something difficult comes up at work – a mistake, a disagreement, a moment of not knowing – what happens? Is it safe here to be seen not knowing something?"
Why ↓
PhD (Gray 2026): containment is a core condition for transformation. Whether AI visibility is productive or threatening depends on whether the container is strong enough. "Not knowing" probes psychological safety without using the term.
v0.3.1 · Travel of Practice
"Can you think of a time when something someone learned about AI actually changed how someone else worked? What happened?"
Why ↓
Targets the travel of practice through relationships rather than formal channels. If no example, ask: "What would need to be true for that to happen here?"
Capture
Safe to not know
Not safe
Leadership clear
Leadership silent
Learns via peers
Learns via training
Learns alone
Practice travels
Practice stuck
8Close1 min▾
- Is there anything I did not ask that you wanted to say?
- Any questions about the program or the research?
- Remind: T2 midpoint (~week 6), T3 post-program. Withdraw any time.
Capture
Had more to say
Asked questions
Emotional
Relieved
CSContact Summary (within 10 min)▾
Overall Impression
Standout Quotes (2-3 verbatim)
Emergent Themes
What Was Not Said
Shaping Arc Stage
Researcher inference only – never shared with participant.
Disconfirming Observations
Ethics Flags
Follow-up Actions
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