Keep what works working.
Clarify plans, share information, and recognize the habits that help you depend on one another.
Rooted in motivational interviewing
What does this
conversation
need from you?
When advice isn’t landing or agreements keep slipping, find a clearer purpose for the next conversation.
Ask–Offer–Ask is a motivational interviewing practice for exchanging information and advice. Explore what supports trust and accountability—with a partner, a colleague, or a team.
Leave with a clearer focus and one useful next step.
The space between reaction and response
What you hear
“I thought we already agreed on this.”
What you could ask
“Can we compare what each of us understood?”
Same moment. A clearer purpose.
Start with shared expectations.
For your next conversationA free guided reflection. No account needed.For directors, supervisors, and learning leaders →Team training through AMIGA · Half-day $3,500 · Full-day $5,000
The space between us
What can we make
possible between us?
What can each person understand, say, choose, take responsibility for, and depend on? These questions matter across everyday relationships, with or without formal authority.
Find room to respond.
Notice your reaction. Consider whether the moment needs understanding, a pause, a limit, or support.
Address what happened.
Acknowledge the impact, clarify responsibility, and decide what would make a next step credible.
Explore what could be different.
When change is the purpose, MI helps people explore their own reasons, concerns, and possibilities.
Different purposes, not fixed stages. Trust can grow through listening and follow-through, and it can make honest participation more possible. These influences work in both directions.
Purpose before technique
You can be right about the problem.
And still miss what the moment needs.
“They are not taking this seriously” may reflect a real concern. It can also leave you with little direction beyond repeating yourself or pressing harder.
You do not have to dismiss your interpretation to ask a more useful question: Which condition may need attention, and what could better look like? Check that possibility with the other person. A shared focus gives Ask–Offer–Ask a purpose.
The bridge from understanding to action
Find the focus.
Then choose the words.
The ideal state makes your purpose concrete: what should be clearer, more workable, or better understood by the end of this exchange?
- 01 · INTERPRETATION
What am I bringing to this?
Notice your response and the meaning you are giving the moment. Separate what happened from what you infer.
- 02 · CONDITION
What may need attention?
Choose a condition to explore or a strength to protect. Keep your own responsibilities in view.
- 03 · IDEAL STATE
What could better look like?
Describe a realistic, observable possibility. Check it with the other person; let their view change the focus.
- 04 · ASK–OFFER–ASK
What would help us get there?
Ask, listen and reflect, offer what is relevant, then ask again. Adapt as you learn; a pause may come first.
Why the foundation matters
Change conversations rest
on everyday foundations.
Trust and accountability become tangible through what we repeatedly say, do, clarify, and follow through on.
Change
conversations
conversations
Engagement +
shared participation
shared participation
Trust + accountability
The six conditionsSpecific behaviors
in everyday exchanges
in everyday exchanges
Build from the foundation
Everyday conversations have many purposes.
We share information, clarify expectations, understand concerns, explain limits, and coordinate what happens next. Ask–Offer–Ask brings MI’s collaborative spirit into these exchanges.
When change is the purpose, participation matters.
In MI, engagement and a shared focus create a basis for exploring the person’s own reasons, concerns, and possibilities for change.
Make trust and accountability concrete.
Pay attention to what each person can actually experience: clear expectations, room to speak and think, genuine choice, understood responsibilities, and reliable follow-through.
The six conditions help you identify which of these needs attention. A possible ideal state gives you a direction to check together. These six conditions are a practice framework, not a proven set of necessary and sufficient causes of trust.
For people responsible for team development
Help your people handle the conversations their work requires.
For directors, supervisors, and learning leaders in helping professions and other people-facing teams. AMIGA training connects MI skills to feedback, difficult information, expectations, and follow-through.
Half-day $3,500 · Full-day $5,000
Practice the work people actually do.
Use relevant situations and feedback to connect the structure to each role’s responsibilities.
Build a shared way to prepare.
Notice an interpretation, explore a condition, and make the purpose of the exchange clear.
Know what happens next.
Tell AMIGA about your audience and needs. We clarify the learning goal and propose a format, scope, and cost before booking.
A place to keep growing
Keep learning from
real conversations.
Try one next step, then return to the reflection to notice what changed. For deeper MI practice, AMIGA’s Becoming MI™ Learning Lab offers conversations to practice, values exploration, and a place to keep your learning.
Try Today’s Conversation without an account. A free AMIGA account opens the wider practice collection and saved learning. Reflections written on this site stay here unless you download them; they do not transfer to the Lab.