Marilee Adams, Ph.D. is the founder and president of the Inquiry Institute and the originator of Question ThinkingTM. As a thought leader, consultant, executive coach, facilitator, and professional speaker for some of the world’s leading companies, Marilee is often referred to as the Chief Question Officer. Her work sets the standard for transforming the spirit of inquiry into practical, powerful and user-friendly questioning skills and tools that are used throughout the world. In her consulting practice, Marilee has witnessed the transformative power of Question Thinking for individuals, leaders, teams, organizations, and communities. This includes Fortune 100 companies, Lockheed Martin, Johnson & Johnson, Siemens Building Technologies, and DHL; the National Defense University and NASA Goddard in the Federal Government; hospitals such as Toronto General hospital; and national non-profit organizations the American Society of Training and Development, the Girl Scouts of America, and the Brookings Institution.

Before turning her attention to the world of business and organizational effectiveness, Marilee was a psychotherapist for more than twenty-five years, facilitating individuals, couples, and families in using thoughtful inquiry to create remarkable new possibilities for themselves. She also expresses her passion, commitment, and belief in the benefits of Learner inquiry through the Thoughtful Citizenship Project she founded as an initiative of the Inquiry Institute.
Marilee’s first book, The Art of the Question: a Guide to Short-Term Question-Centered Therapy (John Wiley & Sons, 1998) was lauded as a “seminal and breakthrough contribution to the field of psychotherapy.” The Question Thinking work at the core of the story in Change Your Questions is based on proven principles and research, described in that book, about how people think, feel, behave, and change.

Marilee has contributed book chapters on Question Thinking to Action Learning and Its Applications and to Positively M.A.D.: Making a Difference in Your Organizations, Communities, and the World. She co-authored, with Margen Schiller, Ph.D. and David Cooperrider, Ph.D., a chapter for Advances in Appreciative Inquiry, Vol. I. She has also published articles on the expert use of questions in coaching, business, relationships, and organizational transformation. Marilee earned her Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from the Fielding Graduate Institute, her Master’s Degree in Social Work from Virginia Commonwealth University, is adjunct faculty for the Adler Institute of Coaching in Canada and lectures at Columbia University Teacher’s College.
Marilee is a member of the Core Faculty, Certificates in Leadership Coaching, which is co-sponsored by Adler International Learning and the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education of the University of Toronto. She is also affiliated with Columbia University’s Learning & Leadership (L&L) Group at Teachers College and is a member of the Berrett-Koehler Author Co-op Board.

Marilee and her husband, artist Ed Adams, live in the river town and arts community of Lambertville, New Jersey. She welcomes your correspondence at Choice@ InquiryInstitute.com.