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By Tim Strasser (PhD)

Please get in touch for inquiries

Email / LinkedIn

Strategic Capacity development, Leadership and Evaluation

in 3 Dimensions

LENGTH

persistence

WIDTH

influence

DEPTH

embeddedness

SCALE 3D

↓↓ See ↓↓ explanations and links in the notes field below

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3D framework

an intuitive way of seeing �innovation processes in 3D

APPLICATIONS

1) planning strategic goals & actions

2) evaluating progress & process

3) learning and adapting strategies

SCALE 3D tool

to design and evaluate strategies

for scaling transformative impact

See this article for more details about benefits and application process

SCALE 3D consists of a framework and tool, which constitute a way of understanding and shaping the network leadership roles and transformative capacities needed for scaling social impact that is widespread, fundamental and long-lasting. This makes SCALE 3D relevant for practitioners, evaluators, action researchers, policy makers and funders seeking to scale transformative social impact of organizations, networks and social movements who are creating urgently needed pathways towards regenerative, just and thriving futures for humanity.

The 3D framework offers a systematic and comprehensive overview of network leadership roles and practices and the ways in which they can contribute to transformative capacities and impacts. It can help to make visible, tangible, and fundable the often hidden and under-resourced practice of network leadership. It offers a simple but not simplistic, generic, yet also context-sensitive way to analyze and guide efforts to develop transformative capacity.

The SCALE 3D tool can be used to guide people in network leadership roles to develop strategies for scaling social impact and to evaluate networks and projects. That is, it can help to clarify strategic goals and actions for developing transformative capacity, to evaluate progress and process, and assess achievements, gaps and possible further developments. The tool consists of a spreadsheet and a canvas (explained in the slides below). Also see this simplified version for projects.

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3D = THREE IMPACT DIMENSIONS

wide

deep

persistent

narrow

volatile

shallow

WIDTH

wide-spread & coherent �influence

DEPTH

structural & cultural �embeddedness

LENGTH

persistent & evolving �reproduction

At the core of the 3D framework is the view that institutions can be understood in terms of their degrees of institutionalization in three dimensions: �width (wide-spread and coherent influence), depth (structural and cultural embeddedness) and length (persistent and evolving reproduction).

Dominant institutions are understood as social rules (what is considered “normal”) that are widely influential, deeply embedded and persistently reproduced & adapted (e.g. neoliberal growth economics, the welfare system, etc). So if social innovators seek to transform dominant institutions (that is challenging, altering and/or replacing them) and create a “new normal”, they need to develop, spread and embed (i.e institutionalise) alternative ways of relating, doing, thinking, framing and knowing across these three dimensions.

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3D FRAMEWORK SIMPLE OVERVIEW

The 3D framework, has three layers: (1) network leadership, supporting and enabling the development of (2) transformative capacity, which contributes to realizing (3) transformative impact, across three dimensions of depth, width and length. Each of these layers consist of more specific framework elements, which are presented on the next slide. Each of these elements interact to co-create transformative social innovation processes.

For example, co-organizing conferences with partner networks, offering courses and trainings, and coordinating research and advocacy projects are network leadership practices that can enable the spread and adaptation of social innovations across the world (widening), while also working towards changes in policies and mental models (deepening) and generating resources and resilience that support continuity of the efforts of social innovators and the institutional changes they seek to achieve (lengthening).

The three dimensions of transformative capacities largely align with and complement existing typologies that describe how social innovation initiatives can scale, diffuse, grow, or amplify their efforts to attain institutional changes.

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3D FRAMEWORK COMPLETE OVERVIEW

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SCALE 3D CANVAS = FOR VIRTUAL WORKSHOPS

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SCALE 3D PROJECT CANVAS

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SCALE 3D SHEET = FOR DETAILED PLANNING & EVALUATION

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SCALE 3D SHEET = NETWORK LEADERSHIP ROLES

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APPLYING SCALE 3D FOR STRATEGY & EVALUATION

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APPLYING SCALE 3D FOR STRATEGY & EVALUATION

Steps	Description	Evaluator roles
1. Clarifying strategic goals and roles	Clearly articulate and prioritize intended transformative impacts and capacity outcomes (in each of the three dimensions) and the network leadership roles needed to achieve these	Guide systematic articulation and prioritisation of strategic goals and roles
2. Designing activities to contribute to strategic goals	Clarify how activities of various work streams can strengthen contributions to transformative capacities and how these activities can interact synergistically	Guide the articulation of capacity contributions and synergies across work streams
3. Monitoring and evaluation	Clarify which data needs to be collected, how, by whom, for which purposes, and by when, so it can inform strategic learning and reporting in a timely manner	Help develop and implement appropriate monitoring and evaluation approaches
4. Strategic learning	Reflect on monitoring data, and internal and external developments to guide strategic learning and decision-making and adapt goals, activities, and monitoring approaches	Support data-informed and goal-oriented reflection on and adaptation of strategic activities
5. Reporting	Integrate monitoring data and lessons learnt into progress and/or impact reports and make use of findings	Capture lessons learnt, write, and disseminate reports

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VISION

SCALE 3D becomes a �widely used, institutionally embedded, and continuously evolving �way of understanding, evaluating, and strategizing �for transformative impact. �

Thereby it increases the effectiveness and coherence among existing scaling efforts and frameworks and helps to strengthen, resource and align practitioners, funders, researchers, �and evaluators working towards transformative innovation.

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3D TOOL APPLICATION IN WORKSHOP SETTING:

The tool can also be used in in-person workshop settings, using physical cards and post-its.

This image shows an application of a prototype version of my evaluation tool in the context of a festival at an ecovillage in Germany, which aimed at gathering a diversity of social innovators and activists to build and strengthen a collaborative network and to spread regenerative culture more widely.

Inspired by how the Ecovillage Design cards are used in a workshop setting (see next slide), I created paper cards for each dimension of transformative impact and related capacities and arranged them according to the three dimensions. After briefly explaining the 3D model and each of the transformative capacities, I invited participants to evaluate to what extent the festival was enacting and contributing to the development of capacities in each of the three dimensions. I first asked participants to individually write aspects they thought were well developed on green post-its and aspects that could be further developed on pink post-its and then to place them on the left and right side (respectively) of each competence.

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SIMILAR TOOLS BY SOCIAL INNOVATION NETWORKS �ECOVILLAGE DESIGN CARDS & TRANSITION HEALTH CHECK

while such tools mostly focus on supporting local social innovation initiatives,

the SCALE 3D tool focuses on the level of networks

Many TSI networks developed diagnostic tools for self-assessment, reflection and evaluation that focuses on what is understood as essential elements or principles of effective practice in local groups: for example the Ecovillage Design Cards of GEN, or the Health Check of Transition Network (see below).

While these tools typically focus on the context of local groups, few such tools exist that focus on the level of the network as a whole. The purpose of the prototype tool offered here is to highlight specifically the capacities (which can be developed via learning processes) that are important for TSI networks to contribute to transformative change.

Ecovillage Design Cards

represent the five dimensions of sustainability that are essential to GEN’s understanding of sustainable design: social, ecology, economy, culture and whole system design.
the cards can be used for assessing the degree to which each of the elements (for each of the 5 dimensions) are developed in the local context that is being evaluated: light green leaves representing elements that are well developed and dark green leaves representing elements that can be further developed.

Transition Health Check

According to their website: “This healthcheck has been designed to help your Transition Group:

Reflect on where your group is at, and spark conversations about what’s working well, what could be strengthened, as well as what isn’t working and needs to change
Celebrate your strengths, successes and your failures as they are also great learning experiences
Identify areas which might need more work, skills, or resources
Clarify appropriate next steps – which might include focusing on less things”

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Building on TSI theory by…

1. articulating three institutional dimensions�for understanding transformative change

2. studying network leadership practices �for developing transformative capacity & impact

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challenging, altering or replacing

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Transformative change

“challenging, altering and/or replacing dominant institutions”

Institutions

“social rules that govern interaction”

Formal: laws, incentives / Informal: customs, beliefs

Transformation

“ Persistent adjustment in institutions

with sufficient width and depth”

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Tim Strasser

By Tim Strasser (PhD): tim.strasser@yahoo.de

Please get in touch for inquiries

RESEARCH

PhD @ Maastricht Sustainability Institute

PRACTICE

ECOLISE

Transition Network

Students Organizing for Sustainability International