Planning and Implementation

Please note: A ParEvo exercise has two stages: generative and evaluative. This page is about the planning and implemenation of the generative stage, where the output is a tree of storylines about alternative futures, all with one common origin. The evaluation stage is described in a separate page here. Both are important. They are equivalent to the Exploration and Exploitation phases of organisational learning, as described by March.

1. Planning

1.1 Purpose

There are at least three kinds of possible exercise objectives:

  • The process: How people participate
  • The contents: The contents of the storylines that are generated
  • The outcomes of the exercise: Cognitive and behavioural

1.1.1 Process objectives

These can be about how people participate. For example:

  • Identifying future scenarios which have maximum ownership by all participants
  • Identifying which participants are particularly good at making contributions valued by others, and vice versa
  • Measuring the diversity of participant contributions, and identifying which participants are most similar and most different in their perspectives on a given issue
  • Doing research on what forms of participation are associated with the development of scenarios that are positively (or negatively) evaluated on criteria like diversity, likelihood or desirability.

1.1.2 Content objectives

ParEvo can be used to develop alternative views of:

  • What has happened in the past
  • What might happen in the future. These can be of two types
    • Forecasting, where there is no prior view of what the desired end state is, for any particular time in the future.
    • Backcasting, where there is an agreed end state, which any scenarios being developed should lead to.

In practice the Facilitator will usually have more specific ideas on what kind of possible futures or past histories they are interested in. These will need to be expressed in the exercise title, the guidance given at the top of the parevo.org exercise page and in the seed paragraph (as discussed below).

1.1.3 Outcome objectives

1.1.3.1 Cognitive changes

During and after a ParEvo exercise changes may take place in about how people think about the future. We can see this as a form of meta-cognition. Cognitive outcomes may be in the form of identified gaps in our imagination, questionable or critical assumptions, or contradictions. Facilitators of ParEvo exercises are likely to have their own particular view of what sorts of changes in thinking about the future would be most desirable and should try to make these explicit.

1.1.3.2 Behavioural changes

During a ParEvo exercise participants may make decisions about what follow up actions they will (or others should or could) take after the completion of an exercise. Facilitators should try to identify the kinds of decisions that would be of most interest given the context of their exercise. These are discussed further below, in the Evaluation stage

1.2 Participants

People can be involved in up to 6 different roles within a ParEvo exercise. But three roles are essential: The Administrator, a Facilitator and Participants, all others are optional

  • The ParEvo Administrator who approves requests from people to act as a Facilitator and provides them with the parameters they can control. Ongoing technical support and advice can also be provided to Facilitators during the planning and implementation of an exercise. The sole administrator at present is Rick Davies
  • A Facilitator(s) who invites participants, sets up the framework within which they can participate, and provides continuing guidance throughout a ParEvo exercise. They set the objectives for an exercise, not the Administrator.
  • Participants (aka Contributors), who generate the contents of scenarios within a ParEvo exercise
  • Commentators, who comment on the contributions made by participants. Commentators can be Contributors, and/or the Facilitator, and/or other third parties.
  • Evaluators, who evaluate the storylines at the end of a ParEvo exercise. They can be Contributors and/or Commentators and or third parties
  • Observers, who can view the contents generated by a ParEvo process, in real-time and after completion. But not to add content in any way. This is done by sharing an exercise-specific hypertext link, created by the Facilitator.

How they can participate: Participants can participate as individuals, representing their own views. Or they can represent their role in an organisation. Or as individuals, participants can each represent a whole team or unit, within an organisation, voicing a particular interest or perspective. Or, in each iteration, they can voice the views/behaviour of different actors who could be involved in the unfolding events. Approaches which maximise the diversity of views are likely to be helpful. But all within the constraint that participants should be expected to have a shared interest in the scenarios being developed.

Numbers: The minimum number seems likely to be four, but larger numbers are preferable. Larger numbers will generate more diversity of views. For more on this question see “How many is too many“. Diversity is what drives the ParEvo process. With really large numbers it may be best for these to be broken into a number of small teams, each acting as a quasi-individual. There is some evidence that diverse teams (each with more homogeneous members) may be the best way to solve complex problems (Pescetelli, et al, 2020)

Fit: There needs to be some degree of fit between the characteristics of the group of participants and the purpose of a ParEvo exercise. The purpose has to be motivational in one respect or another. Asking people to speculate on alternate futures that they either know little about or whose contents will have little consequences for them, may not be very productive.

1.3 Timeframe

This has two dimensions: duration and granularity. Duration is the total length of time that a set of ParEvo generated storylines are expected to cover. For example, 5 years or 10 years. This choice can be revised during the exercise.

Granularity is the total length of time covered by a single iteration. So far, this has varied from three months to a year. Shorter duration exercises tend to have more granularity i.e. cover shorter periods of time per iteration. Each iteration does not have to cover the same period of time. Iterations in the near future might best cover short periods of time, whereas those further in the future could cover longer periods of time.

The total number of iterations will be a function of the desired duration and granularity

The optimal number of iterations may depend partly on the number of participants. If the number of iterations equals the number of participants +1 then this means that each participant will have had the opportunity to build on the contributions of each of the other participants, at on at least one occasion. This might represent a minimal ideal level of opportunity to explore and exploit the diversity of ideas presented by the diversity of participants. In practice, in the exercises completed so far, only one of the exercises has extended this far.

2. Implementation

2.1 Immediate steps

Apply to be a Facilitator, by going to https://parevo.org/. After acceptance by the Administrator Go to My Account, then scroll down to Exercises you’re facilitating and click on Add exercise. The add relevant text to the sections that are describe below.

2.1.1 Add the title and image

These choices need to convey the idea behind the exercises in an imaginative and engaging way.

2.1.2 Write the seed paragraph

This paragraph will normally be drafted by the Facilitator. Think of it as the opening paragraph in the first chapter of a novel. It provides a summary statement of the current reality that the participants have to build on and extend, to visualise possible futures. It has to be imaginable, brief and clear, but at the same time leaving space for participants to populate the story with specific details in the forthcoming iterations. It may be best to leave the drafting to the end of the planning stage. Below is a simple example, from a brief climate action scenario development exercise (undertaken at the start of 2025):

“Last year (2024) was the hottest year on record. World leaders and their representatives were unable to agree at the annual UNFCCC climate meetings on what concrete actions countries should collectively take. The following are stories about some the events that subsequently took place between 2025 to 2035, as told by those working in the field, and by others”

2.1.3 Add the participant instructions

In each iteration, from the beginning onwards, the facilitator needs to provide participants with some guidance. This will be found at the top of the ParEvo user interface. It will usually include the following:

  • Context setting information. This reminds participants of the overall purpose of exercise, in more detail than described in the title.
  • Minimal requirements for participants’ contributions. These can include:
    • Maximum length of contributions, the suggested default is 200 words
    • Deadlines for contributions, say within 24 or 48 hours
    • Plausibility/probability and consistency requirements. Most often participants are asked to describe “possible” events and include both the desirable and undesirable
    • Preferred genre e.g. documentary, or biography
    • Anonymity requirements. Participants should not accidentally disclose their identity
    • Boundaries: No abuse, no science fiction / fantasy, no comedy
  • Privacy policy: A link to the Privacy Policy is essential: https://parevo.org/privacy/

See the Guidance text suggestions page for more ideas

2.1.4 Add exercise participants

This is where all the participants names are entered, along with choices about their authorised roles. Once completed, an invitation email can be triggered that tells participants how to access the exercise.

2.2 The exercise begins

2.2.1 The first iteration

Here all participants start by going to the exercise page, visible immediately after logging in, or via their Dashboard, if there is more than one they are participating in. There they the read guidance notes at the top, and the seed paragraph immediately below. They then add their own contribution, describing what they imagine happens next. Each of these is the beginning of a separate storyline about the future.

The exercise page layout:

  1. The Facilitators guidance in the top right area, with the exercise title above it
  2. A graphic representing the exercise theme, on the top left
  3. The seed text, underneath the Facilitators guidance with the ID #: 0
  4. A tree structure, on the left side, enabling participants to navigate along and between different storylines, while seeing how they connect to each other.
  5. This is supplemented by a scrollable column of text on the right of the page, representing the currently selected storyline of interest. Clicking on any tree node on the left will make the relevant column of text appear on the right
  6. Though not shown here, there is also a space for comments on contributions.

During the timed allocated for this first iteration the Facilitator can check what people have written, via their own interface, also accessible via the Dashboard. If there are problems, with grammar, spelling or understanding of the exercise requirement the Facilitator can either directly edit the contributions or contact the contributor for clarification and perhaps request they make the necessary change.

At the end of the first iteration’s allocated time, the Facilitator ends the iteration. At this point in time all participants can now view what all other participants have written. But they can no longer edit their own contribution. Nor can anyone identify who has written which contribution. Anonymity separates ideas from personalities.

2.3 Subsequent iterations

A new iteration only begins when all participants have contributed to the previous iteration, and they have been displayed.

2.3.1 Facilitator updates guidance to participants

This may or may not be needed at the beginning of each new iteration, depending on participants previous behaviour and the need to introduce any new information about the imagined “surrounding context”.

2.3.2 Participants add new contributions

At the start of each subsequent iteration participants can now choose which existing storyline they want to build on with their new contribution. Before doing so they should re-read the exercise guidance, in case it has been updated. Each participant can only make one contribution, to one existing storyline, per iteration. But with each new iteration, they can change their mind about which storyline they now want to contribute to. Participants can choose to add to any previous contribution, made by others or by themselves. As before, these contributions are anonymous.

Up to now the default response has been for the Facilitator to not provide any guidance as to which types of storylines they should build. Participants are allowed to choose according to their own desires. If it is of interest, how they do this in practice, can be explored during the Evaluation stage.

2.3.3 Display and sharing of contributions

After all participants have made their next contribution the exercise page is updated to show the extended contents of each of the storylines. If more than one participant chooses to add their next contribution to the same existing storyline then that storyline now branches and becomes two (or more) storylines. On the other hand, if some existing storylines did not receive any new contributions they remain as viewable storylines but are now treated as “extinct”. These storylines can no longer be added to in subsequent iterations of participant contributions. The total number of continued storylines in an iteration will always equal the number of participants.

Click on My Account takes you to your Dashboard, where you will see a list of exercises you are participating in and or facilitating. In the Facilitating list you will can either

  1. click on the exercise name link, to view the exercise as seen by participants, or
  2. click on Manage, which will give you a table overview of who has contributed so far in each iteration

Above that table are two rows of additional navigation options:

  1. Next iteration, Next Comments, Start Evaluation, End Participation, Archive Contents. This is the simplest set of options, in a sequence from start to end of an exercise.
  2. Back, View workflow diagram, View and edit exercise settings. The last of these takes you to a full “under the hood” view of all the (editable) settings governing all stages of an exercise. Including real time listing of all contributions being made by participants.

2.5 Completion

When you have completed the last iteration, and (if needed) any evaluation that includes the evaluation widget, you click on End Participation. This will prevent anyone form adding further contributions or comments but will still enable participants to visit and explore the exercise contents.

Clicking on Archive Contents will remove the whole exercise form view, but it will still be accessible to the Facilitator and Administrator view the Edit Exercise page.

Note that full details of the exercise contents can be downloaded by the Facilitator via the Download section at the bottom of the Edit Exercise page.

It is recommended that the Guidance text for the last iteration be updated after exercise completion to signal that the exercise has been completed, and perhaps to gives an overview of what has been done.

In the Edit Exercise view it is possible to create a “public link” to the exercise that enables anyone with that link to view an exercise, at any stage, but not to add or edit any contents

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