01
Scalability
Should we scale?
Assess whether scaling is justified, for whom and under which conditions. Situate examines the place before you use O-DEAR to make or revisit that judgement.
Situate
O-DEAR
Scaling Focus
Directions
The Scaling Field Guide
Should we scale?
How? Is it working?
Practical guidance for deciding whether to scale, planning how to do it and reviewing whether benefits continue. Explore the four Toolkit tools and Situate, with three free documents to support their use.
The framing
Three recurring questions
Scalability, scaling and scale are questions to revisit as the approach and its conditions change. The tools help investigate them. Select a lens to read more.
02
Scaling
How will we scale?
The deliberate process of introducing the innovation through a delivery structure, in a system that pushes back. Choosing a pathway, designing the business model, building the partnerships, planning what is fixed and what is flexible.
Scaling Pathways
Scaling Canvas
03
Scale
Is it working at scale?
Review whether people continue to benefit as delivery changes. Investigate adaptations and the conditions supporting the outcomes, including the local relationships identified through Situate.
Fidelity Checker
Using the Field Guide
How the tools connect
Situate adds an opening place inquiry to O-DEAR. What you learn informs the scaling decision and the choices you revisit during planning and review.
- Situate
Describe the proposal and examine the local conditions that could support or change its benefits.
- O-DEAR
Use those findings to judge whether scaling is justified, what remains uncertain and what would change the decision.
- Scaling Pathways
Consider who should lead, how much control to retain and which partnerships the pathway requires.
- Scaling Canvas
Specify the mechanism, delivery arrangements and resources, with a learning system to review them.
- Fidelity Checker
Review whether benefits and the conditions supporting them continue as delivery changes.
Return to earlier questions when the evidence, approach or place changes. The Toolkit retains its existing four tool numbers; Situate is the additional tool in the Place Supplement.
Place Supplement · Situating the proposal
Situate
What are we seeking to scale, in which place or places, and why?
Local histories, relationships and power affect how people experience an approach and whether they benefit. Situate helps you examine these conditions with people who know and have a stake in the place.
S + O-DEAR = SO-DEAR. Situate is the opening S. Its five sections explore place before you answer the existing five O-DEAR questions.
Scaling in place
Deepen benefits, improve how the approach functions or extend who it reaches here. Consider how scaling could change local conditions.
Scaling across places
Compare where the approach developed with one receiving place. Explore the relationships and activity already there, and what local people want.
The five Situate questions
01 Name the scaling proposition
What would change, where, for whom and towards which benefit? Name what you are scaling and the place or places involved. People may draw the boundaries differently.
Read the guidance (PDF, page 4; new tab)Open the Situate worksheet (PDF, page 6; new tab)
02 Explain what is working
What benefit is evident, and for whom? Describe how you think it happens. Keep evidence separate from assumptions, including what you do not yet know about people who have not participated.
Read the guidance (PDF, page 4; new tab)Open the Situate worksheet (PDF, page 6; new tab)
03 Examine how place matters
Use the Some of Place prompts selectively. Trace an interaction between conditions, consider a relevant history or timescale, and identify whose perspective is missing.
Read the guidance (PDF, page 4; new tab)Open the Situate worksheet (PDF, page 6; new tab)
04 Draw provisional implications
What might need to hold, adapt or develop locally? Give a reason for each suggestion and identify who should decide. These implications can overlap.
Read the guidance (PDF, page 5; new tab)Open the Situate worksheet (PDF, page 6; new tab)
05 Return to the scaling decision
Which O-DEAR answer needs attention? Agree what to learn, with whom and by when. Record implications for Scaling Pathways, the Scaling Canvas or the Fidelity Checker.
Read the guidance (PDF, page 5; new tab)Open the Situate worksheet (PDF, page 6; new tab)
Use Situate before committing to scale, during planning or when conditions change. Include residents and people who deliver or shape the approach. Identify whose input is missing and keep the judgement open to revision.
Download the Place Supplement (PDF)Tool 01 · Scalability decision
O-DEAR
A conversational prompt at the decision point between pilot and scale.
Five questions to help guide the decision between pilot and scale. Click any letter for the deeper prompts.
When place matters to the proposal, use Situate first, then revisit these five questions with the findings. The decision may be to proceed, test, wait or reduce the proposal.
O
Organisational clarity
Does it fit our mission, strategy, capacity?
D
Describable
Can we name the mechanism in plain language?
E
Effectiveness
Does it produce the intended outcomes?
A
Adaptability
What is fixed and what can flex?
R
Reach
Will the population actually engage?
Tool 02 · Choosing a pathway
Scaling Pathways
Three pathways, ordered by the level of control the originating organisation retains.
Treat this as a planning frame, not a fixed taxonomy. Most organisations mix pathways and move between them as the innovation matures. The choice has direct implications for the business model: mismatched models are one of the more common ways scaling fails. Click a pathway for the deeper view.
Use Situate to examine local authority and capability before choosing a pathway. The receiving place has existing relationships and priorities that may change who should lead and how the approach develops.
Pathway 01
Influence & Advise
Examples include advocacy, training, publishing, consulting
Often fits when the core is a principle or method. Lower fidelity cost, wider potential reach. Funded through grants, speaking, training income.
Pathway 02
Package & Deliver
Examples include licensing, franchising, kite-marks, contracts
Often fits when a codified model exists for others to deliver. Tighter fidelity, with the fixed cost of producing and supporting the package. Funded through licensing or subscription income.
Pathway 03
Partner or Grow
Examples include alliances, mergers, branching, in-house growth
Often fits when control is essential and capacity exists or can be built. Highest control, highest resource demand, longest timeline. Funded through contracts and service delivery.
Tool 03 · Planning to scale
The Scaling Canvas
Eleven components. A hybrid of the Business Model Canvas and a Theory of Change.
Front of house on the left (what beneficiaries experience). Back of house on the right (what supports delivery). External influences across the top. The learning system across the bottom, touching every other component. Click any box for its description, or run the walkthrough to step through the eleven components in order.
Carry the Situate findings into the mechanism and delivery context, then consider the implications for partners, resources and the learning system. Record what you still need to learn with people of the place.
11
External influences
political cycles · economic conditions · demographic shifts · cultural movements
02
Beneficiaries (external)
Who the innovation is for at scale.
04
Delivery context
Where and under what conditions the innovation is delivered.
03
Mechanism
The causal heart.
05
Delivery model
How it reaches beneficiaries.
01
Core outcomes
What the scaling is ultimately for. The anchor of every other component.
06
Partners (internal)
Organisations and actors whose involvement is required.
07
Resources
Financial, human, material.
08
Internal infrastructure
Governance, data, HR, training.
09
External infrastructure
Regulation, funding, workforce supply.
10
Learning system
feedback loops · monitoring · evaluation · touches every other component
Bring in Situate.
Carry the findings into planning (PDF, page 5; new tab)Tool 04 · Monitoring at scale
The Fidelity Checker
Seven components for regular review of an innovation at scale.
Use the seven components to review benefits, delivery and the conditions that support them. Involve the people who deliver and experience the approach, and agree a review rhythm that fits. Select a component to explore its questions.
Revisit the benefits and local conditions identified through Situate. Connect Core outcomes (01) with Change drivers (02), then use Learning (06) to agree evidence, review timing and what would prompt action.
Component 01
Core outcomes
Is the innovation still producing the intended outcomes at scale?
Component 02
Change drivers
Is the causal mechanism still operating as intended?
Component 03
Delivery pathways
How is the innovation actually being delivered at each site?
Component 04
Internal infrastructure
Is organisational capacity keeping pace?
Component 05
External infrastructure
Are system-level conditions still supporting delivery?
Component 06
Learning
Is feedback actually being used to adapt the innovation?
Component 07
Environmental factors
What broader forces are shaping the scaling effort?
Three documents for using the Field Guide
Choose the document that matches what you need. Use them together when deciding whether and how to scale in a particular place.
01
Companion
The evidence and reasoning behind the Field Guide, including the three lenses and the four original tools.
Download Companion (PDF)02
Toolkit
Instructions and print-ready versions of O-DEAR, Scaling Pathways, the Scaling Canvas and the Fidelity Checker.
Download Toolkit (PDF)03
Place Supplement
The Situate tool, guidance on scaling in and across places, and how the findings inform the other tools. The blank tool is on page 6.
Download Place Supplement (PDF)