Co-implement
Step 4: Develop solutions
By the end of this step, you will have identified the potential impacts of your solution and assembled a dedicated team to plan for how you will develop, test, monitor and adapt your solution.
You will establish leadership, organise teams to manage each solution, clarify the expected impacts, design the experimentation process, and outline strategies for monitoring, adaptation, and scaling.
This step ensures that your solutions are optimised for successful implementation.
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Organise leadership and assess the potential impacts of each solution
Assigning leadership and distributing responsibilities ensures that each solution is supported by the right people, reduces bottlenecks, and strengthens your living lab’s ability to deliver results.
Make sure you …
Review your actor mapping to identify who could take responsibility for leading and supporting each solution. Consider what competencies, perspectives, or actors are needed now that you are working with specific solutions, as these needs may not have been visible earlier.
Impact screening helps you anticipate risks, identify opportunities, and adapt solutions before investing resources into testing.
Make sure you …
Define indicators that will help you observe or assess the impacts of each solution. Don’t limit yourself to only have ecological indicators. Support yourself by using a structured, verified approach. Some suggested methods are provided below.
BASIC:
Brainstorming. Choose this when you need a quick, accessible way to identify potential impacts with your team or actors. You can use the provided worksheet as a support.
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ADVANCED:
Theory of Change (ToC). Choose this when you need a structured and detailed way to explore how a solution is expected to lead to short- and long-term outcomes. This approach is useful when solutions are complex or when you need a clear impact pathway to support planning and evaluation.
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Develop a plan for implementation of each solution, and include social, cultural and equity dimensions.
A structured plan helps coordinate activities and resources and ensures everyone understands their roles and actions moving forward.
Make sure you …
Outline the timeline, responsibilities, resources, risks, and monitoring actions for each solution. You can use the provided template as a starting point and to keep yourself on track.
TIPS Link with someone in your community who is familiar with «project management» to help you here.
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Ensuring that solutions fit the social and cultural realities of the wider community strengthens legitimacy, supports equity, and enables communities to take a meaningful role in shaping long-term change.
Make sure you …
Review whether the solutions align with local cultural practices and address real community needs.
Inclusive and co-created implementation strengthens ownership, buy-in and leads to solutions that better reflect community needs.
Make sure you …
Take time to self-assess and reflect whether inclusiveness and co-creation are genuinely integrated into the plan. Be honest with yourselves.