When should we ask for evidence behind new ideas?

Give colleagues room to develop unfamiliar possibilities before asking them to justify an idea through precedent. The Frameworks argues that data provides valuable insight into what has happened, but cannot replace the imagination needed to conceive a different future. Analysis belongs in creative discussion without becoming a condition that every suggestion must satisfy before anyone can explore it.

The Frameworks advocates bringing people with different outlooks together to combine analytical thinking with collective imagination. Its distinction is between generating a possibility and testing or rationalising that possibility: number-crunching remains important, but should not be expected to originate the idea. For a team considering something unfamiliar, the practical implication is to invite "what if" conversations and allow possibilities to take shape, rather than treating a lack of precedent as a reason to stop.

Once possibilities have taken shape, turn the remaining uncertainties into questions, hypotheses and tests. For Carbon Tanzania, The Frameworks structured a workshop around a single strategic question agreed in a separate session beforehand. The plan was to develop a shortlist of possibilities, then frame further questions, hypotheses and tests to support an informed final decision. The workshop also gave the founders and their partners space to share ideas, hopes and fears.

The Frameworks' broader B2B Reinvention approach combines collaborative creative work with supporting research to help identify and choose a strategic route. The practice to borrow is a sequence: explore possible answers together, establish what needs testing, and use research to help choose between options. Evidence then serves evaluation rather than becoming a demand that colleagues defend an idea before it has developed.