The method has been tested in the field.

Operating model collapsed in 1998 when the Philippine government banned marine mammal hunting. The community's primary income source became illegal. The institution had no capability for the redesign.

Fifty per cent of the community worked through the three-phase framework systematically: decommissioned the hunting economy (RAZE), built ecotourism capability and community governance (ENRICH), emerged as the leading ecotourism institution in the region (GROW). Thirty per cent resisted and demanded the prior state be restored. Twenty per cent survived without redesigning.

The co-creating cohort now runs one of the region's most-visited ecotourism operations. The resistant cohort declined. The surviving-without-redesign cohort plateaued. The pattern predicted by the framework held across twenty-four years.

Green, S.J. (2002). Marine Ecotourism and Community Participation: Case Studies from Bohol, Philippines.