The TRIC Butterfly Framework and the TRIC Guide are here
Updated: 2 days ago
We are happy to share two important results from the TRIC: The TRIC Butterfly
Framework and the TRIC Guide.
Both have been developed to support teachers, trainers, mentors, guidance professionals
and organisations in helping learners navigate uncertainty during educational, professional
and other life transitions.
The Butterfly Framework provides a practical way of working with uncertainty from both the
learner’s and the organisation’s perspective. The guide brings together research,
experiences from learners and professionals, practical examples and the Butterfly
Framework.
A development process with many contributions
The guide and Butterfly Framework are the result of a broad research and development
process.
The work has included literature reviews, focus group interviews, foresight workshops and
the collection of best-practice cases. These activities helped us build knowledge about
how uncertainty is experienced in different transitions and what kinds of support may be
useful.
The interview material includes more than 25 datasets and participation from 66 people
across five countries. Learners, teachers, trainers, guidance counsellors, psychologists
and other professionals contributed their experiences and perspectives.
The material was then brought into the consortium’s joint development process. Partners
discussed findings, developed ideas, worked on drafts and tested different ways of
presenting the content. Internal reviews and external testing were also used to adjust and
improve the guide before the final version was completed.
The TRIC Butterfly Framework
A central part of the guide is the TRIC Butterfly Framework. The framework places the
learner at the centre and connects two perspectives. One side focuses on the learner’s
own reflection and learning process: acknowledging uncertainty, exploring it and gradually
developing ways of handling it. The other side focuses on the organisation: recognising
signs of uncertainty, mapping the situation together with the learner and enabling relevant
support and scaffolding.
The Butterfly Framework illustrates that working with uncertainty is not only an individual
task. The learner’s own reflection and actions interact with the support, structures and
relationships provided by the surrounding organisation or learning environment.
The framework also includes a set of practical menus. These can be used to identify
relevant knowledge, skills, responsibilities, support and scaffolding. There is a core menu
that is relevant across transitions and transition-specific menus for the different contexts
covered in the guide.
How the guide can be used
The guide can be used in different ways depending on the context.
It can provide background knowledge about uncertainty in transitions. It can support
conversations with learners, help professionals identify possible support needs, and
provide ideas for guidance, teaching and organisational practices. The guide also includes
best practice cases showing concrete examples of how to work with uncertainty in
transitions.
The aim is not to reduce uncertainty. Instead, the Butterfly Framework and guide are
intended to help learners and organisations work with uncertainty in ways that make it
productive and a source of learning and personal development.
Developed across the TRIC consortium
The development process has involved partners from across the TRIC consortium. TRIC
brings together 11 organisations from five European countries.
Working together across these different contexts has added different perspectives to the
process. Partners have contributed different kinds of knowledge and experience, and
discussions across countries and organisations have helped shape both the guide and the
Butterfly Framework. The process has created opportunities to learn from one another,
gain new perspectives on uncertainty in transitions, and strengthen collaboration across
the project.
In the next work packages, we will build further on the Butterfly Framework and the guide
and develop concrete tools and solutions for putting them into practice.
The TRIC Butterfly Framework and the TRIC Guide are now ready to be explored and put
into practice. We hope you will enjoy reading, working with, and using them in your own
practice.
Else Lauridsen and Gitte Warming
SEA-Syddansk Erhvervsakademi
Published October 8 2026.
Read how chaos is tackled in India with surprising, practical tools for long-term resilience.
Or want to read about the Impact strategy workbook and download it?
Curious about TRIC? Stay tuned — and feel free to reach out if you'd like to know more at connect@communitytric.net. And don`t forget to join the community!
Turku University of Applied Sciences, Kukunori, MARKED with Purpose, Innocamp Poland, Universitat Politècnica de València (UPV), Erhvervsakademi SydVest, Business College Syd, IES Bernat Guinovart, Jugend am Werk, University for Continuing Education Krems and the University of Gdańsk.
Co-funded by EU
Funded by the European Union. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the European Education and Culture Executive Agency (EACEA). Neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be held responsible for them.
#ProfessionalDevelopment #UncertaintyCompetence #TRIC #ErasmusPlus #HigherEducation #VET #Innovation #FutureOfWork #LifelongLearning
