March 20, 2026

This week we shipped the first full release of Horizon Invest — Training Edition, a free, interactive training tool for Investment Decision Events. Training Edition teaches participatory budgeting through hands-on experience — facilitators and participants walk a realistic scenario end-to-end using the 4D process (Design, Decide, Do, Debrief), so people learn by actually deciding together under real budget pressure. The same tool used in training is the tool used in real implementations, creating a direct pipeline from learning to practice.

Design — set up the decision

• Facilitate a session from a single Design page — we merged the earlier Design and Develop steps into one Design phase, so the flow is now the 4D arc (Design, Decide, Do, Debrief) instead of five steps. Session name, strategic posture, training scenario, budget, and the investment items all live in one place.
• Start from a realistic industry scenario — the Meridian Bank training scenario ships with fifteen investment items, each with a short description and a horizon and category, so participants debate a concrete portfolio rather than abstract line items.
• Force real trade-offs with a scarce budget — the Design page shows total requested against the budget with an oversubscription indicator and warns when the budget is large enough to fund everything, because scarcity is what makes the conversation meaningful.
• Re-sync the budget when switching scenarios — changing the scenario now updates the budget field to the new scenario's default, so facilitators don't accidentally carry a stale number into a new setup.

Decide — vote individually, then reach group consensus

• Individual voting with a budget sidebar — each participant votes on every investment with a funded, not-funded, or conditional choice. A left-hand sidebar tracks funded, not-funded, remaining budget, and an over-budget badge, so people can feel the constraint as they decide.
• Inline descriptions on every ballot card — each item shows a two-line description preview with a chevron to expand the full text, so voters can remind themselves what they're voting on without leaving the ballot.
• Autocomplete a ballot with a confirmation step — the old Simulate button is now Autocomplete, with a confirmation dialog that warns existing votes will be overwritten, making it safer to use during demos and training runs.
• Unsubmit an individual ballot — participants can pull a submitted ballot back to make changes before the group phase begins.
• Group consensus with multi-group support — when individual voting ends, sessions transition into group consensus. Individual votes seed each group, members are assigned to a group, and each group works toward agreement on its own board, scoped to its own votes.
• Live, collaborative consensus — group boards update in real time over WebSockets instead of polling, with online indicators for who is present, a reconnection banner if the connection drops, and instant transitions between phases.
• Facilitator overview across groups — facilitators see a status view with one card per group showing name, member count, and budget status, and can drill into any group's consensus board to follow the conversation.
• Facilitators can vote their own ballot — facilitators participate from the same overview, rather than needing a separate path to cast a vote.

Debrief — see what the group decided

• Results screen with three views — once a session closes, the results screen opens to an overview, a per-group breakdown, and a journey view, so facilitators can compare how individual judgment converged into group outcomes.
• Score-block card design — each investment shows a prominent score alongside its Endorse, Consent, and Cannot vote breakdown, making it easy to see not just what was funded but how much support it had.
• KPI cards with progress bars — the overview shows funded ratio, budget used, and consensus as progress bars, so the headline numbers are readable at a glance.
• Budget donut charts on results and voting screens — results and the voting sidebars now include donut charts with a horizon and category dropdown, so the group can see where money is landing across strategic horizons, not just totals. An "Unallocated Budget" slice appears when funded total is under budget.
• Shareable result views — the active results tab is encoded in the URL, so facilitators can link a teammate directly to the group tab or the journey view.

Sign in, profile, and home

• Free passwordless sign-in — Training Edition uses magic-link and OTP email sign-in with a branded email template, so anyone can try the tool without creating a password or provisioning seats.
• A welcome prompt that asks for your name — new users are greeted by a full-screen welcome that captures a display name before the rest of the app loads, so participant names show up properly on ballots and consensus boards from the first click.
• Settings page to update your name — a new Settings page lets people change their display name later, reached from the user menu in the header.
• Dashboard home with session counts — signing in lands on a dashboard showing how many sessions you own and how many you've joined, broken down by draft, active, and closed.
• My Sessions and Joined Sessions tabs — the sessions page now separates sessions you run from sessions you're participating in, with the current view remembered in the URL so it survives a refresh or a share.
• Sessions list, create, and delete — facilitators can create a new session, filter the list by name and status, and delete sessions with a confirmation dialog.

Landing page and polish

• A landing page that explains Training Edition — the invest.appliedframeworks.com sign-in page now doubles as a landing page, so first-time visitors understand what Training Edition is before they sign in.
• Legal and support links in the footer — Terms of Service, Privacy Policy, Cookie Policy, Data Access Request, Do Not Sell My Information, and Support links now appear on every page, matching engage.appliedframeworks.com.
• Sign in and return to where you were — the sign-in flow now redirects back to the session URL you came from, so deep links into a session work even if the link is opened before signing in.
• Consistent Nunito Sans typography — the web app now loads Nunito Sans properly, matching the rest of the Horizon Platform instead of falling back to system fonts.