Supporting practitioners in developing effective decision support tools for natural resource managers

In the United States, there is a growing interest in the participatory development of agricultural and natural resource–focused decision support tools (DSTs). To provide greater insight for practitioners developing these DSTs, we conducted a review of manuscripts (n = 23) that describe DSTs in US agricultural and forestry sectors, both those designed through participatory processes and otherwise. Our work operationalizes a novel conceptual framework developed to support participatory DST development, as recent scholarship suggests participatory processes lead to better adoption and use of DSTs. Our analysis suggests that tool developers should, in reporting on their efforts, more clearly articulate the ways decision makers are included in DST development, from problem identification through evaluation. Failure to do so limits our collective understanding of the utility of these tools. Following our review, we present recommendations for DST developers and other practitioners who want to support effective and transparent development of stakeholder-driven DSTs. We propose practitioners (1) implement complete assessments of relevant stakeholder network(s) that might use new DSTs; (2) engage stakeholders iteratively throughout the development process; (3) improve evaluation of DSTs, including an assessment of the usability, usefulness and usage of tools across their life cycle; and (4) and describe the process of stakeholder engagement process in published …