How to develop a logic model to help you achieve your goal

Sport as a tool for change needs to be understood in terms of goals and outcomes. If you have a clear idea of what you want to achieve then you can consider how to get there.

Strategies, policies, plans and roadmaps* are important, but selecting the outcomes that will help you achieve your goal is important before activities are planned or started.

“An activity which intentionally aims to bring about change, where sport or physical activity is the tool, hook or method to bring about that change. Sport as a tool for change implies that sport is being used to intentionally influence development outcomes. Sport is being used as the tool to help someone do something differently at the end.” – SportScotland

Key components of goals and outcomes

• Goals and objectives are statements of intent differentiated by their time frames. Goals are broader and more long-term while objectives are more specific, outlining actions to be taken in the medium to short term. For example, to reduce the incidence of non-communicable diseases (goal) through increasing the number of people participating in regular sport (objective).
• Impacts and outcomes are the results you work towards. These are ultimately what you hope to achieve and are also often what your donors are most interested in. They typically have targets that are measured by indicators.

Measuring impact and outcome

The following example illustrates how outcomes and impact can be measured with targets and indicators, based on the theory that increasing physical activity can improve participant health:

1 Outcome — increased physical activity

1a Target — 30% of the community regularly participating in some form of physical activity or sport

1b Indicator — percentage of the community participating in physical activity or sport

2 Impact — reduction of incidence of NCDs in your target group

2a Target — 20% reduction in the incidence of NCDs among the target group

2b Indicator — percentage of your target group reporting a reduction in NCDs

Financial donors want to hear about outcomes because they want to know what they will get for their money (i.e. return on investment). Therefore, it is important to assess the relationship between what is invested into your initiative and the changes evidenced in the community.

Developing a logic model

It is common to develop a logic model that connects your inputs, activities and outputs to outcomes and impacts.

The diagram below illustrates this in more detail, though of course this progression is not always linear or one-way. This is why a theory of change is vital to describe the process by which change occurs in your project.

*See our glossary for a list of key terms and definitions