ToC: Pros & Cons

- Helps to explain both how and why change takes place
- Can be relatively straightforward or more complex
- Does not follow a rigid ‘one size fits all’ format
- Encourages NGOs and others to really think about what their project is trying to do and what assumptions they are making
- It can help you adjust your project in ways that increase its prospects of success
- It can help you identify intermediate outcomes
- It enables organisations to think about their work and their organisation more deeply
Advantages
Disadvantages
- It can end up being over-simplified, over-complicated or simply wrong with arrows connecting boxes in ways that could never be possible
- Its value is not always recognised by funders
- It can throw up challenging findings (were your assumptions completely wrong, where you were barking up the wrong tree)
For key differences between the Theory of Change and logframe, click here.