You’ve Finished Your Theory of Change – What’s Next?

Three Theory of Change graphics surrounded by phrases that describe similar tools like Theory of Philanthropy, Logic Model, and Causal Chain
Congratulations on finishing your Theory of Change!

Capturing the heart of an organization in a single model is no small feat. Now that it’s finished, how will you encourage your team and wider community to use it?

Visual storytelling is an effective tool to help audiences understand your organization. By transforming your Theory of Change into an easy-to-understand infographic, you’ll jump-start the process of adopting and sharing your new model with the world.

When an organization is ready to visualize their Theory of Change, we kick off our time-tested collaborative process by thinking about and discussing the following details.

Find your primary audience

Who is the most important viewer?
A Theory of Change infographic can be used in multiple ways:

  • Quickly explain the organization to a potential donor at an in-person event

  • Introduce the organization’s programs to a new employee in training

  • Serve as a north star for leadership when making a big decision

Each of these uses has a different primary audience. Before starting to develop the Theory of Change infographic, it can be helpful to determine which audience is your main focus and which audiences are more secondary.
“If I had to pick one measure of success in this project, it would be how quickly – and widely – this work has been adopted across [our organization].”

—Julie Hanus, University of Minnesota Institute on the Environment
Horizontal table with columns titled Inputs, Activities, Outputs, and Outcomes, with icons and color code to show how the items relate

ABOVE: This SpiralHealth Theory of Change was included in an impact report for investors. We used color coding to explain which stakeholder is affected by each outcome, showing the reader how their support makes a difference to each group.

We’ve developed Theory of Change infographics that were for primarily external audiences—potential donors, new collaborators, and community members. The main goal of these infographics is to explain the organization’s mission and give a brief overview of what they are doing to achieve it.

For other clients, the audience was primarily internal—board members, investors, subscribers to the organization’s publication. In these cases, the Theory of Change infographic could assume background knowledge and dedicate more space to the details.

Narrow down the content

What aspects of our organization do we want to include?
When preparing content for an infographic, it helps to think through these questions:

  • Which parts of the Theory of Change do you want to prioritize? Which can be combined or left out for simplicity?

  • What values and tone do you want to portray?

  • Is your Theory of Change more linear (input leads to output), or is it more circular (inputs and outputs reinforce each other)?

  • Does it make sense to use a visual metaphor, such as a garden?

For most projects, the client provides a content outline similar to the length of this example. Then, our design team makes recommendations to restructure—and sometimes condense—their text for a visual format. This process is collaborative and often takes back-and-forth discussions to find the right balance.
“The Background Stories team are not only incredible visual communicators, they're also fantastic facilitators. Working with them helped us break through to critical new clarity about our Theory of Change. The process was as transformative (and delightful) as the end product.”

—Julie Hanus, University of Minnesota Institute on the Environment
Graphic equation with large symbols showing that the organization uses science and verification to create influence and continuously improve
ABOVE: The International Seafood Sustainability Foundation wanted their Theory of Change to emphasize their dedication to continuous improvement. They included this straightforward overview in their Strategic Five-Year Plan to show how their organization approaches the work.

Build in time for feedback

How can we check that the infographic is accurate and works for its intended audiences?
When a infographic draft is ready for feedback, consider the following perspectives:

  • Who worked closely with the Theory of Change and/or infographic design process?

  • Who could tell you whether the infographic would work for your primary audience?

  • Who hasn’t seen the Theory of Change before and doesn’t know much about your organization?

Each of these viewpoints will give you valuable insight into how you can tune the infographic for your audience.
“Background Stories not only helped us break through to new clarity about our Theory of Change, they gave us a new common language and the visual tools to communicate about it.”

—Julie Hanus, University of Minnesota Institute on the Environment
Illustration of a colorful garden with text boxes overlaid that describe the organization's Inputs, Activities, Outputs, and Outcomes
ABOVE: In focus group sessions with the University of Minnesota Institute on the Environment, team members discussed how the garden visual metaphor reflects the organization’s generative structure. We also learned how partners might use the infographic when talking to potential donors.

Focus group sessions are an excellent way to quickly gather first impressions and spark discussion. When we worked with the University of Minnesota Institute on the Environment to adapt their Theory of Change, we hosted two focus group sessions with team members and partners from across the organization. These conversations helped us understand how people might use it and how we could improve the design to make it more effective.

A Theory of Change is a versatile tool to reinforce the core values of your organization. By transforming it into an easy-to-follow infographic, you can jump-start the process of adopting it into your everyday work.

Ready to get started?

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Diagram showing steps of the Background Stories collaborative process. Steps are labelled Scope, Kickoff, Visual Story Development, Sketches, Digital Design, Iteration, Wrap-up
Diagram showing steps of the Background Stories collaborative process. Steps are labelled Scope, Kickoff, Story Development, Sketches, Digital Design, Iteration, Wrap-up

A step-by-step guide to our collaborative process

Visual storytelling is a powerful tool to help people understand and engage deeply with complex information.

Whether developing an infographic, printed sign, or animated video, we approach every project with a time-tested collaborative process. We can help your team benefit from the power of visual stories.

We’ve refined this process over the years to find a good balance of client-facing steps and “backstage” steps—in other words, the work we do behind the scenes.

Scope

Are we ready to work together? Let’s find out!

  1. Consider these questions:

    • What is the budget?

    • What is the scope?

    • What is the deadline?

    • Do I have a refined content outline? (If not, we can help! Our capabilities include research and content development.)

    • Who will be the primary point of contact on my team?

  2. We’ll discuss these questions with you and craft a proposal specific to your needs.

  3. Review and accept that proposal to start working together.

  4. Share any relevant background materials, including existing brand guidelines and data. We like to review these ahead of the kickoff meeting.
Backstage: We assemble our design team. This includes a creative director and a designer whose skills and interests best fit the project. Typically, the designer serves as project manager and main point of contact.

Kickoff

Beginning our work together
At this initial meeting, our teams meet and the journey begins! We will chat about the details of the project, confirm the scope, and review the timeline.

  1. Consider these questions:

    • Who is my audience? (If needed, we can adapt a visual story for multiple audiences.)

    • What are my goals?

    • What key messages do I want to communicate?

    • What are my deliverables?

  2. Share any examples that inspire your team.
We are a remote-based company and are comfortable meeting virtually. We’re also available to meet in person within the Twin Cities area.
Backstage: In advance of the kickoff meeting, we review any materials you’ve provided and compile questions to help us better understand your content, audience, and objectives.
Graphic of a laptop with kickoff questions listed, including who is my audience and what are my goals

Visual Story Development

Finding the key messages

You can provide content to us, or we can develop content based on raw materials that you provide. 

Light story development (always included): You provide content, and we make high-level recommendations to refine the story in a visual format and tune it to your audience. Here is an example of the content structure and length we'll need from you for a one-page infographic with light visual story development.

Content development (optional): From your white paper, your research, or conversations with your team (to be agreed based on the proposal), we develop an outline and ask you to provide feedback. This add-on requires additional budget.

Backstage: We research your topic and dig into the content that you have provided. With your goals in mind, we create a visually-driven story that communicates the key messages to your audience.
Collection of research and data turning into a refined content outline document

Sketches

Confirming the flow with your team

At a meeting, we walk you through our rough sketches and invite you to share feedback. We may show different options and discuss which approach best fits aspects that you want to showcase.

If developing the “look and feel” (visual style) is part of the project scope, we'll propose color schemes, fonts, and/or illustration styles.

Backstage: Using the content outline as a guide, we develop a rough sketch that uses visuals to communicate your message. The primary designer leads hands-on design work, while the creative director provides guidance.
Refined content outline document turning into a black and white rough sketch

Digital Design

Your story comes to life

We share a first draft with you via email and ask for your feedback.

Backstage: We turn the sketched concepts into refined deliverables using color, typography, and illustration.
Rough sketch turning into a digital design with full color and illustration

Iteration

Collaborating to find the best solutions

The fun begins! We send you each design iteration via email, and your team compiles feedback in response. You can contact us with questions or request a check-in meeting at any time.

Most projects include two rounds of revision and one additional round of minor tweaks. If you prefer more iterations, this can be added during the initial Scope phase.

Recommendation: If approval is needed from external team members (such as other people in the department), wait until the second design iteration to share with others. This allows us to address your early feedback in a streamlined process.

Backstage: We use your feedback to refine the design. With each iteration, we may ask specific questions or propose ideas in the email.

Wrap-Up

Share your story with the world
We send you final files, and our account manager follows up with wrap-up steps. We’d welcome your feedback on our process and will confirm whether we can share your project in our public portfolio.

If the project scope includes extra deliverables (social media graphics, slide decks, etc.), we will start developing those with a similar collaborative process.
Backstage: We prepare the final files according to your needs and the project scope. Usually, this means a PDF or image file that you can easily share with your audience.
Finished infographic delivered in JPEG and PDF formats, plus additional deliverables like social media graphics and a physical mailer

That's it!

At the end of our collaborative process, you have a visual story that is ready to be shared with your audience.

Ready to get started?

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