Julie is talking with the group about following a process to achieve change. She emphasises the point of maintaining professionalism at all stages of the project cycle, especially during the fund-raising process.
Any project cycle includes the following:
- The aim of the project. Often aspirational. (Aims)
- What do you want to achieve in order to meet the aim? (Objectives)
- What are you actually going to do? (Activities)
Often people will start thinking about the activities before the the objectives and aims. Something to avoid!
The activities should relate directly to your outputs. Objectives should relate directly to outcomes (the change you are expecting to achieve). Aims and impacts are one and the same.
AIMS -*- IMPACT
OBJECTIVES *-* OUTCOMES
ACTIVITIES *-* OUTPUTS
Always ensure that all these factors are linked strongly.
Julie gave an example of this methodology in action using ‘Reducing illiteracy in the Lebanon’. If you can’t see the video player below, click here.
I will update this post with a diagram explaining the project cycle shortly.
