Outcome
The condition, experience, behavior, relationship, or practice expected to change.
Students can navigate a process more confidently.Resource Hub · Evaluation and Learning Tool
Success Indicators and Learning Plan
Define what the team needs to learn, identify credible signs of change, and decide in advance how evidence will guide the next move.
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Complete meeting sequence
Brief working canvas
Success Indicators and Learning Plan
Purpose: Connect a decision to a small, balanced set of observable indicators, evidence, and interpretation rules.
Use this when: A team needs a learning plan before testing or evaluating a change.
Start with: A theory of change, near-term intended outcome, affected perspectives, feasible sources, and decision owner.
Time: 30–35 minutes for a prepared small test; the steps allocate 30. Preparation takes 10–15 minutes. Use 45–60 minutes for baselines, multiple methods, sensitive data, or substantial group comparisons. These are planning estimates; allow additional processing and participation time.
Participation: Think individually before discussion. Use bullets, a labeled diagram, or spoken ideas captured and checked by a partner. You may pass and return. Keep the required information and reasoning visible in your chosen format.
1. Name outcome, assumption, and decision
4 minutesAn outcome is the condition or practice expected to change. Name it for specific people, context, and timeframe; identify the consequential causal assumption and decision date.
Keep the labels shown so related answers remain distinguishable. An explicit unknown is useful.
Include: Test / outcome / for whom / context / timeframe · Priority assumption · Continue / revise / expand / pause / stop decision · Owner / review date
2. Choose learning questions
5 minutesWrite one primary question and up to two supporting questions. Identify evidence that could challenge the preferred explanation.
Keep the labels shown so related answers remain distinguishable. An explicit unknown is useful.
Include: Primary question · Supporting questions — if needed · Disconfirming finding
3. Build a balanced indicator set
9 minutesIndicators are observable signs of change. Select about three to six across relevant reach/participation, experience/quality, delivery/conditions, near-term change, equity/distribution, and unexpected effects. Explicit indicators are stated or counted; implicit indicators appear in routines or relationships and need a clear observation strategy.
Keep the labels shown so related answers remain distinguishable. An explicit unknown is useful.
Include: Question / intended outcome · Observable indicator / relevant family · For whom / change period · Explicit or implicit / observation definition · Expected change / caution signal
4. Match indicators to evidence and interpretation
8 minutesEvidence is the information gathered. For each indicator, record source, method, timing, collector/reviewer, and burden/access/privacy. Define baseline or contrast, patterns to compare, implementation context, triangulation (comparison across sources or methods), affected and operational interpreters, and how dissent is retained.
Keep the labels shown so related answers remain distinguishable. An explicit unknown is useful.
Include: Indicator / source / method · When / who gathers and reviews · Burden / access / privacy / storage
Keep the labels shown so related answers remain distinguishable. An explicit unknown is useful.
Include: Baseline / comparison · Patterns across time / role / setting · Sources read together / implementation and context · Affected / operational interpreters · Outliers / disagreement / missing evidence
5. Set thresholds and review rules
4 minutesA target or threshold is a pre-specified pattern guiding a decision. Define continue, revise, expand, and pause/stop patterns, with non-negotiable harm limits and a documented review.
Keep the labels shown so related answers remain distinguishable. An explicit unknown is useful.
Include: Continue — evidence pattern · Revise — evidence pattern · Expand — evidence and support needed · Pause / stop — caution or harm condition · Review / decision owner / documentation
Done when
Outcome, indicator, evidence, and threshold remain distinct; selected indicators have usable sources and protection; shared interpretation and pre-specified decision rules address differences and harm.
One next move
At the review point, bring the collected evidence and rules to the Evidence-to-Decision Canvas.
The brief preserves explicit and implicit indicators, the six relevant indicator families, and the Collaboratory’s decision-linked evaluation extensions. The brief is a Collaboratory presentation adaptation of this tool; its established sources and local contributions remain attributed in Optional support. CAST UDL Guidelines 3.0 informs the navigation and participation supports.
Complete instructions and working materials
Full guide
Success Indicators and Learning Plan
Work through the visible activity below. Use the Brief working canvas tab to enter or revisit your notes.
Plan the chosen activity, preparation, fieldwork, and review separately. The brief gives revised meeting estimates; allow more time to complete the full working materials or resolve missing evidence and commitments.
Why use a learning plan?
Use measurement to support judgment.
A prototype can be busy, well attended, or warmly received while the intended change remains uncertain. A learning plan connects the theory of change to a small set of questions, indicators, evidence sources, and decision rules before implementation begins.
Success indicators are observable signs that help a team interpret progress. Causal claims require an appropriate research design. Their meaning depends on implementation, context, participant experience, and who is represented in the evidence.
Four useful distinctions
Keep outcomes, indicators, evidence, and targets separate.
Teams often blur these elements, which makes later interpretation harder.
Indicator
An observable sign that helps assess whether and how change may be occurring.
Fewer unresolved handoffs and clearer next-step explanations.Evidence
The information collected to examine an indicator.
Journey notes, follow-up interviews, and process records.Target or threshold
A pre-specified level or pattern used to guide a decision.
Continue only if no serious access harm appears and most participants can name a next step.Balanced indicator set
Pair visible results with the quieter conditions around them.
Use only the families relevant to the prototype. Most small tests need three to six indicators.
Reach and participation
Who encounters, joins, remains, or is absent—and how does participation differ across relevant groups?
Possible evidence: Counts, participation patterns, access requests, reasons for nonparticipationExperience and quality
How do participants experience usefulness, belonging, clarity, respect, accessibility, or burden?
Possible evidence: Brief reflections, interviews, observations, open-ended feedbackImplementation and conditions
Was the prototype delivered as intended, and which resources, relationships, routines, or adaptations shaped it?
Possible evidence: Process notes, completion records, adaptation log, staff observationsNear-term change
What changed first in knowledge, behavior, relationships, confidence, access, or institutional practice?
Possible evidence: Pre/post prompts, artifacts, behavior traces, follow-up conversationsEquity and distribution
Who benefits, who is left out, and where do access, outcomes, voice, labor, cost, or risk differ?
Possible evidence: Disaggregated patterns where safe, contrasting accounts, burden and access checksUnexpected effects
What emerged beyond the team’s predictions—positive, negative, or ambiguous?
Possible evidence: Open-ended prompts, incident log, critical-friends review, observationIndicator quality check
A useful indicator earns its place in the plan.
Ask each team member to flag indicators that are unclear, burdensome, insensitive to change, or disconnected from the eventual decision.
- Connected to a learning question and decision
- Observable and proportionate to what the evidence can establish
- Specific about who or what may change
- Sensitive to plausible change within the test period
- Feasible to gather with a reasonable burden
- Interpretable alongside context and implementation evidence
- Able to reveal uneven benefits, access, labor, or harm
- Paired with a source, method, timing, and responsible person
25–30-minute facilitation sequence
Decision → Learning → Evidence → Action
Start with the decision, then identify the evidence it requires. The plan should be proportionate to the scale and risk of the prototype.
3 minutes
Name the decision
Clarify what decision the evidence will inform and when that decision must be made.
4 minutes
Choose learning questions
Write one primary question and no more than two supporting questions.
5 minutes
Describe success
Name what should become observably different, for whom, and over what realistic period.
8 minutes
Build indicators
Select a small balanced set of explicit and implicit indicators across relevant evidence families.
6 minutes
Plan evidence
Assign sources, methods, timing, responsibility, and safeguards while checking collection burden.
4 minutes
Set interpretation rules
Define what would support continuing, revising, expanding, pausing, or stopping.
Participant canvas
Question → Indicator → Evidence → Decision
Complete this plan before the prototype begins. Revisit it when implementation conditions or the theory of change shift.
Orient
Name the decision and intended change
Prototype or change being examined
Decision this evidence will informContinue · revise · expand · pause · stop
Intended near-term change
Who should experience that change?
Relevant timeframe and context
Most consequential theory-of-change assumption
Ask
Choose a small set of learning questions
Primary learning questionWhat must we understand to make the next decision?
Supporting question 1
Supporting question 2
What finding could challenge our preferred explanation?
Define
Build a balanced indicator set
Condition or intended changeObservable indicatorFamilyFor whom?Explicit or implicit?
Indicator sentence: If __________________ changes, we would expect to observe or hear __________________ among/from __________________ within __________________, while also monitoring __________________.
Plan
Match each indicator to usable evidence
IndicatorSource and methodWhen?Who gathers/reviews?Burden, access, privacy
Interpret
Plan how evidence will be read together
Baseline or comparison pointWhat is happening now, or what will provide useful contrast?
Patterns we will compareAcross time, roles, access conditions, locations, or participant groups
Evidence that should be triangulated
Important context or implementation information
Who will help interpret the findings?Include affected and implementation perspectives
How disagreement and outliers will be recorded
Decide
Set proportionate decision rules before seeing the results
Next moveEvidence pattern or threshold that would support itNon-negotiable caution or stop condition
Continue
Revise
Expand
Pause or stop
Decision discipline: Use a threshold to guide judgment. Review magnitude, distribution, implementation, context, unintended effects, and evidence limitations together.
Equity, ethics, and evidence safeguards
Collect less, interpret together, and look beyond averages.
Evidence practices can reproduce exclusion when collection burdens are high, identities are exposed, only easy-to-reach participants are represented, or institutional convenience defines success.
Use the smallest useful dataset.Collect evidence tied to a named learning question or decision. Additional data should earn its burden by improving judgment.
Interpret participation in context.Attendance may reflect schedule, transportation, trust, technology, invitation practices, interest, and need.
Protect small groups.Disaggregation can reveal inequity, but very small cells may expose identities. Suppress, combine, or describe patterns qualitatively when needed.
Offer accessible evidence pathways.Provide more than one way to respond and avoid requiring rapid writing, public disclosure, or inaccessible technology.
Include implementation evidence.Interpret outcomes alongside evidence about delivery, adaptation, and barriers.
Look for disconfirming evidence.Ask what would challenge the team’s preferred explanation and preserve accounts that differ from the dominant pattern.
Where it fits
Build the learning plan before testing and use it throughout the test.
Translate a critical causal assumption into an observable learning question.
Define evidence, ownership, timing, safeguards, and decision rules before the bounded test begins.
Document adaptations, unexpected effects, access differences, and implementation conditions.
Carry the evidence into the Evidence-to-Decision Canvas to continue, revise, expand, pause, or stop.
Before using indicators and evidence rules to judge the test
Experience, Conditions, and Power Thread
Carry situated evidence into the next decision.
1Relevant conditionSelect only what is genuinely connected to this decision.
2People, role, and contextLocate whose experience is being considered and where it occurs.
3Institutional cue or structureName the practice, message, relationship, resource, rule, or expectation shaping it.
4Evidence and differencesRecord direct evidence, variation across groups or settings, and what remains uncertain.
5Implication for the next decisionState what this evidence means for continuing, revising, inquiring, pausing, or stopping.
- Select only the Conditions for Thriving that are genuinely relevant.
- Do not infer another group’s experience without direct or appropriately situated evidence.
How this tool connects
Carry the work forward.
Use these handoffs flexibly. New evidence may send a team back to an earlier tool.
Conditions thread: Carry the selected condition, people and context, institutional cue, evidence status, and remaining uncertainty into the next tool.
Useful before this tool
Return to this tool
when the prototype or decision need changes.
Optional support
Preparation, pacing, and participationPrepare the starting information and access supports; allow time for the activity and its follow-through.
A theory of change, near-term intended outcome, affected perspectives, feasible sources, and decision owner.
30–35 minutes for a prepared small test; the steps allocate 30. Preparation takes 10–15 minutes. Use 45–60 minutes for baselines, multiple methods, sensitive data, or substantial group comparisons.
Share purpose and prompts in advance when possible. Offer private preparation, accessible formats, and a recorder or partner. Plan how outputs will be returned, stored, and reviewed.
Worked examples and applicationsUse illustrations to understand the prompts, then return to your own context and evidence.
Generic higher-education example
Testing a clearer academic-support referral
A college is testing a revised referral conversation and follow-up message. This composite example draws on general higher-education patterns.
Learning question
Does the revised process help students understand and complete an appropriate next step without adding avoidable burden?
Balanced indicators
Students can explain the next step; referral completion becomes more consistent; unresolved handoffs decline; staff workload remains manageable; access remains consistent for students with schedule or technology constraints.
Evidence
A one-question follow-up, referral records, short staff process notes, and interviews with a small varied group of students, including people who left the referral unfinished.
Decision rule
Revise before continuing if students remain unclear, access gaps widen, or the process depends on hidden staff labor, even when overall completion increases.
Sources, adaptations, and attributionReview the intellectual foundations, local contributions, and suggested citation.
Source and attribution
Adapted in 2025 and extended for the Resource Hub
The 2025 Collaboratory adapted Caitlin Martin’s “Documenting the Mundane” seminar framing to consider explicit and implicit indicators and where institutional change might become visible in practices, relationships, narratives, and culture.
This Resource Hub tool extends that activity with learning questions, balanced indicator families, evidence planning, equity and burden safeguards, interpretation guidance, and pre-specified decision rules. The linked Evaluation Support Scotland template provides complementary guidance for connecting outcomes, indicators, methods, timing, and responsibility. The Collaboratory contributed the local adaptation and this extension; the evaluation practices come from established sources.
Authorship, foundations, and suggested citation
Adapted and developed by Jessica A. Leveto, Ph.D.
Intellectual foundations: Caitlin Martin’s Documenting the Mundane seminar framing and established evaluation-planning, indicator, evidence, and decision-rule practices.
Suggested citation: Leveto, Jessica A. 2026. “Success Indicators and Learning Plan.” Sensemaking Collaboratory Resource Library. https://sensemakingcollaboratory.org/resources/tools/success-indicators-learning-plan.