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Documentation Index

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An impact pathway in MARLO is the structured theory of change that connects your cluster’s deliverables, innovations, and OICRs to the broader development outcomes the program is designed to achieve. It is not a free-form narrative — it is a hierarchical network of outcomes at different levels of abstraction, from project-level outcomes up through Intermediate Development Outcomes (IDOs) and System-Level Outcomes (SLOs). Impact pathways are configured at the program level and serve as the backbone against which all research outputs are tagged and reported.

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Pathway structure

MARLO’s impact pathway is built from four types of elements:

System-Level Outcomes (SLOs)

The highest-level changes the program aims to contribute to — for example, improved food security, more resilient livelihoods, or reduced climate vulnerability. SLOs are defined by the program and aligned with CGIAR’s global targets.

Intermediate Development Outcomes (IDOs)

Mid-level changes in practice, policy, or capacity that represent stepping stones to SLOs. An IDO might describe a policy environment changed, a technology adopted at scale, or a gender-responsive approach institutionalised.

Outcomes

Cluster- or project-level changes that your work directly contributes to. These are the outcomes your deliverables, innovations, and OICRs are linked to. Outcomes are associated with specific flagships or clusters and align upward to IDOs and SLOs.

Cross-cutting issues

Thematic dimensions that run across all outcomes: gender equality, youth inclusion, climate change adaptation, and nutrition sensitivity. All outputs and outcomes carry cross-cutting marker scores that feed into program-wide reporting.
The impact pathway is accessible from the main menu under Impact Pathway. There you can view:
  • Outcomes — the project-level outcomes your cluster contributes to, with their IDO and SLO alignments.
  • SLO indicators — the program’s high-level indicator targets and current progress.
  • Program impacts — the full pathway visualisation linking outputs to outcomes at each level.
  • Cross-cutting dimensions — how outputs are scored against gender, youth, climate, and nutrition.
The pathway is a read view for most cluster users. The structure — which SLOs exist, how IDOs map to them, and which outcomes belong to which flagship — is set by program administrators and leaders.
Impact pathway structure (SLOs, IDOs, and the linkages between them) can only be modified by users with Program Admin or Program Leader roles. Cluster coordinators can link their outputs to pathway elements but cannot add or rename the elements themselves. If an element is missing, contact your PMU or program administrator.

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Country collaborations

The impact pathway also captures geographic dimensions: which countries and regions the program’s work is relevant to, and which partner institutions are involved in specific outcome areas. Country collaborations are registered at the program level and can be linked to specific outcomes and clusters.

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Linking your outputs to the impact pathway

Every deliverable, innovation, and OICR you register must be linked to at least one outcome in the impact pathway. These links are the mechanism by which MARLO connects operational data to strategic results. To link an output to the pathway:
  1. Open the output record (deliverable, innovation, or OICR) from within your cluster.
  2. In the Contributions section, use the outcome selector to choose the project-level outcome that best describes what this output contributes to.
  3. The associated IDO and SLO are displayed automatically, based on how the program has configured the pathway.
  4. Save.
MARLO uses these linkages to calculate completeness scores, populate the BI dashboards, and produce program-wide synthesis reports. Outputs that are not linked to any outcome are flagged as incomplete and cannot receive a passing QA score.

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Cross-cutting issues

Cross-cutting markers are scored on every output and outcome:
MarkerDescription
Gender equalityDoes the output address or benefit women and girls differently from men and boys?
Youth inclusionDoes the output target or engage young people (typically 15–35)?
Climate changeDoes the output address adaptation, mitigation, or climate resilience?
Nutrition sensitivityDoes the output have a pathway to improved nutritional outcomes?
Scores use the standard CGIAR scale: 0 = not targeted, 1 = significant objective, 2 = principal objective. These scores roll up into program-level cross-cutting reports.

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Impact pathway as a program-level configuration

Because impact pathways represent the program’s theory of change, they are set up once per program and updated through a governed process:
  • SLOs and IDOs are defined at program inception in consultation with CGIAR leadership.
  • Outcomes at the cluster level are configured by program administrators for each flagship or cluster at the start of each annual cycle.
  • Phase replication applies: outcomes and pathway elements replicate forward to future phases. Structural changes (adding or renaming an IDO, for example) affect the current and all future phases.
If your program is launching a new annual cycle and the pathway needs updating to reflect a changed theory of change, the program admin should make those changes before clusters begin entering new planning data.
Review the impact pathway at the start of each planning cycle to confirm that the available outcomes still reflect your cluster’s work. If the program has changed focus areas, the pathway elements may have been updated and you may need to re-link outputs that previously pointed to a now-retired outcome.

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