The global rise and future challenges for evaluation
Very interesting article from the latest edition of the newsletter of the European Evaluation Society “Evaluation between evidence‑based policy and “fake news”: paths to the future” (p. 3).
The article presents the reasons why there has been a global rise in evaluations and four future challenges, summarised here:
Why the global rise of evaluation:
1) In many countries, evaluation is a fixed element in policy-shaping and a management control element
2) The number of national evaluation societies has grown
3) Market for evaluation is continuing to grow
4) The dissemination of evaluation findings has surged
5) Training activities have increased
Future challenges for evaluation:
1) Increasing importance of global issues
2) The challenge of populist movements and “fake news” to evidence-based policy
3) Need for reflexive systems-thinking approaches
4) Increasing demand for participatory evaluation
New article: Pathways to use of campaigns’ evaluation findings
I’m very happy to share with you an article I co-authored – for those interested in campaigning, evaluation and evaluation use:
Highlights
- A categorization of six pathways to evaluation use is proposed.
- Evaluation use occurred slightly more non-linear than linear.
- Evaluation use was mostly unexpected.
- Overall meaning assigned to evaluation was linked to frequency of evaluation occurring.
- Evaluation use contributing to change was often indirect and not simple.
Abstract
This article presents a study on the pathways and processes regarding the use of evaluation findings of communication campaigns from two international organizations, the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). Several years after the completion of the campaigns and their evaluations, our research identified 28 instances of use and six instances of non-use of the evaluation results, of which the large majority being surprising in nature. Results showed that evaluation use facilitated formal and informal changes at the individual and the organizational level; and, this pattern occurred in a predominantly non-linear fashion, interconnected and overlapping, while gradually decreasing in time and space. Evaluation use was mostly unpredictable, which reflected how meanings are constructed by staff members, as they adjusted and interpreted the findings in opportunistic ways.
What to read on communication evaluation?
If you are like me and eager to read anything on evaluation and communications, this will be of interest to you. AMEC has an exhaustive reading list (pdf) put together by Prof. Jim Macnamara, that has a top ten “must reads” – many of them available online.
Presentation in Vienna: Evaluating Advocacy and Communication: Challenges and Solutions
Next Wednesday afternoon, 9 May, I am happy to announce that I will be making a presentation for the Vienna Evaluation Network on “Evaluating advocacy and communication: challenges and solutions”. Further information is available here. All interested persons are welcome to attend!
New e-learning course: managing the politics of evaluation
One of the challenges faced in evaluation is managing the politics involved – notably with the “tricky triangle” between the evaluator, the commissioners and the project being evaluated. Key is to try and preserve the impartiality and independence of the evaluation while meeting the needs of all stakeholders.
To help tackle these challenges, a new e-learning course is available from TRAASS International – “Managing the Politics of Evaluation“. The course is taught over 5 modules by Dr Marlène Laubi Loud, an experienced evaluator and commissioner. More information is available here>>.
You can learn more about the course in this video:
Full disclosure: I also teach e-learning modules for TRAASS International on evaluation report writing and how to be a successful evaluation consultant.
Use and value of evaluations
What is the value and use of evaluations is a commonly asked question from many funding or commissioning evaluations. So of interest is that the Hewlett Foundation has just carried out an interesting study on the use and value of the evaluations they carry out. Some of their key findings were:
- Evaluation quality has improved over time
- Spending on evaluation has nearly doubled
- Higher-quality evaluations cost more
- Evaluations are being shared more than in the past, but there’s room to improve
- Evaluations are valuable and used in multiple ways
On this last finding, they provide the following breakdown on evaluation use- interesting to see that only 3% of evaluations had “no use” – good news for evaluation!
Read more about the study here>>
Together with the Centre for Evaluation Innovation, the Hewlett Foundation is holding a free webinar on the study – April 19, 2018 2:00 PM in Eastern Time (US and Canada) – Register here>>
New resource: Communications monitoring, evaluation and learning toolkit
The Uk-based Overseas Development Institute (ODI) has published a new resource “Communications monitoring, evaluation and learning toolkit“; the toolkit focuses mainly on how to monitor your communication outputs and has some handy indicators by channel.
