This blog is written with the evaluation commissioner (clients) in mind at the stage where they have to assess whether a proposed design is going to be successful, but the advice is relevant for those designing evaluations and those designing terms of reference for evaluations too! It might seem like Read more…
It is always exciting to help an organisation develop its vision and goals. Last month I had the opportunity to work with a client and three country teams from India, Egypt and Nepal to establish a Theory of Change following a summative evaluation I completed in 2018 on their work Read more…
As I’ve mentioned before I am the Chair of EUConsult. Recently we held our Spring Conference in London, with the theme “The Challenges and Opportunities of Income Generation in Europe”. This conference gave us the opportunity to look beyond traditional fundraising into impact investment and hear from high net-worth individuals Read more…
Recently I completed a mid-term evaluation for a small client that wasn’t used to doing evaluations. The evaluation process had gone smoothly, but it was clear from the data collection that some of the stakeholders involved didn’t really understand the point of doing an evaluation. So, having completed the draft Read more…
Ok, as if we didn’t know…. You will notice that until now I’ve stayed away from commenting on the whole Brexit process and for very good reason – I’m not an expert. But I can tell you what I’ve learned from what I’ve observed about this process that can be Read more…
How often do you read about an innovation or see a documentary about some breakthrough in science or development and wonder, “how did they come up with that?” Well, sometimes it is about dogged determination around a clear vision, but often it is about looking outside of your regular network, Read more…
One of the biggest challenges any organisation faces is ensuring strong engagement from beneficiary groups, community stakeholders and other groups involved with or affected by that organisation’s work. NGOs in the global South have gotten better at including beneficiaries and communities in their design processes and mobilising them to be Read more…
Last month the NCVO issued its review of issues that UK charities should be focused on in 2019. NCVO conduct this PEST analysis each year. This time it does feel however like the results are too general as to be properly useful. The review focuses on the political impasse in Read more…
You will remember that last month I mentioned that M&E was one of the five basic planning issues that social impact organisations needed to get right. So what happens when M&E doesn’t work? What happens when, despite best efforts, either the wrong data is collected or the tools and M&E Read more…
I was asked this question by a client recently: “why is it always about data?” The organisation has struggled to identify appropriate measures to track its programme performance and impact, it has some systems in place but needs to improve and in exasperation one of the team turned to me Read more…