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Global challenges in practice: designing a development intervention
Global challenges in practice: designing a development intervention

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6 Evaluation and performance

Greater monitoring and evaluation is often prioritised as a means to hold organisations accountable for their performance rather than as a means to facilitate learning. The demand for greater accountability, demonstration of cost-efficiency and of results has led to increased application of results-based management (RBM), which you were introduced to in Week 2 of this course.

The benefits of such an approach include:

  • the provision of valuable tools for monitoring and evaluation of interventions
  • a framework for learning, improvement and quality assurance
  • a framework for demonstrating results and good use of funds.

or put another way:

  • a means of determining how you are performing in relation to what you originally proposed.

RBM seems a very logical and objective approach to measuring performance. However, ‘performance’ can also mean putting on a show to an audience, and so judging performance becomes a very subjective business. What is considered a ‘good’ or ‘poor’ performance within an organisation is composed of the multiple perspectives of those involved with its operations, taking on different forms at different times. It is an elusive, fluid concept that the RBM system attempts to capture. This problematic nature of performance measurement is further emphasised with the focus on ‘measurement’.

Typically, performance measurement is achieved via the examination of two factors: efficiency and effectiveness. Efficiency is generally expressed as a ratio. It is not just the carrying out of the activities or the achievement of the outputs which matter, but the amount of output per unit of input. Effectiveness usually relates to the targets of an intervention beyond the immediate outputs.

In theory, efficiency is relatively easy to measure. For example, in a project to supply irrigation water, it could be ‘the amount of land irrigated by the project’ divided by ‘the cost of providing the irrigation’. However, such a ratio would tell us nothing about whose land was being irrigated (an equity concern), nor whether it was resulting in improved cropping, nor whether farmer livelihoods were being improved (both broad effectiveness concerns).

Whatever problems there may be in measuring efficiency, they tend to be multiplied when it comes to measuring effectiveness. Problems can arise if the effectiveness indicators themselves become the goals because of a lack of clarity, or even absence, of the latter. A metric used in emergency departments of a hospital is patient wait time (how long anyone has to wait to see a doctor/receive treatment) and is seen as a prime contributor to patient satisfaction or dissatisfaction. Its attractiveness in being measurable can result in staff focusing on reducing waiting times over the other considerations of an emergency department.

To add to the problematic nature of measuring performance is that gathering information relies on the accounts given. Different ideas as to what constitutes good performance may lead, in good faith, to very different interpretations being put forward of the same organisational activities. In particular, the idea that an organisation has achieved what it set out to achieve is always subject to reinterpretation after the event in relation to what exactly was intended. In any case, achieving one’s own objectives is a very different matter from an interpretation of achievement in relation to externally set criteria or an assessment of unintended impacts.

This quote from John Atkinson sums up this conundrum:

Does how you respond get conditioned by who asks the question? … Do you always answer exactly the same or do you change it? … In describing ourselves and our organisations we call forth a history of selected memories. Sometimes we select these consciously to project an image that suits.

(Atkinson, no date)

In the next activity, you will consider performance in your own context.

Activity 4

Timing: Allow around 20 minutes

Think about your own personal experience and answer the following questions:

  • How do you react to having your performance assessed by someone else?
  • If you have experienced a performance review, how did you find the experience?

Note your answers in the box below.

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Discussion

It can be challenging to hear what others say about you as feedback and criticism can be taken personally, as in ‘hurt’ by them. But for practice to improve, reviewing performance allows the opportunity to understand what is being doing well, what isn't being done well and be guided as to how to work on those aspects of practice that need improvement in order to do a better job.

Performance is so often measured in numbers rather than experience. Yet a lot of development work is about building trust, capacity and confidence. The measures that are often used are proxies and can be one dimensional. For example, how many girls went to school is an easy measure. How many got a qualification, again easy. How many hurdles and disadvantages did they overcome to attend school and gain a qualification, this is more difficult. Evaluating this needs more understanding, subtlety and time.