Evaluation is all about questions...

Evaluation has a reputation for being technical and difficult- in practice it is part of every day life and we do it many times a day without realising, whether it is reflecting on a meal we have just cooked or chatting to other people about some experience we have shared. The kind of questions that the evaluation of projects seeks to answer include:

• Did we do what we planned to do? If not, why not?
• What worked? Why?
• What did not work? Why?
• What difference, if any, does the project make? How have things changed over time and for whom ?
• Is the project meeting needs? Whose needs?
• What do users/members/beneficiaries think about the work?
• Is the donor's money well spent? Is it achieving what the donor intended?
• What could we do differently?
• How can we use the learning to develop the work?

What are evaluation questions about?

There are different kinds of evaluation, asking and answering different sorts of questions:

• about the needs ands issues that organisations are trying to respond to ...
• about processes - how an organisation works, how things are done ...
• about performance - the outputs or volume of activities and costings ...
• about outcomes - the results or benefits of the work; what real difference it has made and for whom ...

The trust has produced short and simple definitions of terms, such as evaluation, monitoring, and quality. For these, and a more in-depth look at what evaluation is really about, click here...