The first video is from Dorothy Lucks, Secretary of the International Organization for Cooperation in Evaluation (IOCE). She is the Executive Director of SDF Global and works as an advisor for the United Nations, the Asian Development Bank, the World Bank, and other multilateral organizations. Her areas of expertise include executive development, adult education, project and stakeholder management, economic innovation, community-based initiatives, environmental protection and poverty reduction.
In her video, Ms. Lucks emphasizes the need for systematic and credible data in evaluation, and for embedding evaluation across the evaluation cycle. She calls for strengthening evaluation practices through social research and social impact. She recalls participating in an evaluation that had the unexpected benefit of increasing self-determination of indigenous populations. The International Year of Evaluation is an occasion to generate a greater understanding of the added value of performance assessments.
The second video is from Michael Bamberger, member of the International Evaluation Advisory Committee of UNDP’s Evaluation Office and former M&E specialist at the World Bank. Since retiring after 22 years with the World Bank, Michael has consulted for a number of UN, multilateral and bilateral development agencies, has published widely on development evaluation, and has served on the editorial board of several evaluation journals.
In his video, Mr. Bamberger discusses the mismatch between evaluators’ understanding of how communities respond to development programs, and the resources and perceptions of the communities themselves. A critical lesson for him has been to spend time with communities to conduct ‘realist evaluations’ that integrate unintended outcomes for the communities (rather than focusing only on how the program has met its objectives). In the next few years, Mr. Bamberger sees the need for greater participatory and equity-focused evaluation, particularly to capture the voices of the most vulnerable groups. Finally, he notes the need to integrate complex perspectives into evaluation, beyond the pre-test/post-test model that is generally employed.
You are welcome to add your voice to the campaign by writing to Jérôme Gandin at jgandin@universalia.com. If you are interested in joining the EvalPartners initiative to promote an enabling environment for evaluation in line with the Global Evaluation Agenda, please write to Asela Kalugampitiya at aselakalugampitiya@yahoo.ie.