While I fully appreciate the evaluation problems caused by the mismatch between the achievement of 'deliverables' and their actual human benefits, I nevertheless cannot help thinking this is a problem we have created for ourselves. It's just another instance of the difficulties every reductive approach entails.
Consider for a moment what would have happened with that 'road' if the planners asked themselves a few simple questions like:
1. What's the likely daily volume of wheeled traffic on it?
2. How many living in the vicinity of that road will be using it? And for what purpose? Etc, etc...
In a very affluent industrialized country in the North, a similar thing happened. It involved a very expensive bridge in a distant area intended to link a moderately inhabited island with the main land. The intention was to enable the people living on the island to travel to work on the main land without having to take the regular ferry. The outcome was interesting to say the least.
The islanders used the bridge to move their goods and chattels and settle down in the main land closer to their places of work, while keeping their old homes as summer houses! It was hoped to finance the bridge at least in part, by the daily toll drivers would have had to pay, but this became less than insignificant.
So, the lesson is obvious, but then, what is obvious seems to be the most difficult to understand.
If before planning begins, one achieves a clear understanding of what would really help the potential beneficiaries of a project and balance it against their actual ability to derive those benefits from it, one would arrive at some realistic set of goals. Then, it would be easy to design a project where the gap between the abstract 'deliverables' and real benefits is minimal, thus making the evaluator's task easier and pertinent.
At the risk of being accused of unseemly levity, a fairly unusual example here would be a project to supply mountain mules to the farmers in High Andes cultivating say quinoa in their fields. This seems to be the most effective way to help them to transport their surplus food to the nearest market. Lack of good roads, high expense in road construction and maintenance, length and cost of training people, and most of all, the time all these take will make the traditional beast of burden a not so comical a choice.
RE: Is this really an output? Addressing terminology differences between evaluators and project managers
Greetings!
While I fully appreciate the evaluation problems caused by the mismatch between the achievement of 'deliverables' and their actual human benefits, I nevertheless cannot help thinking this is a problem we have created for ourselves. It's just another instance of the difficulties every reductive approach entails.
Consider for a moment what would have happened with that 'road' if the planners asked themselves a few simple questions like:
1. What's the likely daily volume of wheeled traffic on it?
2. How many living in the vicinity of that road will be using it? And for what purpose? Etc, etc...
In a very affluent industrialized country in the North, a similar thing happened. It involved a very expensive bridge in a distant area intended to link a moderately inhabited island with the main land. The intention was to enable the people living on the island to travel to work on the main land without having to take the regular ferry. The outcome was interesting to say the least.
The islanders used the bridge to move their goods and chattels and settle down in the main land closer to their places of work, while keeping their old homes as summer houses! It was hoped to finance the bridge at least in part, by the daily toll drivers would have had to pay, but this became less than insignificant.
So, the lesson is obvious, but then, what is obvious seems to be the most difficult to understand.
If before planning begins, one achieves a clear understanding of what would really help the potential beneficiaries of a project and balance it against their actual ability to derive those benefits from it, one would arrive at some realistic set of goals. Then, it would be easy to design a project where the gap between the abstract 'deliverables' and real benefits is minimal, thus making the evaluator's task easier and pertinent.
At the risk of being accused of unseemly levity, a fairly unusual example here would be a project to supply mountain mules to the farmers in High Andes cultivating say quinoa in their fields. This seems to be the most effective way to help them to transport their surplus food to the nearest market. Lack of good roads, high expense in road construction and maintenance, length and cost of training people, and most of all, the time all these take will make the traditional beast of burden a not so comical a choice.
Best wishes!