Thanks for raising very pertinent issues. In my evaluation practice, I have seen KM as either not part of programming or working separately (or shall I say ‘remotely’, the catch phrase now a days!) from M&E function with the twin hardly communicating to each other. Hope and wish success to your initiative /experiment of bringing them under one unit or initiating some form of convergence. As you both acknowledge, KM and M&E have different roles and skills required. Synergies are possible but tensions are inevitable. How these are managed in an integration process would determine how successful and effective it is. Needless to say that consistent role divisions and clear lines of communication between different members of the ‘one unit’ would be the key. More so as M&E evidence is likely to feed into KM processes. Sometimes KM would be selective in terms of communicating some M&E evidence, which can also create some sticky points for independently minded M&E team members. Sometimes KM would demand ‘stories of success’ from the M&E and programme teams. Conversely, for a M&E and programme team, KM function is crucial for uptake and behaviour change (generally outcome level results), and therefore expectation would be that KM would have the necessary capabilities to relay evidence through user-friendly infographics and other tools, using traditional media, social and new media to reach target audience better. Further, a programme and M&E team would expect that there is consistency and continuation of communication for increasing the staying power of messages and for sustaining the momentum of programme level uptake. KM may perceive this expectation as somewhat undue and so ensuing tension would need to managed. Am sure that you are aware of all these issues and are on course to achieving reasonably smooth convergence of KM and M&E, which nonetheless is a challenging proposition.
RE: How to use Knowledge Management to strengthen the impact of Evaluation on smallholder agriculture development?
Dear Paul and Bassirou,
Thanks for raising very pertinent issues. In my evaluation practice, I have seen KM as either not part of programming or working separately (or shall I say ‘remotely’, the catch phrase now a days!) from M&E function with the twin hardly communicating to each other. Hope and wish success to your initiative /experiment of bringing them under one unit or initiating some form of convergence. As you both acknowledge, KM and M&E have different roles and skills required. Synergies are possible but tensions are inevitable. How these are managed in an integration process would determine how successful and effective it is. Needless to say that consistent role divisions and clear lines of communication between different members of the ‘one unit’ would be the key. More so as M&E evidence is likely to feed into KM processes. Sometimes KM would be selective in terms of communicating some M&E evidence, which can also create some sticky points for independently minded M&E team members. Sometimes KM would demand ‘stories of success’ from the M&E and programme teams. Conversely, for a M&E and programme team, KM function is crucial for uptake and behaviour change (generally outcome level results), and therefore expectation would be that KM would have the necessary capabilities to relay evidence through user-friendly infographics and other tools, using traditional media, social and new media to reach target audience better. Further, a programme and M&E team would expect that there is consistency and continuation of communication for increasing the staying power of messages and for sustaining the momentum of programme level uptake. KM may perceive this expectation as somewhat undue and so ensuing tension would need to managed. Am sure that you are aware of all these issues and are on course to achieving reasonably smooth convergence of KM and M&E, which nonetheless is a challenging proposition.
Thanks and Best,
Ravi