When I decided to join this community, I had great hope for simple but interesting debates on the importance of M & E in general, and evaluation, in particular, for the development practitioner and to encourage the generalization of its practices for a sustainable development by 2030. The debate on developmental evaluation, launched by our colleague Prosper, and which I am following, is a debate that only academics, mastering perfectly the art of "intellectual speculation" can afford because they have the time for that. Moreover, in my humble opinion, such a debate can bring nothing to the development practitioner except additional confusion about the usefulness and importance of both monitoring and evaluation. First of all, I note that we are not all on the same wavelength with respect to the concept of developmental evaluation, from what I read in this debate. Some contributions push towards the concept developed by M.Q. Patton, quoted several times in an article and PPT presentation shared by our colleague Koffi; others evoke a concept very close to evaluation in general, which aims to assess the effectiveness and efficiency of interventions, as presented by our colleague Émile. In the first case, having read several books and articles of Patton, this one evokes an evaluation approach accompanying the intervention (ie a project, a program, or a policy) throughout its implementation so that the evaluation results are used by the intervention team to improve the performance of the intervention or possibly its continuous reformulation until it meets the needs of the beneficiaries. I believe, to simplify the debate, that this is the expected role of the Monitoring function in any M&E system. Why then do we try to wrap it in a new packaging called "Developmental Evaluation"? If in the team in charge of an intervention, more importance and sufficient means are given to the monitoring function, for instance by developing participative mechanisms in this function, I am certain that one will reach convincing results in terms of performance and adaptation of the intervention, exactly as Patton's "Developmental Assessment" concept proposes. The only difference is that this Monitoring function will be less costly for the team and driven by the internal resources of the team, something that almost all M & E training manuals recommend. In the second case, our colleague Émile evokes what is really the role of evaluation since it must focus on the effects and impacts at the macro-economic level in relation to the main development indicators. For my part, and to put it simply, this is what must be attributed to the "Evaluation" function in the monitoring-evaluation system of a given intervention; whether or not we add the adjective "developmental" does not change this "Evaluation” function. In fact, which project or program, or national or sectoral policy, etc does not intervene in the developmental sphere? And which evaluation action of such project, or program, or policy, etc. is not intended to appreciate the effects - especially what are commonly known as end effects - and impacts?
Having said that, I think our community is made up mostly of practitioners in the field who want to see debates develop that can bring them practical solutions that are appropriate to their problems and that they can implement on the ground. So my recommendation is to develop simple debates on current topics and to avoid unnecessary confusion for our development practitioners. On the contrary, let us help them strengthen their monitoring and evaluation system by further strengthening their "Monitoring" function and further develop their "Evaluation" function.
RE: Developmental evaluation
Hello everyone,
When I decided to join this community, I had great hope for simple but interesting debates on the importance of M & E in general, and evaluation, in particular, for the development practitioner and to encourage the generalization of its practices for a sustainable development by 2030.
The debate on developmental evaluation, launched by our colleague Prosper, and which I am following, is a debate that only academics, mastering perfectly the art of "intellectual speculation" can afford because they have the time for that. Moreover, in my humble opinion, such a debate can bring nothing to the development practitioner except additional confusion about the usefulness and importance of both monitoring and evaluation.
First of all, I note that we are not all on the same wavelength with respect to the concept of developmental evaluation, from what I read in this debate. Some contributions push towards the concept developed by M.Q. Patton, quoted several times in an article and PPT presentation shared by our colleague Koffi; others evoke a concept very close to evaluation in general, which aims to assess the effectiveness and efficiency of interventions, as presented by our colleague Émile.
In the first case, having read several books and articles of Patton, this one evokes an evaluation approach accompanying the intervention (ie a project, a program, or a policy) throughout its implementation so that the evaluation results are used by the intervention team to improve the performance of the intervention or possibly its continuous reformulation until it meets the needs of the beneficiaries. I believe, to simplify the debate, that this is the expected role of the Monitoring function in any M&E system. Why then do we try to wrap it in a new packaging called "Developmental Evaluation"? If in the team in charge of an intervention, more importance and sufficient means are given to the monitoring function, for instance by developing participative mechanisms in this function, I am certain that one will reach convincing results in terms of performance and adaptation of the intervention, exactly as Patton's "Developmental Assessment" concept proposes. The only difference is that this Monitoring function will be less costly for the team and driven by the internal resources of the team, something that almost all M & E training manuals recommend.
In the second case, our colleague Émile evokes what is really the role of evaluation since it must focus on the effects and impacts at the macro-economic level in relation to the main development indicators. For my part, and to put it simply, this is what must be attributed to the "Evaluation" function in the monitoring-evaluation system of a given intervention; whether or not we add the adjective "developmental" does not change this "Evaluation” function. In fact, which project or program, or national or sectoral policy, etc does not intervene in the developmental sphere? And which evaluation action of such project, or program, or policy, etc. is not intended to appreciate the effects - especially what are commonly known as end effects - and impacts?
Having said that, I think our community is made up mostly of practitioners in the field who want to see debates develop that can bring them practical solutions that are appropriate to their problems and that they can implement on the ground. So my recommendation is to develop simple debates on current topics and to avoid unnecessary confusion for our development practitioners. On the contrary, let us help them strengthen their monitoring and evaluation system by further strengthening their "Monitoring" function and further develop their "Evaluation" function.
Cordially
Mustapha