Monitoring and Evaluation: the frontline of the effectiveness debate
There
is increasing pressure for NGOs, and the international development sector
in general, to be more effective and accountable in the activities they
engage in. The benefits and outcomes of their work need to be demonstrated
to a host of different stakeholders, including donors, beneficiaries and
the general public. Monitoring and evaluation plays a key role in how the
impact of their work is measured, as Louisa Gosling explores.
The motivation that drives most non-governmental organisations (NGOs), whatever their shape, size and area of work, is simple: how to make a difference to the lives of the world’s poorest and most vulnerable people. The way they go about it might differ but the cause that binds all NGOs together is the same. The most important element though, is not what they do, but the way that they do it, and, increasingly, the way that the work is measured to show the difference it has made.
This raises a multitude of questions: how can NGOs make sure work is effective? Are they really making a difference, and what kind of difference and to whom? Could they do it better? These questions raise the twin concerns of quality and accountability: how to make sure the work is of high quality and therefore more likely to be effective, and how to demonstrate the effectiveness in order to be accountable for the way the money is spent.
Many people are interested in the answers to these questions - individuals who give money to NGOs, major donors who contribute public money to bring about greater stability and prosperity, NGO staff and their partners who are running the programmes, and most importantly, the ’beneficiaries’ of the work - the people whose lives should be improved by the efforts of NGOs.
But it’s not that easy. NGOs operate in a wide range of different and challenging contexts. They work on different levels, trying to change attitudes and behaviours, to provide services, to influence policies, and to build up supportive structures and mechanisms. They work to build up the capacities of local organisations, to build up civil society, promote rights, and lay the ground work for sustainable change.
This means working through a huge network of relationships with people and institutions, all of which are stakeholders in the process, and therefore have an interest in quality and accountability.
The consensus now amongst development NGOs is that their primary accountability is to the beneficiaries. These are the people who must, first and foremost be satisfied that the money has been well spent in terms of producing benefit to their lives. If this accountability is met, then accountability to donors, partners and NGO boards should also be satisfied.
NGOs broadly agree that their best work is done where the beneficiaries take part in and are committed to the process. This means “institutionalising” the participation of stakeholders, not only in planning and running projects, but also in organisations' governance and strategy. And what happens when participation becomes “institutionalised”? Does this inhibit and eventually define the nature and extent of people’s participation? And if so how does this affect what is monitored and evaluated, by whom and how?
Essentially monitoring and evaluation is the way in which organisations measure their work. The challenge now is to make sure this really looks at meaningful measures of quality, that the information it gathers is useful, and suits the needs of the organisational culture involved.
All organisations have the dilemma; in order to learn from and improve their work they need to understand what goes wrong as well as what goes right. But to raise money they need to be perceived as doing good work. This means that monitoring and evaluation has to be carefully and purposefully designed to meet specific learning and accountability needs. One size will most definitely not fit all.
Want to find out more?
The Monitoring and Evaluation for Accountability workshop is an introductory level workshop that is being held on 15 May. It will look at how monitoring and evaluation can help to meet the needs of both quality and accountability. It will be examined from the perspective of different stakeholders, looking at the kind of information they need, how they will use the information, and ultimately, how this will help to make the work more effective. It will also look at the challenge of increasing the participation of different stakeholders in monitoring and evaluation.
More information about the Monitoring and Evaluation for Accountability workshop.
Contact the Learning and Training team on 020 7520 0242.
More information about how BOND is facilitating the effectiveness debate through the Quality Standards Working Group.