Can an evaluation platform support the relationship building that is key to doing good evaluations?
The fit between my job of helping to build a web-based evaluation platform and my preference for participatory evaluation techniques had been niggling at me for some time now. This niggling recently became demanding in response to the discussions generated during the forum we co-sponsored with PHAC and Propel on Evaluation for Learning. Throughout the forum, the importance of relationships and human engagements was mentioned over and over again. I found myself needing to resolve the question of whether or not our web-based evaluation platform could support participatory, engaging evaluations.
My first thoughts were that the web has proved to be valuable for connecting people both personally and in their work lives. Many of us know at least one couple who met on the net and I can think of many ways my ability to connect with people via e-mail and through searching websites has helped my work. I was pleased to be able to think of one way our platform can support relationships. We are developing Facebook-style networking so practitioners can find others who work in the same areas. We also see the potential to link practitioners to evaluators and intervention researchers and vice versa. But what about supporting the relationships between evaluators and program stakeholders, can our platform help here?
After I answered this question, I showed my blog to Diane and in true Diane-like fashion she let me know what she thought of my answer. Among other things, she called it a cop-out. And she was right. I had suggested that our platform can support the human side of evaluation by allowing practitioners to use our evaluation tools (program planning tools, evaluation planning tools, and reporting tools) to engage their partners in whatever type of evaluation best suits them, including engaging them in their participatory evaluation journeys. In short, I was satisfied with helping to make evaluation easier for practitioners. But both Diane and I want the platform to do more and the practitioners we have talked to also want and need more. So while I have been able to reduce my concerns about the fit between participatory evaluation and web-based platforms, I want to use this blog as a call for others to help us think about how the platform can support the human side of evaluation. At our inaugural International Advisory Board meeting, Megan Ward, Associate Medical Officer of Health, Regional Municipality of Peel told us a few of the ways she has helped to put a human face to evidence-based practice. One example she provided involves posting videos of practitioners relating the story behind their evidence searches as a way to engage other practitioners in their own evidence-based practice. If you have other examples of how the web has been used to change practice, please consider sharing your story with us.
So now that I have assured myself that I don’t have to lay aside my evaluation principles to use a web-based platform, I can obsess about some of the other niggling thoughts about evaluation practice and web-platforms. Things like……
- If we build it, will they come?
- How can the platform address organizational barriers and facilitators to doing evaluation?
- How can the platform contribute to the paradigm or culture shifts that are needed to facilitate evaluation?
Care to offer your thoughts on these issues as well?
