Julia Laidlaw

This concise guide by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention defines evaluation questions and outlines the process needed to develop them. 

Contents

This guide from the Alliance for Useful Evidence is an introduction to systematic review and the necessary steps that should be considered as a part of the process.

Produced by the Change Agency, this resource gives a brief overview of the history, use and application of the photolanguage technique.

Iconarray.com is an online tool for effectively communicating risk in a pictograph form.

This AEA365 blog, written by Lee-Anne Molony a Principal Consultant at Clear Horizon,  provides a brief overview on

A webpage and blog site of Professor Ray Calabrese, from Ohio State University USA.

Written by Associate Professor of Evaluation, Statistics, and Measurement at the University of Tennessee, Jenifer Mor

Composed by Michael Quinn Patton in 2002 and updated in 2013, this is a comprehensive checklist for undertaking a utilisation-focused evaluation.

This web-based toolkit has been developed to help program managers in New South Wales (Australia) government agencies manage evaluations (including those undertaken by internal or external evaluators, or by a combination of both).&nbsp

Step Four in the

This paper by the Overseas Development Institute discusses the nature and history of networks and their relation to the field of international aid and development.

This is the project report on a study conducted on the collective action in capacity development by International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI

This slide show by Dr Howard White presents the use of randomized control trials (RCTs) in impact evaluation.

This is a podcast that offers an overview of the Developmental Evaluation approach according to the perspectives of an internal and an external evaluator.

Eco Evidence is a useful tool for anyone required to review the literature on a specific topic of interest, especially those exploring cause-and-effect questions from existing literature.

This monitoring and evaluation handbook is designed to be used by street educators, as well as other people working with street children.

The Global Forum for Rural Advisory Services (GFRAS) have developed this guide to evaluating rural extension with the aim to provide comprehensive support for people involved in extention evaluations

This presentation explains a method for outcome measurement for the purpose of impact evaluation.

This resource is a detailed overview of study conducted by Lewis and Pattanayak (2012) on the systematic review of the literature surrounding the adoption of Improved Cook Stoves (ICS) or cleaner fuels by households in develo

Aimed at providing guidance for Government Officials and other evaluation practitioners this manual provides an overview of techniques which do not necessarily rely on monetary valuations, namely the Multi Criteria Analysis (MCA).

This case study evaluation of the Pact's Umbrella Grants Management (UGM) Program in South Africa highlights the additional benefits that the organisational capacity building assistance can provide to the effectiveness of grants.

This blog offers an example of a video that was created to communicate evaluation findings.

Drawing on Michael Quinn Patton's best-selling Utilization-Focused Evaluation, this book provides an overall framework and ess

This session was posted by Kari Cruz in the American Evaluation Association (AEA) Public Library.

The book Time to Listen: Hearing People on the Receiving End of International Aid provides a rich overview of international aid, from the perspective of those who receive financial assistance. 

This chart drawing tool for the Apple ipad can be used to draw program logic models. Boxes and arrows of different shapes can be drawn by hand, enlarged, moved and edited easily.  The final model can then be easily emailed.

This resource is a video of an interview with Dr Howard White, Executive Director of the International Initiative for Impact Evaluation (3ie).

This publication is an analysis of six monitoring and evaluation (M&E) case studies from Benin, Ghana, Kenya, Senegal, South Africa, and Uganda.

Understanding and Measuring Women's Economic Empowerment - Definition, Framework and Indicators is a conceptual guide written with the intention of helping practitioners, researchers and donors design effective, measurable interve

The aim of this book is to explain the philosophical foundations, specific techniques, common evidentiary sources, and standards and best practices of process tracing in order to reduce the risks of making inferential errors in the analysis

"Developmental evaluation offers social innovators an approach to collecting strategically focused information in real time, on questions that matter, in contexts where programs or initiatives are not well-tested, and where the outcomes can

The Organizational Cultural and Linguistic Competency Assessment Tool can be used to assess where organizations and individuals fall along the cultural competence spectrum, and to serve as a guide to identify training needs and ar

Drawing on the emerging principles of Agricultural Innovation Systems (AIS) analysis and action, this sourcebook was developed by the World Bank to strengthen innovation systems and promote agricultural

This book, by Sue Funnell and Patricia Rogers, discusses ways of developing, representing and using programme theory and theories of change in different ways to suit the particular situation.

This report was written on a gender focused sector analysis workshop given for DACAAR teams in Afghanistan.

This background paper from Bond for International Development has been produced as part of developing the Im-Prove it! Framework.

This template can be used when doing a Multiple Lines and Levels of Evidence analysis, to record all the lines of evidence available for each evaluation question.

Developmental evaluation (DE) is particularly useful for supporting ongoing learning in complex situations

This blog posted on the Capturing Development Website offers an inviting overview and discussion of Developmental Evaluation as presented in Michael Quinn Patton's (2011) book&nb

This resource, developed by the Independent Evaluation Group of The World Bank, provides a detailed description on how to prepare an evaluation Terms of Reference (ToR) and includes a checklist at the end to help users.

This audio recording and slides are from a presentation given by David D Williams at the 2011 American Evaluation Conference. 

This toolkit explores the use of telephone interviews in qualitative research.

This toolkit deals with transcribing your own, or your team’s, data. If you are considering sending your data to somebody else or an external transcribing agency, see the toolkit on outsourcing transcribing.

This is a summary of the example of how most significant change (MSC) was used to measure “perceptions of ‘significant change’ in school cultures in South Australia” (Cornu et al 2006)

This paper was produced following a discussion between Thomas Cook and Michael Scriven held at The Evaluation Center and Western Michigan University’s Interdisciplinary PhD in Evaluation program jointly hosted Evaluation Cafe´ event on

This document provides an overview of the method of process tracing and a series of examples and exercises to aid in its teaching .

Divided into four main parts this book aims to share lessons and experiences and document cross-country learning in 11 countries from bridging research and extension to fostering multi-stakeholder partnership for “research to impact.” into

This PowerPoint, developed by Kataraina Pipi, Nan Wehipeihana and Kate McKegg as part of a presentation given at the American Evaluation Association conference 2010, looks at using development evaluation to focus on the process of movi

This webpage outlines the circumstances in which qualitative interview techniques are best applied for the purpose of evaluation.

A framework for understanding and assessing adaptive capacity at the local level is needed to begin to understand how it can be supported through wider development processes at both the local and national levels.

The first in a series of lecture notes produced by the Poverty Action Lab and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), this presentation introduces you to the 'whys' and 'hows' of impact evaluation and when it should

This resource explains the importance of knowing 'how to randomize' for the purpose of impact evaluation.

This presentation explores methods for identifying the right sample size for randomized evaluations so that results are defendable.

This PowerPoint presentation is an extensive guide to understanding causes in an evaluation and the difference its proper diagnosis has on the effectiveness and accuracy of an evaluation.

This in-depth presentation introduces you to the 'whys' and 'hows' of randomised assignment and randomised sampling for evaluation as well as when it should be used and potential pitfalls.

This paper identifies a number of frameworks for positive indicator development which focus on the positive well-being of children.

This document explains the process and benefits of meta-analysis using the comparative analysis of different treatments as an example.

This presentation, titled Analyzing Data talks about how to deal with “problems” of non-compliance, choosing what effects to report in your study, as well as achieving external validity and cost-effectiveness.

This is the first of the presentations that explain the importance of knowing 'how to randomize' for the purpose of impact evaluation.

This presentation, titled Managing threats to evaluation and data analysis talks about potential problems that can arise while undertaking impact measurement and analysis.

Drawn from Michael Quinn Patton's book Utilization-focused evaluation, this paper introduces this approach to evaluat

This page describes the reporting outcomes of an Australian Government conducted COR process on a Dugong and Marine Turtle Project in Northern Australia.

This book offers a comprehensive exposition of modern analysis of causation.

This is an example of collaborative outcomes reporting (COR) used for a natural resource management program in South Australia.

This manual details the 8-step causal criteria framework, a method that can be used to integrate information from different data sources.

An example of a COR used for an indigenous education program in Australia. 

This paper outlines the background and philosophy of

Drawing on the author's experience in rural resource management in Brazil this paper discusses the common misconceptions, potential and processes involved in Participatory Monitory and Evaluation (PM&E) 

This short paper summarises the results of a case study analysing the role of collective action in securing property right for the poor in two Indonesian villages.

This paper describes the quantitative and qualitative research designs for survey and ethnographic methods have been combined in the evaluations of conditional cash transfer (CCT) programs for the governments of

This PhD thesis from Irene Guijt draws on her extensive knowledge and experience in the field of rural resource management in Brazil.

Useful for practitioners and students alike this book is both theoretical and practical. Features include follow-up exercises at the end of each chapter and a utilization-focused evaluation checklist.

This resource provides set of practical participative exercises to help both large and small groups, teams and boards introduce new and different ways of change the option of communicating, analysing and deciding what to do.

This short guide defines in-depth interviews, explains their advantages and disadvantages and the steps involved in their application. 

This overview of the RealWorld Evaluation book "Working Under Budget, Time, Data and Political Constraint" explains how the RealWorld Evaluation Approaches can be applied at every step of the evaluation process.

This report is an example of a Collaborative Outcomes Report (COR) from a community sustainability project in Victoria, Australia. It is titled "How we ran a behaviour change program and the lessons we learnt".

"Using projective Techniques in the Evaluation of Groups for Children of Rehabilitating Drug Addicts" is the documentation of research that discusses and applies projective techniques to identify variables and draw conclusions about the men

This website offers a toolkit for evaluators. Available on the EuropeAid website on evaluation, it details 13 key evaluation tools explaining what, why and when they should be used and how to implement them.

This guide, authored by Kirrin Gill, Imogen Fua and Ekong Emah for Program for Appropriate Technology in Health (PATH), provides a step by step process that supports program managers im

This resource on Capacity Indicators, is a compilation of indicators for assessing capability and effectiveness of organizations and the standards of the environment in which they must operate.

This is a concise description of ‘Performance Story’ written by Jess Dart and John Mayne for  the Sage ‘Encyclopaedia of Evaluation’.

Drawing on the experience ActKnowledge and Aspen Institute had in evaluating the "Super Woman" Program, this guided example shows how to develop an

This evaluation report, written equally in English and Vietnamese, is about the Ausaid-funded My Thuan Bridge, the first bridge constructed across the Mekong River in Viet Nam.

This guide presents information about different tools for economic evaluation.

This paper reports on the approach used in a multicountry study of the poverty impact of research programs under the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR).

This discussion brief considers the benefits of using the Sustainable Livelihoods Framework (SLF) to assess the impact of research on agricultural poverty.

This reading is taken from Session 8 of the online course Action Research and Evaluation Online (AREOL). It explains in detail the technique known as convergent Interviewing and how it can be used for effective data collection.

Soft Systems Methodology (SSM) can be used to gain understanding of complex relationship drive situations and their contexts.

This paper discusses the usefulness of Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) in weighting agricultural research results in ex-post research evaluation.

This guide facilitates the decision about how to collect research data and how to select a sample of the population of interest so that it is truly representative.

This guide from the University of Wisconsin Cooperative Extension is designed to support the planning of a program evaluation.

This paper from the United States General Accounting Office (GAO) explains structured interview techniques for GAO evaluators and how they should be incorporated when appropriate.

This webpage from the KnowledgeSharing Toolkit website offers a guide on how the Fishbowl Technique can be used for stakeholder engagement in a variety of settings.

The Point K Learning Center's website of free tools and resources h

If you are looking to learn more and hone your skills in evaluation there has never been a better time to tap into any number of fantastic free or low cost professional development opportunities.

This week we’re featuring Developmental Evaluation to

The Guide to Evaluating Rural Extension is a new resource produced by The Global Forum for Rural Advisory Services (GFRAS).

An organisational assessment is a systematic process for obtaining valid information about the performance of an organisation and the factors that affect performance. It differs from other types of evaluations because the assessment focuses on the organisation as the primary unit of analysis.

In many research contexts, sampling simply involves asking for volunteers.

A realist synthesis is the synthesis of a wide range of evidence that seeks to identify underlying causal mechanisms and explore how they work under what conditions, answering the question "what works for whom under what circumsta

A matrix chart shows relationships between two or more variables in a data set in grid format.

Intermediate outcomes are identified in a logical model before the final impact. 

Geo-tagging is the process of adding geographic information about digital content, within “metadata” tags - including latitude and longitude coordinates, place names and/or other positional data.

Best evidence synthesis is a synthesis that, like a realist synthesis, draws on a wide range of evidence (including single case studies) and explores the impact of context.

Vote counting is a simple but limited method for synthesizing evidence from multiple evaluations and involves comparing the number of positive studies (studies showing benefit) with the number of negative studies (studies showing harm)

A network diagram uses a set of nodes and connecting lines to display of how people (or other elements) in a network are connected. It is usually a product of social network analysis.

Stacked graphs depict items stacked one on top (column) of the other or side-by-side (bar), differentiated by coloured bars or strips.

The Six Thinking Hats method encourages participants to cycle through six different ways of thinking, using the metaphor of wearing different conceptual “hats”.

Value for money is a term used in different ways, including as a synonym for cost-effectiveness, and as systematic approach to considering these issues throughout planning and implementation, not only in evaluation.