Stated goals and objectives

Synonyms:
Legislative review

Evaluations can use the program's stated objectives and goals to assess program success or failure.

Program objectives and goals are generally determined at the beginning of the design process. Occasionally this has not been done, or the program goals have changed along the way. If this is the case, it can be useful to generate a project logic model - either collaboratively or through key inputs and then tested with team members.

Examples

Denmark has provided development assistance to Bhutan for 30 years. In 2010 the two countries undertook a joint evaluation to assess and document the relevance and effectiveness of the Danish support over the past ten years (2000-2009) with a particular focus on the outcomes and sustainability of the support given.

The evaluation document provides an overview to the changing program objectives and goals. These included:

  • The 1997-2002 focus on health, natural resource management and sustainable development, urban planning and urban infrastructure. Decentralisation, governance and democratisation were primarily targeted as cross-cutting themes.
  • The 2003-07 focus on health, environment and natural resource management, and urban development. It also added education to the country programme and reinforced the support to democratisation, good governance and decentralisation through a full sector-programme. At the same time, from 2003 the environment and urban development programmes were merged into one programme with emphasis on natural resource management and sustainable development of towns.
  • The overall objective for the Bhutan-Denmark cooperation stated in the country programme is ‘poverty reduction through promotion of sustainable economic development and strengthening of the democratic process, including popular participation, good governance, gender equality and respect for human rights’.
  • The current Danish-Bhutanese cooperation programme is aligned to the 10th Five Year Plan (FYP). The programme states the following objectives for the cooperation: ‘Poverty reduction through the promotion of sustainable economic development, strengthening of the private sector development, democratisation and good governance, gender equality and respect for human rights’. Hence, as something new, strengthening of the private sector is now one of the objectives

Advice for using this method

Check whether the original goals and objectives still apply. If this is not the case, work with the client and stakeholders to surface and articulate what the current goals and objectives are.

Resource

Danish International Development Agency (DANIDA). (2010). Joint Evaluation: Danish-Bhutanese Country Programme 2000-09 SYNTHESIS REPORT. Evaluation Department, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Denmark. Retrieved from http://um.dk/en/~/media/UM/English-site/Documents/Danida/Eval/978-87-7087-426...

 

'Stated goals and objectives' is referenced in: