Are We Learning From Evaluations?

Are we learning from our evaluations?  

If we are, we should be able to prove it. USAID’s Bureau for Policy, Planning, and Learning’s (PPL) Office of Learning, Evaluation and Research (LER) is taking steps towards this by undertaking an evaluation utilization study, which is currently in progress. If we are not learning from our evaluations, we have to ask some additional questions: Do we know how to learn from evaluations? What would learning from evaluations look like at an institutional level? Is there a model of organizational learning from evaluations that we can identify? Is it happening in a significant way in other international development organizations or other government agencies? Do we need to make substantial changes to the way we conduct evaluations in order to maximize learning?

Jacob Laden covered his ideas on maximizing learning in his recent Learning Lab blog post on Learning from Evaluations. As he mentions in his blog, a big part of not learning lies in the lack of alignment between concluding and delivering evaluation results prior to beginning related projects. Timing for utilization is just the first step. I believe that properly designing reports for use along all elements of the knowledge value chain—not just for project or mission consumption, but at an agency level—is another critical component. At the March 18 KM Reference Group Meeting, I will present some exciting new concepts of what that could look like.