Teaching People to Fish? Building the Evaluation Capability of Public Sector Organizations
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 12567955 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Bron McDonald (Department of Primary Industries, corresponding author), Patricia Rogers (0000-0002-4427-1924, Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, Australia), Bruce Kefford (Department of Primary Industries) |
| Year | 2003 |
| Volume | 9 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 9-29 |
| Publication date | 2003-01-01 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Evaluation (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1356-3890 • E-ISSN: 1461-7153 |
| Publisher | SAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US) |
| DOI | 10.1177/1356389003009001002 |
| OpenAlex | W2010918817 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 23 |
| References cited | 11 |
In response to an increasing demand for public sector accountability, many government agencies have sought to develop their internal evaluation capabilities. Often these efforts have focused on increasing the capacity to supply credible evaluations, yet addressing demand is just as important. This article focuses on a government agency and tracks its five-year journey towards developing such a capability. It documents contextual matters, drivers for change, the actions taken by the agency, and its response to emergent challenges during four phases. Based on feedback from project staff and managers and those involved in the capability development project, it offers seven recommendations. These are: start small and grow evaluation; address both supply and demand; work top-down and bottom-up simultaneously; use a theory of change behaviour; develop a common evaluation framework, including a generic programme theory; build knowledge of what works within the agency's context; and systematically and visibly evaluate each stage
Accountability · Agency (philosophy · Business · Context (archaeology · Economics · Government (linguistics · Knowledge management · Management · Political science · Process management · Public relations · Public sector · Sociology · Theory of change · Work (physics · Community Health and Development · Computer Science · Engineering · Evaluation and Performance Assessment · Public Policy and Administration Research
Mechanisms for institutionalising evaluation
Lessons learned from a collective evaluation and community of practice focused on evidence-based learning
Managing Conflict Constructively in Program Evaluation
Data and Decision Making
Using a Complex Adaptive Systems Perspective to Illuminate the Concept of Evaluation Capacity Building in a Network
Measuring Evaluation Capacity—Results and Implications of a Danish Study
A Multidisciplinary Model of Evaluation Capacity Building
A Research Synthesis of the Evaluation Capacity Building Literature
The Historical Development of Evaluation Use
A Dialogical, Story-Based Evaluation Tool
A Dialogical, Story-Based Evaluation Tool
Exploring Organizational Evaluation Capacity and Evaluation Capacity Building
Evaluating monitoring, evaluation and learning initiatives in the New Zealand and Australian agricultural research and innovation systems
Critical appraisal of the establishment of a theory-informed evaluation capacity building function in a large government department
Bridging the Gap Both-Ways
Capturing Evaluation Capacity
Examining Youth Sector Stakeholders’ Experiences in an Online Program Evaluation Certificate
Using Evaluation Capacity Building (ECB) to Interpret Evaluation Strategy and Practice in the United States National Tobacco Control Program (NTCP)
The Road to Evaluation Capacity Building
Citizen attitudes about the construction of a prison in Spain. Challenge to the concept “Nimby”
Organisational analytical capacity
Polity, Politics and Policy Evaluation in Belgium
Attributing Outcomes to Social Policy Interventions – ‘Gold Standard’ or ‘Fool's Gold’ in Public Policy and Management
| Citations per year | 1 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2003 - 2026 (24) |
| Highly cited | No |