Evaluation+&+Control

Dina, Razan After completing this chapter, students will be able to: - Understand the nature of the control cycle and four key steps in a general project control model. - Recognize the strengths and weaknesses of common project evaluation and control methods. - Understand how Earned Value Management can assist project tracking and evaluation. - Use Earned Value Management for project portfolio analysis. - Understand behavioral concepts and other human issues in evaluation and control. - Control Cycle - a general model - Monitoring Project Performance - Earned Value Management

=Project Monitoring, Evaluation and Control – What is the difference? = It can take some time to understand the difference between the big three, that are often misunderstood by managers as a separate activity, often referred to as M&E. Often within large development projects, M&E run separately from the project implementation team. Its important for those involved to understand their roles and responsibilities and that project reporting can occur in addition to M&E activities, which might not be the case in other commercial projects. Ideally a development project would have these activities tightly integrated with project managers working very closely with M&E personnel to avoid conflict between these two areas of an operation. M&E activities can occur months after a project has transitioned and closed. Here is how I learnt to differentiate: ** Monitor **the ** work **, ** Evaluate ** the ** results, **then ** Control **the ** changes **needed for continual improvement.
 * Progress ** Monitoring **- Passively watching, changes nothing, continuous review,** Activities and Outputs ** – Lower Levels of the Logical Framework.
 * ** Evaluating **at a higher level within the Logical framework – ** Goals and Outcomes **that take some thought and expertise to analyse.
 * ** Control **the decisions and ** changes **made as a result to manage variances identified during implementation[[image:http://pm4gis.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/image.png?w=625]]



= evaluation: =

Factors to evaluate

 * Stakeholder engagement
 * Outcomes and impacts
 * Benefits
 * Learning
 * Effectiveness of the project

Types of Evaluations: Formative A formative evaluation is a method for judging the worth of a program while the program activities are forming (in progress). This part of the evaluation focuses on the process.

Formative Evaluation questions:

 * Have milestones been met on schedule?
 * What is holding up progress?
 * What should we do to correct this?
 * Is project management effective?

Summative A summative evaluation is a method of judging the worth of a program at the end of the program activities. The focus is on the outcome.

Summative Evaluation questions:

 * Have objectives been met?
 * Have outcomes been achieved?
 * What impact did the project have?
 * What benefits are there for stakeholders?
 * Was our approach effective?
 * What lessons have we learned?
 * What would we do differently?