Summer school on
Outcome Harvesting

for Complex Development Programmes

Outcome Harvesting is a utilisation-focused, highly participatory evaluation tool that enables evaluators, grant makers, and managers to identify, formulate, verify, and make sense of outcomes they have influenced when at the time of planning the relationships of cause-effect were substantially unknown. As the UNDP says, Outcome Harvesting is “an evaluation approach that — unlike some other methods — does not measure progress towards predetermined outcomes, but rather collects evidence of what has been achieved, and works backward to determine whether and how the project or intervention contributed to the change”. [UNDP Discussion Paper, “Innovations in Monitoring & Evaluation”, August 2013] For further information, go to www.OutcomeHarvesting.Net, a website devoted to supporting the growing number of Outcome Harvesting practitioners around the world.

Expected Result: Participants will have sufficient knowledge and skill to be able to continue learning how to adapt the Outcome Harvesting approach to monitoring and evaluation to their specific needs following the workshop.

Target audience: Evaluators and commissioners of evaluations of development and social change with no previous experience with Outcome Harvesting.

Level of participants: Intermediate — Participants should have knowledge and experience of evaluation.

Methodology: The workshop embodies the hands-on, participatory values that are at the core of this utilization-focused evaluation approach, combining theory and examples with group discussion, individual reflection and small group practical exercises all revolving around a case study especially written for this CID workshop. Special attention is given to dealing with the uncertainty about the causal relationships linking inputs, activities and outputs with the outcomes of development interventions. The participants will apply all concepts embodied in the six steps in working groups. The ten underlying principles will be explained throughout the workshop with examples from one or more of the 50+ evaluative experiences for which the facilitator has been responsible. Thus, participants will build their practical capacities and leave the course with skills in adapting this tool to evaluate interventions for the purposes of both accountability and improving performance.

*note that fees do not include travel, lodging, meals or visa and insurance

Program

Staff and Instructors

Our instructors are diverse and moving practitioners with a combined 100+ years of professional experience.

Pier Giorgio Ardeni

The Director of the Summer Programme is Pier Giorgio Ardeni. Pier Giorgio is a full professor of Political Economy and Development Economics and teaches Development Economics (undergraduate courses) and International Development Economics (graduate courses). Pier Giorgio Ardeni has extensive experience with monitoring and evaluation, poverty assessments and poverty statistics in various countries, as well as with nation-wide household surveys. He has more than 20 years of experience as advisor/consultant in developing and transition countries in statistical development and capacity building projects, household surveys, PRSPs and MDG indicator monitoring and evaluation, policy advice. He has been an advisor for OXFAM, the World Bank, the Department for International Development (DFID)of the UK Government, the Swedish International Development Agency (Sida), the International Development Cooperation of the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and for several development assistance programmes funded by the European Commission in several countries like: Afghanistan, Armenia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Cambodia, Cyprus, Ethiopia, Kazakhstan, Mali, Mexico, Mozambique, Serbia, Sierra Leone, Turkey, Ukraine, Uzbekistan, Yemen. Currently, he is the President of the Foundation Research Institute "Carlo Cattaneo" based in Bologna.

Ricardo Wilson-Grau

Ricardo, evaluator, organizational development consultant and president of Ricardo Wilson-Grau Consultoria em Gestão Empresarial Ltda will deliver the workshop. Since 2004, working with colleagues Ricardo developed the Outcome Harvesting tool through evaluations generating thousands of outcomes achieved in 143 countries by over 500 networks and associations, NGOs, community-based organisations, research institutes and government agencies. In 2013, the UNDP selected Outcome Harvesting as one of eleven promising innovations in monitoring and evaluation practice. Ten World Bank Institute teams piloted a customised version of Outcome Harvesting and the World Bank published a booklet of the cases and now lists the tool amongst its resources for monitoring and evaluation. USAID highlights Outcome Harvesting as one of five approaches especially well-suited for evaluation practitioners operating in dynamic, uncertain situations who need tools to evaluate the change and results they are achieving through interventions where relations of cause and effect are not fully understood. Outcome Harvesting is featured as a chapter in Developmental Evaluation Exemplars (Guilford 2015) and in Principles-Focused Evaluation (Guilford, 2017), both by Michael Quinn Patton. His book Outcome Harvesting: Principles in Practice will be published by IAP in the boreal autumn 2018.

Andrea B. Wolfe

Andrea Wolfe is a Senior Associate of the Center for International Development of the Rockefeller College of Public Affairs and Policy. She has more twenty-five years of experience in designing and implementing international governance projects, as a project director, advisor, M&E specialist and evaluator. She has worked overseas as team leader (Chief of Party, Mozambique), technical advisor for large projects to support devolution and local governance (DFID and USAID Kenya), and has been technical lead on parliamentary development and civil society strengthening projects in Kenya, Morocco, Mozambique, Bosnia and Herzegovina (EU, DFID, USAID, and OSCE) and for Elections (Mozambique, Carter Center). Her consulting assignments include M&E team leader and institutional assessment team leader for projects in Bolivia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brazil, Cote d’Ivoire, Guinea, Guinea Bissau, Haiti, Malawi, Mozambique, Nepal, Kenya and Vietnam. Andrea has been collaborating with the University of Bologna and the CID-SUNY to design and deliver the International Summer School on Monitoring and Evaluation since 2006.

Institutional Partners

This is the 13th annual season of the Monitoring and Evaluation Professional Summer Training Programme for Development Experts and Practitioners. Over the years, the programme has been jointly promoted by the Centre for International Development (CID Bologna), the University of Bologna Department of Economic Sciences (DSE-Unibo), the Cattaneo Institute Research Foundation and the Center for International Development at the State University of New York (CID-SUNY).

Location – Bologna, Italy

Bologna is a medieval university town in northern Italy. Bologna is a city of contrasts. It is the home of Europe’s oldest university, established in 1088, yet the city maintains a youthful spirit, rife with students, concerts, political activism and chic to simple bars. It is legendary for its traditional cuisine, but is home to some of Italy’s most innovative and trendy restaurants. It is also less touristy than more famous Italian cities (like nearby Venice or Florence), which lends itself to a more authentic experience.