Evaluation, performance management, project management, and quality improvement (everything I do) all have at least one thing in common. They start with the end in mind, articulating goals. Before anything else, they ask what the end game is. For example:
- Evaluation – What do you want to learn from this evaluation? How do you want to use the results?
- Performance Management – What does success look like? How will you know when you’ve achieved it?
- Project Management – Where’s the finish line? What boundaries (budgets, timelines) do we have to work within?
- Quality Improvement – What does quality, fidelity, or efficiency look like? What improvement do you seek? How will you know when you’ve achieved it?
All of these disciplines have roots in evaluative thinking. So too does (should) program design, marketing, fund development, training – basically everything we do! Before diving in, getting busy, and spending time and energy, figure out why you’re doing it and how you’ll know when you’ve been effective. It sounds so simple and obvious that I think many organizations overlook this key step. They assume their team is on the same page and shares the same assumptions about why they do what they do. Over time, any small differences within teams related to those goals and assumptions can grow and create significant disconnects that diminish the impact of their efforts and create tensions in teams.
Instead, this is the time of year when I hope organizations are being reflective – pulling out those annual plans and checking their proposed vs. actual progress, running year-end reports and discussing them, and talking to their teams about what worked and didn’t work. And, grounded in that reflection, I hope organizations are setting meaningful, measurable, and manageable goals for the new year. For more on setting goals, check out this post.
I’m practicing what I preach. Insight Partners will be closed from December 15 to January 1 to do our own reflecting, evaluating, and planning, so this is our last post for 2018. We wish you all joyful and restful holidays and look forward to seeing you in 2019!