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In common usage, evaluation is a systematic determination and assessment of a subject's merit, worth and significance, using criteria governed by a set of standards. It can assist an organization, program, design, project or any other intervention or initiative to assess any aim, realisable concept/proposal, or any alternative, to help in decision-making; or to generate the degree of achievement or value in regard to the aim and objectives and results of any such action that has been completed.[1]

The primary purpose of evaluation, in addition to gaining insight into prior or existing initiatives, is to enable reflection and assist in the identification of future change.[2] Evaluation is often used to characterize and appraise subjects of interest in a wide range of human enterprises, including the arts, criminal justice, foundations, non-profit organizations, government, health care, and other human services. It is long term and done at the end of a period of time.

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Evaluation is the structured interpretation and giving of meaning to predicted or actual impacts of proposals or results. It looks at original objectives, and at what is either predicted or what was accomplished and how it was accomplished. So evaluation can be formative, that is taking place during the development of a concept or proposal, project or organization, with the intention of improving the value or effectiveness of the proposal, project, or organisation. It can also be summative, drawing lessons from a completed action or project or an organisation at a later point in time or circumstance.[3]

The main purpose of a program evaluation can be to "determine the quality of a program by formulating a judgment" Marthe Hurteau, Sylvain Houle, Stphanie Mongiat (2009).[6] An alternative view is that "projects, evaluators, and other stakeholders (including funders) will all have potentially different ideas about how best to evaluate a project since each may have a different definition of 'merit'. The core of the problem is thus about defining what is of value."[5]From this perspective, evaluation "is a contested term", as "evaluators" use the term evaluation to describe an assessment, or investigation of a program whilst others simply understand evaluation as being synonymous with applied research.

There are two functions considering to the evaluation purpose. Formative Evaluations provide the information on improving a product or a process. Summative Evaluations provide information of short-term effectiveness or long-term impact for deciding the adoption of a product or process.[7]

Not all evaluations serve the same purpose some evaluations serve a monitoring function rather than focusing solely on measurable program outcomes or evaluation findings and a full list of types of evaluations would be difficult to compile.[5] This is because evaluation is not part of a unified theoretical framework,[8] drawing on a number of disciplines, which include management and organisational theory, policy analysis, education, sociology, social anthropology, and social change.[9]

However, the strict adherence to a set of methodological assumptions may make the field of evaluation more acceptable to a mainstream audience but this adherence will work towards preventing evaluators from developing new strategies for dealing with the myriad problems that programs face.[9] It is claimed that only a minority of evaluation reports are used by the evaluand (client) (Datta, 2006).[6] One justification of this is that "when evaluation findings are challenged or utilization has failed, it was because stakeholders and clients found the inferences weak or the warrants unconvincing" (Fournier and Smith, 1993).[6] Some reasons for this situation may be the failure of the evaluator to establish a set of shared aims with the evaluand, or creating overly ambitious aims, as well as failing to compromise and incorporate the cultural differences of individuals and programs within the evaluation aims and process.[5] None of these problems are due to a lack of a definition of evaluation but are rather due to evaluators attempting to impose predisposed notions and definitions of evaluations on clients. The central reason for the poor utilization of evaluations is arguably[by whom?] due to the lack of tailoring of evaluations to suit the needs of the client, due to a predefined idea (or definition) of what an evaluation is rather than what the client needs are (House, 1980).[6] The development of a standard methodology for evaluation will require arriving at applicable ways of asking and stating the results of questions about ethics such as agent-principal, privacy, stakeholder definition, limited liability; and could-the-money-be-spent-more-wisely issues.

Evaluating programs and projects, regarding their value and impact within the context they are implemented, can be ethically challenging. Evaluators may encounter complex, culturally specific systems resistant to external evaluation. Furthermore, the project organization or other stakeholders may be invested in a particular evaluation outcome. Finally, evaluators themselves may encounter "conflict of interest (COI)" issues, or experience interference or pressure to present findings that support a particular assessment.

General professional codes of conduct, as determined by the employing organization, usually cover three broad aspects of behavioral standards, and include inter-collegial relations (such as respect for diversity and privacy), operational issues (due competence, documentation accuracy and appropriate use of resources), and conflicts of interest (nepotism, accepting gifts and other kinds of favoritism).[10] However, specific guidelines particular to the evaluator's role that can be utilized in the management of unique ethical challenges are required. The Joint Committee on Standards for Educational Evaluation has developed standards for program, personnel, and student evaluation. The Joint Committee standards are broken into four sections: Utility, Feasibility, Propriety, and Accuracy. Various European institutions have also prepared their own standards, more or less related to those produced by the Joint Committee. They provide guidelines about basing value judgments on systematic inquiry, evaluator competence and integrity, respect for people, and regard for the general and public welfare.[11]

Independence is attained through ensuring independence of judgment is upheld such that evaluationconclusions are not influenced or pressured by another party, and avoidance of conflict ofinterest, such that the evaluator does not have a stake in a particular conclusion. Conflict ofinterest is at issue particularly where funding of evaluations is provided by particular bodieswith a stake in conclusions of the evaluation, and this is seen as potentially compromising theindependence of the evaluator. Whilst it is acknowledged that evaluators may be familiar withagencies or projects that they are required to evaluate, independence requires that they not havebeen involved in the planning or implementation of the project. A declaration of interest shouldbe made where any benefits or association with project are stated. Independence of judgment isrequired to be maintained against any pressures brought to bear on evaluators, for example, byproject funders wishing to modify evaluations such that the project appears more effective than

Impartiality pertains to findings being a fair and thorough assessment of strengths andweaknesses of a project or program. This requires taking due input from all stakeholders involvedand findings presented without bias and with a transparent, proportionate, and persuasive linkbetween findings and recommendations. Thus evaluators are required to delimit their findings toevidence. A mechanism to ensure impartiality is external and internal review. Such review isrequired of significant (determined in terms of cost or sensitivity) evaluations. The review isbased on quality of work and the degree to which a demonstrable link is provided between findings

Transparency requires that stakeholders are aware of the reason for the evaluation, the criteriaby which evaluation occurs and the purposes to which the findings will be applied. Access to theevaluation document should be facilitated through findings being easily readable, with clearexplanations of evaluation methodologies, approaches, sources of information, and costs

Furthermore, the international organizations such as the I.M.F. and the World Bank have independent evaluation functions. The various funds, programmes, and agencies of the United Nations has a mix of independent, semi-independent and self-evaluation functions, which have organized themselves as a system-wide UN Evaluation Group (UNEG),[13] that works together to strengthen the function, and to establish UN norms and standards for evaluation. There is also an evaluation group within the OECD-DAC, which endeavors to improve development evaluation standards.[15] The independent evaluation units of the major multinational development banks (MDBs) have also created the Evaluation Cooperation Group[16] to strengthen the use of evaluation for greater MDB effectiveness and accountability, share lessons from MDB evaluations, and promote evaluation harmonization and collaboration.

The word "evaluation" has various connotations for different people, raising issues related to this process that include; what type of evaluation should be conducted; why there should be an evaluation process and how the evaluation is integrated into a program, for the purpose of gaining greater knowledge and awareness? There are also various factors inherent in the evaluation process, for example; to critically examine influences within a program that involve the gathering and analyzing of relative information about a program.

Founded on another perspective of evaluation by Thomson and Hoffman in 2003, it is possible for a situation to be encountered, in which the process could not be considered advisable; for instance, in the event of a program being unpredictable, or unsound. This would include it lacking a consistent routine; or the concerned parties unable to reach an agreement regarding the purpose of the program. In addition, an influencer, or manager, refusing to incorporate relevant, important central issues within the evaluation e24fc04721