The Useful Evaluation Podcast

Scott Florence is the Managing Director at reThink Green in Sudbury, Ontario, where he brings together ideas, partners and resources to build a more sustainable community. Scott is also an accomplished member of the arts community and has many different creative projects on the go. We start this episode with a discussion about how he’d evaluate his most recent endeavour, The Letter Project, that challenges strangers to engage through the written medium.

In this week’s episode, Scott and Adam have a candid conversation about how evaluation can work for and against organizations trying to respond to community needs. We talk about the danger of applying the same evaluation tools across every context and how we can talk ourselves into cycles of positivity and negativity bias. If you’ve ever written a journal, you’ll want to listen to this section.

Before signing off on the final episode of season one, we consider the consequences of focusing on metric-based evaluation and how it might stand in the way of honesty in the nonprofit sector.

Resources Mentioned in this Episode:

* The Letter Project

* reThink Green where Scott works

* Send us a tweet at @evalcast to tell us what you’d like to hear about on Season 2

Music: Wavy Glass by Podington Bear. Licensed under an Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 International License. Find Podington Bear and other artists at freemusicarchive.org/music.

Anne Bergen is an evaluator, consultant and researcher based in Guelph, Ontario, who seeks to build a common understanding of problems and solutions through participatory research. She loves data and is a self-confessed evaluation nerd.

In this week’s episode, we explore the difference between evaluation that’s driven by reporting and evaluation that’s part of a learning culture. We talk about different ways of engaging with people and how the tools we use to measure may in fact affect behaviour. We ask what data might you already be collecting – and what might you be able to do with that? Knowing that people may interpret data in different ways, how can we be mindful of secondary audiences to our evaluation work?

Resources mentioned in this episode:

* 10C – the Guelph coworking space where we interviewed Anne. 10C was also a partner on the Useful Evaluation Project, from which this podcast was born.

* When we say knowledge mobilization, what do we really mean? The Knowledge Mobilisation Toolkit explores this question.

* Learn more about the Logic Model

* Anne’s website is KnowledgeToAction.ca

Music: Wavy Glass by Podington Bear. Licensed under an Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 International License. Find Podington Bear and other artists at http://freemusicarchive.org/music.

Maria Luisa Contursi is Director of Impact and Storytelling at Pillar Nonprofit Network where she gathers and shares stories to inspire people to ask new questions about the work that they do. She also is also the founder of Mind Your Mind and a contributor to the work of Goodwill Industries Ontario Great Lakes.

In this week’s episode, we talk about modelling vulnerability, asking new questions, genuine curiosity, and the importance of developing a relationship with failure. We talk about pushing the boundaries of knowledge mobilization, for the purpose of creating change and what we might learn from arts and theatre.

We also explore how evaluation can help us to ask different questions, in different language, that reveal deep truths about ourselves and our communities.

Resources mentioned in this episode:

* Social Artist, Melanie Schambach

* Follow Maria Luisa on Twitter

* Learn more about the Logic Model

* The Musical, Come From Away, as a piece of an evaluation process

* Pillar Nonprofit Decision Making Tool

Music: Wavy Glass by Podington Bear. Licensed under an Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 International License. Find Podington Bear and other artists at http://freemusicarchive.org/music.

Stefan Hostetter is an environmentalist, storyteller, and community builder, who is currently working with the Centre for Social Innovation (CSI) in Toronto as the Community Manager of CSI Spadina.

In this week’s episode, we examine how doing evaluation can generate some uncomfortable answers – and how facing those realities can be tough! Perhaps if evaluation isn’t dangerous, it isn’t worth doing.

We also talk about evaluation and environmentalism, what it means to do better evaluation (and who has the power to make that happen) and the Sustainable Development Goals, and explore how to be mindful of the complexity of today’s world and act accordingly.

Resources mentioned in this episode:

* The Centre for Social Innovation (CSI) – Toronto’s co-working space and community hub for the social mission sector since 2003, now home to over 2,500 members across five locations

* The Green Majority – Stefan’s nationally syndicated radio show that covers environmental topics

* The Stories We Don’t Tell – Stefan’s monthly storytelling series and podcast that dives into the parts of people’s lives society often is happy to leave untold.

* Better Evaluation – An international collaboration to improve evaluation practice and theory by sharing and generating information about methods and approaches.

 

Music: Wavy Glass by Podington Bear. Licensed under an Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 International License. Find Podington Bear and other artists at http://freemusicarchive.org/music.

Michelle Baldwin is a social entrepreneur and the Executive Director of Pillar Nonprofit Network in London, Ontario, an organization focused on strengthening individuals, organizations and enterprises invested in positive community impact. She is a driving force behind the Useful Evaluation Project, from which this podcast emerged.

In this episode, we chat about growing cultures of evaluation in the broader social sector and the importance of inclusion and patience when movement building. We talk about the importance of taking intentional pauses to clarify strategy, gain perspective, and connect to ourselves. We explore how to build healthy relationships with failure and how a deeper understanding of failure can help nonprofits to increase their impact.

* Michelle references an organization in London, Ontario called The Sisters of St. Joseph

* Follow this link to learn more about Developmental Evaluation

* Learn more about the latest thinking on Collective Impact and a set of alternative principles that can guide collaborative work

* A social innovation supported by Pillar, Verge Capital

* Another link to learn about logic models and theories of change

Music: Wavy Glass by Podington Bear. Licensed under an Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 International License. Find Podington Bear and other artists at http://freemusicarchive.org/music.

Nichola Martin began her evaluation career in job evaluation, fighting for participation, equity, and fairness in the United Kingdom. Today she returns to evaluation, as a student at Ryerson University. She is about to embark on her first evaluation as an independent consultant.

In this episode, we chat with Nichola shares her journey from evaluation to sceptic to cautiously optimistic evaluator. We confront the potential for evaluation to be a tool for control and oppression, while time and again returning to the potential for evaluation that empowers and creates meaningful moments of participation.

* Learn more about job evaluation, follow this link

* Meet Nichola’s professor at Ryerson University, Martha McGuire

* The Ontario Pay Equity Act

* We talk about a lot of different concepts, find more information about some of them at the following links: Open Space Technology, Appreciative Inquiry, Participatory process, Impact Evaluation, Logic models and theories of change

Music: Wavy Glass by Podington Bear. Licensed under an Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 International License. Find Podington Bear and other artists at http://freemusicarchive.org/music.

Carolyn Holdsworth works for Pillar Nonprofit Network in London, Ontario, whose goal is to strengthen individuals, organizations and enterprises invested in positive community impact. Carolyn also runs her own business, sings and, like one of the co-hosts of this show, is a member of the cult of “Getting Things Done”.

In this episode, we chat with Carolyn about a wide range of things, beginning with the difference between evaluation at school and in one’s adult life. We go deep into a conversation about purpose and positive community impact, noting that evaluation is not – or should not be – a simple process.

* To learn more about Pillar Nonprofit Network, visit www.pillarnonprofit.ca

* Me & C, Carolyn’s handprinted textile business, can be found at meandc.ca

* To learn more about David Allen’s Getting Things Done, begin with gettingthingsdone.com

Music: Wavy Glass by Podington Bear. Licensed under an Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 International License. Find Podington Bear and other artists at freemusicarchive.org/music.

Skylar Franke is the Executive Director of London Environment Network, which connects and supports over 40 non-profits and community groups with an environmental focus in London, Ontario.

In this, the very first episode of the Useful Evaluation Podcast, Skylar tells us where she first encountered evaluation, how she is using evaluation to tell the stories of LEN’s members and her dream of creating a giant metrics spreadsheet that can be used across the environmental sector. We also ask what happens with data once it’s collected and how evaluation can help to keep (or drop) New Year’s resolutions.

To learn more about London Environment Network, please visit their website: http://londonenvironment.net

Music: Wavy Glass by Podington Bear. Licensed under an Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 International License. Find Podington Bear and other artists at http://freemusicarchive.org/music.

The Useful Evaluation Podcast is a series of long-form interviews about how evaluation is changing the world.

Co-hosts Adam Fearnall and Heenal Rajani create a platform for individuals to explore powerful questions that help all of us to do more of what communities need.

Music: Wavy Glass by Podington Bear. Licensed under an Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 International License. Find Podington Bear and other artists at http://freemusicarchive.org/music.