Another great article from our Associate:
Lorretta Barbours
Reshaping our monitoring and evaluation practices
Why do so many people feel trapped in their work? Why do our existing practices not work? We diligently set goals, work out the steps we need to take and somehow our projects still come off the rails – WHY?
We are taught again and again that the bridge between a good strategy and effective implementation lies in the plan – breaking down goals into objectives and objectives into tasks. We assign tasks to teams and track their work. When the project goes off track we go back to our project management checklists and we try to identify the reason(s) why.
We may have not understood how things fit together. We may have lacked focus or misunderstood the intent. Tasks were too big, too small, too complex. Timelines were too tight or there was no urgency. We just couldn’t get going. There was always something else that was more important. Maybe that is it we simply did not set a big enough goal. We gave up too soon or we did not have the necessary support.
I am sure we have all been through these scenarios and can recite a thousand more reasons why projects derail, objectives are not met and we simply do not get done what we set out to do.
More than One Size, More than One Type
It is time for us to move away from the ONE-SIZE-FITS-ALL approach. Why are we taking a cookie cutter approach to determine what makes an organisation viable? Even cookies come in different shapes, styles and flavours. Again and again, we have seen organisations falter as excellent leaders take the helm and impose systems, process and metrics they used before – Apple under John Sculley, Microsoft under Steve Ballmer, Sasol under David Constable, Anglo American under Cynthia Carroll and many more.
In each of these cases, the person showed potential and promise but one key thing was missing they did not understand what made the company they stood at the helm of great.
In his book Lead Right for Your Company Type, Dr William E. Schneider identifies four different types of organisations which he classifies by there customer promise.
Type | Promise | Principles | Proficiency | Practice |
Predictable & Dependable (e.g. Utility or General Food Retailer) | Meeting common needs (necessities) of food, water, electricity, banking | Certainty, predictability, stability, objectivity, systematic | Objective decision making, driving efficiencies | Directing activity through instructions. Setting up operational goals and systems that allow service to be available whenever customers need it. |
Customised Solutions (E.g. Software Solution Provider, Interior Designer) | Addressing a particular customer goal | Teaming, people processes, incremental development, community, co-involvement | Collaborative problem solving and innovation | Establishing a participative environment where coaches, teams are key to integrating all players and achieving an effective consensus. |
Enrichment enterprise (e.g. Schools, Fair Trade Enterprises) | Improving life, helping someone live up to their potential | Meaningfulness, fulfillment, development, values, potential | Stewardship and advocacy around the intent and values of the organisation | It is focused on building commitment to the greater good acting as a catalyst, developer and enabler of the vision for a better tomorrow. |
Best-in-Class Company (e.g. Software Development Firm, Specialist Manufacturer, Luxury Hotels) | Realising a personal product vision | Distinction, innovation, expertise, challenge and achievement | It becomes about setting the standard and creating the best widget | This is a challenging environment where demonstrated, provable expertise wins out. Teams are challenged to do more, work more and give it all in developing something exceptional. |
These organisational parameters and imperatives allow each organisation to develop its very own programme of work which engages its founders and people. Starting its own distinctive chain reaction which develops into the performance it needs to meet its priorities.
What is the implication of such Organisational Diversity for Monitoring and Evaluation functions?
- Monitoring and evaluation processes and metrics will need to be designed – there is no standard solution that can simply be rolled out again and again.
- These processes need to empower people – so processes need to support priorities and set safeguards for organisational viability.
- Monitoring and evaluation is not always about control but rather there to support responsible and effective decision making
How do you track your performance?
Step 1. Keep the fire burning
A fire needs energy to get started, fuel to sustain itself and oxygen to keep burning. What are the energy, fuel and oxygen that keep your business going? Do you know who is involved in making sure these provisions exist?
Step 2. Your replication cycle
When DNA replicates or when we need to duplicate DNA in a lab there is a particular series of steps that happen. The same is true for replicating performance in an organisation. These involve:
- Unfurling your processes and thinking sufficiently to separate and identify the building blocks of what makes your organisation tick – how you build your success?
- Establishing the connection points at which your successes can attach – what are the indicators that you are ready to go?
- Replicating short strands of excellence.
- Extending your strands of excellence to achieve more.
- Starting again and repeating the process.
Step 3: Understanding the boundaries and effects
In step 3, it becomes about understanding the impact and functions your work is supporting. This means being aware of how you build your muscle – the structure and ability in your organisation; how you protect yourself – how does your immune system function; how do you get more people on board – what communication mechanisms do you have and use; finally how do you enable others to help?
This means understanding where you fit into the bigger picture. As an example schools, colleges and universities are all about enabling a better future for their scholars and students – as such their business runs on values and visions but they fit into a bigger framework that needs to address national imperatives so they need to reconcile how they plan to address and manage national metrics and processes like standardised testing and reporting on numbers. These disjointed boundaries require building bridges.
Step 4: Designing a Customised Performance Cycle
This comes in four phases:
- Tracking and monitoring ACTIVITY as effort and quality. Taking the time to establish the way you work and making it work for you.
- Scaling your activity and involving others through a process of enabling broader PARTICIPATION. Making sure the relevant processes, goals, intent, dependencies and benchmarks are addressed without reducing engagement and focus.
- Establishing the appropriate feedback cycles so that INTERACTION with customers makes your effort more worthwhile.
- Completing the cycle to establish what leads to a customer SATISFACTION.
Closing the gap and adapting to a changing market.
And so we start again – making sure you meet your goals without getting caught in meaningless busy-work.