5 Reasons Why Monitoring & Evaluation Matters

I had been receiving many inquiries from M&E professionals and I consulted Jakes, a professional who has been in the project management field for many years. He said that when he started his career in the field of international development, the main challenge that he faced was to explain the importance of monitoring and evaluation to people who wanted to learn more about the nature of his job. Through the monitoring & evaluation certificate course in Kenya, he gained the skills that enabled him to monitor various projects with ease.  “Besides asking what I do, many people wanted to know why our organization was conducting some activities, why we were conducting project analysis, and how we knew the project was successful,” he said.

One thing that Jakes noticed is that most of the companies that fail to complete the project successfully were because they didn’t perform monitoring and evaluation to identify the mistakes and measure the success of the project.

The questions that Jakes was asked encouraged him to create a blog where he would post content and videos that aimed at educating the audience about M&E.

Monitoring and Evaluation play a crucial role during project assessment and its main goal is to provide detailed information that enhances the output and impact.

Here are the reasons why M&E matters,

1. It Keeps The Organizations On Track Through The Cycle Of A Project

M&E provides greater transparency and accountability because the organization can analyze and report on relevant information.

The stakeholders understand what is happening throughout the project and they acquire the information that allows them to make informed decisions.

2. It Leads To Better Output & Deliverables

A well-planned M&E helps the project team to define the scope of the project, and relevant design objectives, and understand the needs of the target population.

It also clarifies the interventions that will improve the project performance and allow the organization to see the progress and identify the gaps and work towards achieving the desired results.

For the companies that lacked effective M&E, they failed to provide a detailed blueprint of what went wrong during the process and they replicated that in most projects which led to project failure.

3. Effective Resource Allocation

Jakes said that when developing an M&E plan, he first define the problem, the project goals and objectives, and the steps that he would take to come up with a solution.

The resources that are essential for a successful project include time, finance, and personnel. The finance allocated to a specific project determines the duration and the people who will work on that project.

4. Promotes Effective Decision Making

M&E data provides quantifiable results to help the team determine what worked, what did not, and how it could be improved in the future.

Through the M&E plan, the project managers can predict the results, measure the success, and adapt the new strategies for successful outcomes by establishing the link between the past and future actions to improve project implementation.

5. If Functions As Systematic Management For Organization

M&E facilitates the organizations to gather, disseminate and utilize information to improve the project operations, enhance performance, and encourage innovation.

M&E helps to fuel innovative methods for data collection and the use of tools that provide a new perspective on data.

Wrap-Up

Every organization needs a monitoring and evaluation system whether it is a small business, or corporation to oversee the progress of the projects and determine if they’re successful. Without strong M&E, the project is vulnerable to failure, and you can lose the trust of stakeholders.

To assess the progress and achieve the expected desired results of the project, it is important to develop your Monitoring and Evaluation skills through training.