Commissioning managers of evaluation processes always reflect on what is needed and what is appropriate in terms of: internal / external evaluation, mid-term or final evaluation, qualitative vs quantitative or mixed method evaluation, plus some other dimension.

One of the areas that needs consideration is how detailed the Terms of Reference really should be. With more in-house M&E specialists within organisations ToRs tend to be written after a process of planning and conceptualising the evaluation thoroughly. In itself this this not bad at all. Just one thought here: who will or will not be attracted to an already laid out and detailed evaluation process and methodology? Evaluators with a lot of experience will prefer work where they can, to some extent, use their own expertise and creativity and add value that way. This becomes particularly pertinent if the potential consultants don’t quite agree with the approaches, methods, time frames or priorities outlined in the ToR and may result in ruling themselves out.

We recently found ourselves facing a decision like this so we thought it might be worth sharing.

 

 

Normally ToR specify a list of outputs – in other words a “shopping list.” It is good practice to also give information about the indicative budget available. In most cases it will be known internally how much is available for a piece of work to be commissioned. giving the budget will help, or even make it possible, to devise appropriate and realistic methodologies that will produce the desired outputs. Even better, if the commissioning organisation can state an acceptable day rate or a range of acceptable day rates. That way some potential bidders can rule themselves out at their own feasibility assessment stage (where we decide whether to go for a piece of work or not) and this will save everyone time and effort. But equally we understand if clients want to keep an open mind about that one.

Some clients argue that they want to find out the best Value for Money provider by withholding the information about the budget available. But this is not so! They will find out who is asking for the least money, but in fact they will not be able to make a good and fair comparison between bidders. Indicating the budget available will make it possible to compare like with like and appoint the best provider for the job.

Hi, this blog is intended for anyone in the business of planning, monitoring, evaluation and learning. Mostly we will share experiences, insights and learning from our own practice of bidding for, carrying out, reporting and invoicing for PMEL work. If you would like our comments on an issue that interests you, you are are welcome to suggest it to us my emailing dp@dpevaluation.co.uk