Sabita has overseen a complete overhaul of our monitoring and evaluation systems, so that we can track our strategic plan down to activity level. This has helped us win major institutional bids and will help us in the successful delivery of multiyear projects. Sabita has worked with high level grant providers from Comic Relief to DFID and her work has been recommended to other beneficiaries of these funding streams.”
Molly Brech, Director, Cecily’s Fund
What I can offer
From M&E to MandELA
For me, ‘M&E’ is shorthand for ‘MandELA’* – a term that I have coined to emphasise the fact that the most effective MandE is driven by a commitment to Learning from experience, and consciously putting that learning into Action so that our work continually improves… rather than being done solely (and often grudgingly) to meet donor requirements.
That’s why I specialise in promoting innovative, highly participatory methods of gathering the views of intended beneficiaries. One example is SenseMaker – an exciting new approach to listening to workers in global supply chains combining complexity theory, behavioural psychology and pattern detecting software. I have linked up with a group of SenseMaker specialists to promote its use in a supply chain context. Approaches like SenseMaker and Outcome Mapping are much more appropriate for understanding the complex, shifting and nuanced landscape of development and ethical trade than the traditional logframe or audit approaches (although these also have their uses). They will help you get a better understanding of the human landscape you are operating in and how successful (or not) you are bringing about the changes you and your intended beneficiaries want.
MandELA is integral to the whole lifecycle of your programme from design, through implementation to closure – not just a bolt-on at the end. I can help you develop effective, strategic and above all measurable objectives a deeper, more pragmatic understanding of your work and your progress towards your objectives and help you learn valuable lessons about what works, what doesn’t and why.
*The pun is intended, and is a tribute to Nelson Mandela – a powerful advocate for ensuring that everybody’s voice was heard. I believe that the people whose lives we are aiming to transform should have a genuine say in how we do it and whether we have succeeded.
More general M&E support
- Helping you to think through and design your monitoring and evaluation strategy and to identify appropriate tools and resources to help you deliver it.
- Conducting independent evaluations of your programme or organisation.
- Facilitating in-house reflection sessions to assess progress and results and to develop learning about what is working, what’s not and why.
- Introducing you to innovative people-centred concepts and systems such as Theory of Change, Outcome Mapping and SenseMaker.
- In-house training in more effective, participatory monitoring, evaluation and learning for you and your partner organisations, including Practice Exchanges, Peer Review and Communities of Practice and Mapping.
- Setting up logframes, Outcome Maps and MandELA plans – or advising you on how to do so – to enable you to track your progress towards objectives.
Please do contact me for an initial chat about how I could help
My Monitoring and Evaluation experience
As ETI’s Senior Knowledge and Learning Advisor, I led on the development of a new MEL framework to align with ETI’s ambitious new organisational strategy, significantly scaled up in resources and scope. I also developed ETI’s supply chain programme M&E system to enabled streamlined reporting against objectives and donor requirements. I coached programme colleagues to ensure the system was understood, used and valued. I introduced Outcome Mapping to ETI and led a project trialling SenseMaker with a Moroccan strawberry workers’ project.
In 2012 I was Bond‘s Monitoring and Evaluation In More Depth course trainer, helping NGOs to increase their knowledge of M&E tools and methods. Course participants came from the British Red Cross Society, Action Against Hunger, CAFOD, Sense International, Y Care International and the Salvation Army as well as many smaller organisations and independent consultants.
really glad I attended – [Sabita] has managed the difficult balance between acknowledging the complexity of M&E but at the same time giving me the confidence to do it!
Participant
As Monitoring and Communications Officer at Cecily’s Fund (May 2008- Dec 011), a small education charity operating in Zambia, I worked alongside the director and partner organisations to develop a monitoring and evaluation framework, and to identify the most appropriate tools and methodologies to measure our progress. I designed and facilitated workshops combining theoretical and practical training, including an M&E tools ‘marketplace’ role-play, transect walk, priority mapping etc.
At Oxfam GB, I was part of the team that supported the redevelopment of the organisation’s Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning system; a series of monitoring reviews and reflection sessions at different levels; from project/ programme, through country and region to organisational level reflection, complemented by thematic cross-programme evaluations.
Sabita Banerji 