Independent evaluation across the life of a programme, with findings shared while there is still time to act on them, and a final report your funder or investor will trust.
The requirement is usually non-negotiable and often arrives late. Building the framework at the start rather than reconstructing evidence at the end is the difference between a useful evaluation and an expensive one.
Something always does. An evaluation that only speaks at the end tells you what went wrong at the point you can no longer do anything about it.
Self-reported success is discounted by everyone reading it. Independence is not a formality here, it is the entire value of the output.
Most sit in an appendix. One built with the delivery team, and revisited when reality disagrees with it, becomes the thing the programme steers by.
Uncertainty is recorded as uncertainty. Where the evidence does not support a claim, the report says so, which is precisely why the ones that do land carry weight.
Built with the delivery team rather than written at them, and sized to what the programme can realistically collect. A theory of change nobody uses is an appendix. One built together becomes the thing the programme steers by.
Data collection and analysis across the period, with what is emerging shared at the point a course correction is still possible. Uncertainty is recorded as uncertainty rather than filled in with something more convenient.
The report your funder or investor needs, plus a learning workshop so the findings land with the people who delivered the work rather than arriving as a verdict.
It is not a randomised controlled trial. If your funder needs that level of causal proof, you need a research institution and a much larger budget, and I will say so early rather than deliver something that cannot answer the question.
It is not a marketing document. An independent evaluation that only ever finds good news is worth nothing to the person reading it, including the funder who paid for it.
And it is not a judgement on the team. The most useful evaluations I have run were the ones where the delivery team stopped defending and started asking, which only happens if the interim findings arrive without a scoreboard attached.
Either works, though the earlier the conversation the cheaper and more useful the evaluation tends to be. A first conversation costs nothing.
Practical consultancy for public systems, commercial enterprises, founder-led organisations and community interest companies.