1. The theory of evaluating outcomes is simple. You provide a service because you want to do some good. That means bringing about some change. So you decide on the kinds of changes you hope your service will make. These are your outcomes. Then you devise ways to measure them. By applying them at the beginning and through the life of your project or service you can see whether your master plan is working. Then you can adjust, or celebrate, accordingly.
2. The practice is a tad harder. Some outcomes are genuinely hard to measure. How do you rate an improvement in children's happiness? Can you score self-esteem? Is it practical to measure the changes in children's behaviour, knowledge or attitudes? What does an increase in empowerment look like? There are other influences too, not under your control. These are often more powerful than the service you can offer. So you may feel you have made a modest improvement in crime reduction or alleviating poverty. But it won't show up on any official statistics because of bigger changes elsewhere.
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