Monitoring is the systematic collection and analysis of information as a project progresses. It is aimed at improving the efficiency and effectiveness of a project or organization. It is based on targets set and activities planned during the planning phases of work. It helps to keep the work on track, and can let management know when things are going wrong. If done properly, it is an invaluable tool for good management, and it provides a useful base for evaluation. It enables you to determine whether the resources you have available are sufficient and are being well used, whether the capacity you have is sufficient and appropriate, and whether you doing what planned to do.

§  Evaluation is the comparison of actual project impacts against the agreed strategic plans. It looks at what you set out to do, what you have accomplished it. It can be formative (taking place during the life of a project or organization, with the intention of improving the strategy or way of functioning of the project or an organization It can also

be summative(drawing learning from learning from a completed that is no longer functioning).

What monitoring and evaluation have in common is that they are geared towards learning from what you doing how you are doing it by focusing on:

1.   Efficiency

2.    Effectiveness

3.   Impact

Efficiency tells you that the input into the work is appropriate in terms of the output. This could be input in terms of money, time, staff, equipment and so on. When you run a project and are concerned about its reliability or about going to scale then it is very important to get the efficiency element right.

Effectiveness is a measures of the extent to which a developments programs or project achieve the specific objective it set. If, for example, we set out to improve the qualification of all the high school teachers in a particular area, did we succeed?

Impact tells you whether or not what you did made a difference to the problem situation you were trying to address. In other words, was your strategy useful? Did ensuring that teachers were better qualified improve the pass rate in the final year of school? Before you decide to get bigger, or to replicate the project elsewhere, you need to be sure that what you are doing makes sense in terms of the impact you want to achieve.

Monitoring and evaluation enable you to check the “bottom line” of development work: Not “are we making a profit?” but “are we making a difference?” Through monitoring and evaluation, you can: Review progress, Identify problems in planning and/or implementation, Make adjustments so that you are more likely to “make a difference”. In many organizations, “monitoring and evaluation” is something that that is seen as a donor requirement rather than a management tool. Donors are certainly entitled to know whether their money is being properly spent, and whether it is being well spent. But the primary (most important) use of monitoring and evaluation should be for the organisation or project itself to see how it is doing against objectives, whether it is having an impact, whether it is working efficiently, and to learn how to do it better.

Plans are essential but they are not set in concrete (totally fixed). If they are not working, or if the circumstances change, then plans need to change too. Monitoring and evaluation are both tools which help a project or organisation know when plans are not working, and when circumstances have changed. They give management the information it needs to make decisions about the project or organisation, about changes that are necessary in strategy or plans. Through this, the constants remain the pillars of the strategic framework: the problem analysis, the vision, and the values of the project or organization. Everything else is negotiable. (See also the toolkit on strategic planning) Getting something wrong is not a crime. Failing to learn from past mistakes because you are not monitoring and evaluating is the effect of monitoring and evaluation can be seen in the following cycle. Note that you will monitor and adjust several times before you are ready to evaluate and replant.

Links: http://upaidscontrol.up.nic.in/MISforMonitoringEvaluation.aspx

         http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monitoring

         http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_quality

         http://www.civicus.org/new/media/Monitoring%20and%20Evaluation.pdf