Knowledge Solutions
February 2009 | 26
Monthy Progress Notes By Olivier Serrat
Rationale
Feedback is the dynamic process of presenting and disseminating information to improve performance. Feedback mechanisms are increasingly being recognized as key elements of learning before, during, and after. Monthly progress notes on project administration, which document accomplishments as well as bottlenecks, are prominent among these.
Feedback is a circular causal process whereby some portion of a system’s output is returned to the input to control the dynamic behavior of the system. In organizations, feedback is the process of sharing observations, concerns, and suggestions to improve performance. In work that seeks to address the increasingly complex challenges of development, often with limited resources, feedback is essential to maximize development impact.1 Examples of feedback include audits, performance appraisals, monitoring and evaluation, shareholders' meetings, surveys, and 360-degree assessments. Figure: The Feedback Mechanism
Source: Author
Monitoring and Evaluation
The essential first steps of feedback are the processes of monitoring and evaluation. Monitoring2 provides senior management with information about current and emerging problems and data to assess if objectives are being met and remain valid. Monitoring Typically, feedback mechanisms on development activities seek to (i) improve future policies, strategies, programs, and projects, including their design, implementation, and results, through feedback of lessons learned; (ii) provide a basis for accountability, including the provision of information to the public; and (iii) facilitate the updating or reformulation of current project design to increase the implementability and sustainability of the project. 2 The primary questions of monitoring are: (i) Are the right inputs being supplied or delivered at the right time? (ii) Are the planned inputs producing the planned outputs? (iii) Are the outputs leading to the achievement of the desired outcome? (iv) Is the policy environment consistent with the design assumptions? (v) Are the project or program’s objectives still valid? 1