Table of Contents -> Global Performance Framework

What is Global Performance Framework?

Oxfam GB’s  new Global Performance Framework is part of our strong commitment to better capture and communicate our effectiveness and promote evidence-based learning.  This framework requires all programme staff to report annually on generic output data in six thematic indicator areas.  In addition, a modest sample of sufficiently mature projects (i.e. those closing during the following financial year) associated with each thematic indicator area will be randomly selected each year and then rigorously evaluated.  The primary focus will be to measure the extent the sampled projects have promoted change in relation to their respective global outcome indicator. 

As the Monitoring, Evaluation, Accountability and Learning page on OGB Website says:

We operate in 63 countries with an annual budget of approximately £240M. Our global portfolio comprises over 250 programmes and 1,200 projects operating in diverse contexts across OGB’s five aims. Despite the scale, breadth, and complexity of our work, we are strongly committed to being accountable to a wide range of stakeholders and, in particular, becoming better at capturing and communicating our effectiveness.

Our new Global Performance Framework has been designed to do this in a realistic, cost-effective, and credible way. There are two principle components:

1. Record project-level outputs, use analysis to effectively communicate the scale of our work.
2. Randomly sample and independently evaluate project outcomes to demonstrate the impact of our work.   

In particular, Regional Directors and other members of our Programme Leadership Team (PLT) have defined six core ‘indicator’ areas:

On an annual basis, all relevant projects will be required to feed output data into these areas.  This is referred to as Global Output Reporting (GOR). While not everything we do will be captured, GOR will help us to paint a powerful big picture of our work to help bring about a world free of poverty, inequality, and injustice. 

Our critics may still require evidence on whether we can demonstrate the effectiveness of our work in terms of outcomes.  We recognise that to request all programmes to collect data against a global set of outcome indicators would be very resource intensive and difficult to control quality.  Moreover, while it has the potential of generating interesting statistics, there would be no way of linking any of the observed outcome changes back to the impact of our work.

We also recognise that commissioning rigorous evaluations is the only way to provide credible evidence of the effectiveness of our programmes in promoting positive changes to the lives of the poor and the marginalised. Unfortunately, given that there are over 400 projects closing during any given year, it is difficult to manage this for all our projects, at least in the short to medium term. Instead, we propose to drill down and rigorously evaluate a random sample of our projects. This approach is known as Project Effectiveness Auditing.

All OGB programmes will be required to submit global output data on an annual basis for their respective projects. This GOR replaces the Annual Output Reporting (captured in 2009/10) within the newly configured OPAL project format (OGB’s management information system). Similar to 2009/10, and with the help of an Excel-based tool, PIP Managers will be supported to address the issue of double counting across multiple projects offline. In the future, OPAL will be developed further to manage this complex issue online. 

In order to demonstrate our effectiveness;  i.e. the extent to which our work is successfully promoting positive change, and as a complement to existing monitoring, evaluation and learning (MEL) processes, a sample of mature projects closing during the following year (one per thematic area) will be randomly selected and independently evaluated using robust and reputable methods.  A key focus of this work will be to capture data from this sample of projects relating to our new global outcome indicators in a way from which it is beneficial for OGB to aggregate and learn. 

The evaluation designs for three of the six thematic areas will involve capturing quantitative data on both intervention and comparison groups. More in-depth qualitative methods will be used for the remaining three. As part of this analysis, it will be reviewed whether projects have met quality standards and partner/beneficiary expectations. Projects found to be particularly effective will be researched further to identify the key success factors, so learning can be disseminated for use elsewhere.    

• Credible feedback on our effectiveness as a change agent in general and in fulfilling our mission in particular

• Greater opportunities for programme learning and performance improvement relevant not only to OGB but also the development sector at large, i.e. via identifying what works, what does not

• Stronger organisational evaluation culture and capacity 

To Download a presentation by Karl Hughes - Heading the GPF process at OGB HQ - Click HERE

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