What have you learned about the evaluation of projects/events/processes from the course? Success measures are critical and the evaluation of our projects is how we typically know if we are successful. Something that greatly surprised me in this class, through my classmates’ discussions, is how many projects begin without a success measure or an evaluation strategy. A timeline and storyline should be set, and can always be flexible, but having a gauge to report to senior leadership or your division is so important. Many lessons in this class greatly emphasized the importance of “the why” around the project/process. This is a lesson I have witnessed again and again at my workplace, however, it is still often missing in the communications or talk track. I am a fan of the What? Why? How? framework and often coach to it in my current role. Through this class though, I am emphasizing even more the importance of the evaluation process, but I am encouraging more creative thought as many often use surveys – lots of ways to evaluate and I am a bigger fan of qualitative data as gathering voices is often quite easy and direct and increases engagement.
What tools will you take from this course and use in your career—now or in the future? I was a fan of the interview assignment and appreciated the deeper thoughts of multi-layered questions. I do a lot of needs assessment work as my role is very much like a consultant, just internal to my company, and the way I approached that assignment stretched my thinking and approach. My biggest takeaway I believe is the basic concept of the importance of evaluation to any projects or change plans. What does success look and feel like? How will we measure it? Who is impacted? This will top of mind in all projects I support and coach.