Country-Level Monitoring & Evaluation Dashboard

This past week (2-7 May 2010) I worked with a great team in SC's Cairo office to sketch-out a system that would provide the Senior Management Team (SMT) a consolidated "dashboard" report of key project
indicators on a quarterly basis.

The goal of the dashboard report is to provide the SMT an at-a-glance view of the progress of all projects to meet 1) quarterly benchmarks on key indicators, 2) successes and challenges for that quarter, 3) the burn-rate of project funds, 4) as well as number of beneficiaries reached, thus allowing better informed decision-making by the SMT on project improvement BEFORE the end of the reporting year or the project.

Like the dashboard of a car, this Dashboard Report will carry only those indicators that the SMT consider "key" to measuring the accomplisment of the project NOT ALL indicators.

Example of a Dashboard Report

A Dashboard Report is primarily based on comparing quarterly achievements with quarterly benchmarks for activity-level indicators. The Dashboard Report will present result-level indicators on an annual basis. Therefore, if projects do not have end-of-project targets and established quarterly (or semi-annual) benchmarks then developing a meaningfuly Dashboard Report to show process is more difficult.

In addition, identifying over or under achievment of quarterly benchmarks, or annual targets, will only be the beginning of the process; if, for example, there is an under achievement of a quarterly benchmark, then the SMT can "drill-down" deeper with the Project Director as to possible reasons which can be discussed and hopefully resolved before the next quarter.

A Dashboard Report should be simple and easy to read; however, this takes a lot of work! Behind a good Dashboard Report is consensus of key indicators, systems to ensure data quality, adequate staff resources, long-term SMT committment, userfriendly IT tools, clearly defined roles and flow of data, and project with M&E plans that clearly state end-of-project targets to be achieved and quarterly or semi-annual bechmarks to track progress toward the targets.

The Egypt Country Office will be working on developing these systems and has planned the 1st draft of a Dashboard Report this summer. Once it is developed I will present it here.