Capacity building is an
integral part of development assistance. It seeks to build the understanding,
skills and knowledge-base of individuals and institutions. But after capacity
building, it is prudent to justify the intervention by measuring the impact it
has on trainees.
In 2015, the VakaYiko
consortium entered an agreement with the Civil Service Training Centre (CSTC)
in Ghana to develop a course and train civil servants on Evidence-Informed
Policy Making (EIPM). From April 20 to 30, 2015, 23 officers from 14
Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) of the civil service and 2
parliamentary staff participated in the first batch of the course.
Participants were taken
through all four (4) modules of the course ranging from the concepts of
evidence and evidence-informed policymaking; challenges and opportunities
involved with the use of evidence for policymaking; different sources of
evidence and evidence products available; accessing these evidence literature;
appraising the evidence literature; understanding methodological issues within
the literature; and communicating evidence gathered to appropriate audience(s)
using appropriate communication tools and media.
Based on Action Plans
submitted a follow-up impact assessment was carried out from August 17 to
October 8, 2015 for 3 main objectives; to
assess the status of Action Plan implementation by participants, to learn from
conditions existing at their work places for course improvement, and to assist
with communicating best practices. Data was collected from twenty participants
served as respondents.
Five thematic areas
were assessed:
Action Plan
Participants were
assessed on the levels at which they had implemented their actions plans.
Twenty percent of the participants completed the implementation of their action
plans, 40% were almost complete and the remaining 40% were half way through the
implementation of their plans.
On challenges
encountered in the implementation of the action plans, 1 respondent did not
encountered any challenge, 9 reported overloaded work schedules, 3 had a
problem of internet connectivity, 3 were isolated by their members and 2 did
not get adequate support from their colleagues.
Participants were also
assessed on factors that created enabling environment for the implementation of
their action plans. Sixteen (57.1%) respondents received cooperation from team
members involved in the action plan implementation. This was confirmed by their
supervisors. Other enabling factors for the performance include; the fact that
activities being implemented were satisfying organisational needs; that minimal
organisational resources were required; that strategic buy-ins were secured
from stakeholders within and outside the organisations; and that participants
showed positive attitude towards the implementation of action plans.
Internal
monitoring and evaluation
Participants were
required to monitor and evaluate their action plans, and they used varied means
to monitor and evaluate their actions — crosschecking action plans; looking out
for output/indicators; personal visits; as part of to do lists; and by
collaborating with other colleagues.
Using these M&E
activities as guiding tools, 1 participant developed an information request
form to be used by the front desk unit of the organisation for information to
regularise and clarify the nature of information request. Twelve others sensitised
members of their organisations; whiles another 4 made efforts to organise
internally created documents.
Another 3 participants
satisfied their obligations by working to gather evidence in the form of
data/information/research publications for their organisations, activities that
have been stimulated by the training. Other outstanding activities perform by
the participants include; uploading documents onto the website, gathering feedback,
sensitisation and uploading database with current data.
Effects
of training
Participants experience
better appreciation of internal documents for EIPM; better understanding of
research methodologies, increased knowledge of information/evidence sources,
enhanced skill-set to access evidence, improved contribution to policy
documents, critical thinking capacity when assessing evidence products and an
increased awareness and appreciation of EIPM concepts.
General
feedback and recommendation
In general the EIPM
course has enhanced the skills of participants to access evidence, improved
their contributions to policy documents and increased ability to communicate
evidence. All the participants recommended EIPM training to their colleagues.
The training is believed to be having significant effects on participants and
their organisations. Constant introduction of innovations by participants to
their work places will result is marked improvement in policy making processes
with Ghana’s Civil Service.
It is recommended that
support be offered to successful graduates of these trainings once they return
to their organizations, and training partners must endeavour to consolidate the
implementation of these action plan through follow-ups such as was conducted by
VakaYiko partners.
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