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Metaphor Overload
 
“So moving on from the manure and back to the tree,” says person presenting in the front of the room. Person watching, “I think you may be taking the metaphor too far.”
Tags: evaluation, Metaphor, presentation, theory of change
Published On: April 15, 2022
"Careful? You fall into that and you'll never see our program in the same light again."
"So you just fell into evaluation?" person 2, "I considered starting my own nonprofit. But then I thought, we don't need more nonprofits, we need the ones we have to be more effective.
What it means to "fall into" evaluation. "Our grant application requires an evaluation plan. You're good at Excel and power point right?"
That's a job.
Fell into a logic model cartoon.
Have you ever flipped through a notebook and found some random phrase that you have no recollection hearing, thinking, or writing? "This frog has style. "Asking for a friend."
So yea, I went to school for social science, and, yada, yada, yada, now I'm a program evaluator."
"I was told you find our new report really useful? Person 2, "Oh, I do, I needed to raise my monitor and it was just the right length."
You said to only schedule with likely report readers. There are none.
Think Aloud
Do you even know how to use a computer?
My Cartoonist Trophy
26K or 1.99
VR Report
Too many reports?
Eval-entine's day
Creative in the box.
50 page word doc 25 page visual report
Sure, you can write what you want to write.
Missed Communication
Itzhak Perlman of Mixed Method Data Governance
Pretend we read it.
Reporting Secret
Matchy Matchy Color
“So moving on from the manure and back to the tree,” says person presenting in the front of the room. Person watching, “I think you may be taking the metaphor too far.”
That data set is so dirty we might need to put a parental advisory label on it.
Who, Deja Vu. I feel like we've asked these same evaluation questions before. Person 2, "That's because we have. And I would call them monitoring questions.
"If you're cleaning data and you just delete it all. Could you still call it a clean dataset?" Person 2, "Umm, I guess so, kinda misses the point through."
We found our new evaluator! Here resume was just okay. But the after the inerview she delivered a very well written actionable report on how we can improve our hiring process.
I don't this this whole NFT and bitcoin thing. They are just made up things that are only valuable because people say they have value. "So just like paper money and shiny rocks?"
Hi, I donated $20 last year. Can you tell me exactly how many children I've saved?
Cartoon - So this is my first interview with an applicant who showed up without pants. Person 2 (standing in boxer shorts) You know the advice "dress for the job you want?" Well, I want to work from home.
Cartoon person standing next to machine, "This is our new impact washing machine. Simply drop your impact investment money here and the machine will generate a nice impact statement you can share with your investors."
Cartoon: I'm part of the internal evaluation team. Or, technically, we are the Strategy, Measurement, Evaluation, Learning, and Leadership Team. It was a recent change." Person 2, "SMELL?" Person 1, The group that does the acronyms didn't like our last evaluation. I think the name change was payback.
If logic models were drawn to scale…”if you’ll follow me, we’ll head down the hall and take a look at our longer term outcomes.
Cartoon Person reading..."Give us money and nobody will get hurt." They then say, "okay everyone, I am all for using simple language in our grant applications but can we avoid sounding like bank robbers in the next draft?"
Person in front of shed with ribbon, "Before we cut the ribbon on our freshly repainted school storage shed, I would like to thank the 37 organizations that have taken credit for contributing the tens of dollars needed to buy the paint.
Cartoon - I'm a theoretical evaluator. Person 2, "Meaning you develop evaluation theory or you just consider yourself an evaluator in theory." Person 1, "the second one."
Cartoon with one person talking to another, "Look, as an evaluator, I know you are going to focus on the effectiveness of our program model. But our priority is really to just show our department head that we're not a total waste of money."
Impact Washing is Kind of Like cartoon.
Can you believe it's been over two years since our last in-person meeting? Just like old times, huh?
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