Storytelling in the Context of International Development: Discussion of an Innovative Evaluation Framework used to tell our Social Impact Story to Stakeholders and to inform Organizational Learning
Storytelling in the Context of International Infrastructure Projects
Director, Office of Program Monitoring and Evaluation U.S. Trade and Development Agency, United States
The U.S. Trade and Development Agency (USTDA)'s mixed methods evaluation approach integrates collecting stories from stakeholders into its evaluation process to assess performance, tell multiple audiences its socioeconomic impact story, and inform and refine its evaluation strategy and learning agenda. We will showcase how storytelling is embedded throughout our evaluation framework. This presentation will share experiences around stories, how they help make sense of the projects we support and feed into evidence-based narratives that help us assess USTDA’s role in international infrastructure project outcomes. Moreover, the presentation will share how the Agency uses evaluation and evaluation stories to inform and refine its strategic planning, program design, evaluation strategy, and organizational learning agenda processes. The presentation will also discuss how evaluation findings are used by various stakeholders, including program teams, public affairs/communications teams, and executive leadership in storytelling, as well as strategies for effective coordination with these teams to ensure that evaluation findings are relevant, utilized, and timely. The presentation will also share strategies for managing objective evaluations of complex international infrastructure projects with intended beneficiaries being international partners and stakeholders as well as U.S. stakeholders.
