External Evaluation of the Community-led innovation partnership (CLIP) programme

Background

Start Network, on behalf of the Community-led innovation partnership (CLIP), is looking for either an individual consultant or a small team to conduct an external evaluation of the CLIP initiative for the period April 2020 –March 2023.

The CLIP is a three-year programme (2020-2023), funded by the UK Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO, formerly DFID), that seeks to improve the relevance and effectiveness of humanitarian preparedness, response and resilience interventions through innovation driven by the people affected by humanitarian crises. The programme is providing financial and non-financial support to community innovators in three countries: Guatemala, Indonesia and Philippines.

The CLIP is coordinated by Elrha, the Start Network, the Asian Disaster Reduction & Response Network (ADRRN), working alongside the Center for Disaster Preparedness (the Philippines) the Start Network Hub in Guatemala (hosted by la Asociación de Servicios Comunitarios de Salud), and Yakkum Emergency Unit (Indonesia). All organizations have significant and unique experience in humanitarian innovation.

Humanitarian innovation and particularly institutional support for community innovation in humanitarian contexts is very much an emerging field. Our collective experience will thus be critical to the delivery of this programme and enable the emergence of new tools and more effective approaches that are so urgently needed as this field grows and becomes more widely adopted in the sector.

This evaluation will assess effectiveness and impact of the programme and provide evidence to strengthen its approach in the future phase.

Evaluation Objectives

The specific objectives of the evaluations are the following:

• Assess the CLIP overall performance and value for money. This will include a review of the programme theory of change, results framework, and partnership principles, to demonstrate whether the initial assumptions made, and programme approach were the right ones to achieve the desired goal.
• Assess what impact each country’s initiative has achieved or is on track to achieve. This will look at the systems and processes that each country team has provided to local innovators to ensure that the most promising local innovations are identified and supported.
• Assess the progress made by innovation projects to generate positive impact in their communities. This can be developed through 2-3 case studies from each country, using a structured case study method allowing for documentation of both quantitative and qualitative achievements (e.g. numbers reached, lessons learned).
• Make recommendations on how to strengthen and improve the CLIP in the next three years with particular attention to the strategy and theory of change, good practices and bottlenecks in managing community-led innovation initiatives for resilience and response to humanitarian crises

Activities and outputs

The following deliverables should be met:

1. Inception report with methodology and workplan. Development of a detailed methodology, data analysis plan and work plan to be included in an inception report. This will also include finalised evaluation questions, and agreed data collection tools. It is expected that the methodology should draw from process, impact and real time evaluation methods that are appropriate to assess progress and programme performance as well as to provide feedback for improvement and learning. Being a community-led programme, the evaluation design should also use a strong participatory mixed method approach with the use of both quantitative and qualitative data, although it is expected that qualitative data along with case studies will be of greater focus. The methodology will be finalized during the inception period.
2. Independent data. The evaluation team is expected to gather evidence reviewing programme documentation as well as independently following up with the CLIP coordination teams and with country initiative teams to review programme approaches and capture progress. Additionally,they are expected to collect their own independent qualitative and quantitative data using participatory and accessible tools that will take into consideration elements such as inclusion, local language and context. Data collection may require both remote video/telephone interviews and in person field work. To minimise travel and ensure the evaluation is in line with the locally-led agenda, for field work, we expect that local consultants who are familiar with country context and dynamics will be deployed to allow context specific analysis as described in the evaluation questions. The CLIP partnership will also be able to provide contacts of consultants and researchers in each of the three countries. Their stipend/collaboration will need to be included in the evaluation budget and will not come as a separate cost or covered in other ways by the CLIP.
3. Evaluation report. Production of an evaluation report, synthesising the findings from the collection and synthesis of primary and secondary data aligned around the evaluation questions, objectives and the approach in the inception report. The draft report is expected to include sections in line with objectives and evaluation questions, as well as a good degree of individual case studies, illustrative examples, and recommendations for phase 2. It will be shared with partners and stakeholders for feedback before being finalised and published.
4. Dissemination and facilitation of a strategy session. The evaluation team is expected to lead on dissemination of the final report, findings and recommendations across the partnership. This may include producing additional communication resources such as presentation materials, short blog posts, visuals, podcasts, etc. Additionally the evaluation team will be involved in the delivery and facilitation of a reflection and strategic workshop (or multiple workshops) to support incorporation of lessons learnt into design and implementation of phase 2 of the CLIP.

Timeline (subject to change)

30th October2022: Deadline for proposals

31stOctober-11thNovember2022: Selection of consultants and interviews

14th–18thNovember: Signing of contract

21stNovember: Start of work and kick off meetings

5thDecember: Inception report outlining approach and tools

1st March 2023: Draft report for review

27th March: Final report

Budget

A total budget of £35,000 is available for this work. The price and rates quoted submitted shall not exceed the total available funds and include all costs (taxes and VAT, services, expenses, together with all general risks, liabilities and obligations, set out or implied). Please indicate whether you/your company is VAT registered.

Full Terms of Reference can be found here https://start-network.app.box.com/file/1022519028852?s=jfg0362fh8ncy4k08d5ga8179o763496