is community-owned evaluation more expensive?

At a time when funding for public programs is shrinking, it comes as no surprise that our potential collaborators are even more conscious of how they spend money. Many of us also know that justice-driven approaches, like community-ownership, have cost drivers that are typically absent from budget planning. 

But, is community-owned evaluation really more expensive than traditional evaluation approaches? 

The Short Answer

Not necessarily. Community ownership makes space for involvement, power sharing, and reciprocity during and after the evaluation. The cost of each varies, but can add very little to the financial cost of an evaluation. 

When the financial cost of ownership is driven up, we account for this by shifting where - and on whom - money is spent, keeping the cost on par with traditional evaluation. 

How Money is Spent Differently

So, then, where is money going in a community-owned evaluation, and how does it differ from other approaches? Traditional evaluations often assume expertise is concentrated in the hired evaluators, and this expertise can come with a hefty price tag. 

We, however, believe that evaluations benefit most from multiple forms of expertise. So our commitment to justice involves shifting spending that would otherwise go to the evaluation team toward equitable compensation packages, acknowledgements, and reciprocity for community involvement and expertise. This enables evaluations that share power without requiring organizations to raise their evaluation budgets. 

What Really Costs More

The resource that funders of community-owned evaluations should expect to spend more of is not necessarily money, but calendar time. Ownership requires time for deliberation about evaluation purpose and design, making sense of data, and creating useful and relevant recommendations that apply to organizations, community members, and others affected by the program/evaluation.

Rather than expect collaborators to extend their deadlines, we encourage them to contract evaluators sooner. Community-owned evaluation invests more time upfront to align on questions, decision-making, and safeguards. This can make the early stages feel slower, but it reduces delays, rework, or misalignment later.

A Hidden Cost of Other Evaluation Approaches

It’s important to point out the shortcomings of discussing cost in strictly financial terms. What other approaches save in monetary costs, they can more than make up for in non-monetary costs, especially the sustainability of evaluation findings.

Other evaluation approaches place the responsibility to act on findings squarely with the organization implementing the program. Because of this, knowledge is also concentrated there. The problem, however, is that programs end and organizations close. When this happens, institutional knowledge evaporates and needs to be re-learned by the actors/initiatives that follow in their footsteps. 

Bestowing communities ownership over new knowledge, the responsibility to act, and the ability to hold people in power accountable better ensures the longevity of findings and the ability for action to continue despite changes in the landscape. 

It also enhances utility, since evaluation questions are developed by the people most affected by the program. Community ownership also helps build trust at a time when public expectations for accountability and transparency are on the rise. 

While concerns about the cost of any evaluation are fair and valid, the real cost question isn't what COE adds to budgets, it's what other evaluation approaches have already been costing in ways nobody invoices for.