Health Canada First Nations and Inuit Home and Community Care (FNI HCC) Program - Evaluation Guide
The Purpose of Evaluation
This section discusses why evaluations are important, both in general and in context of the First Nations and Inuit Home and Community Care Program.
Reasons to Evaluate
While there are many reasons to undertake a program evaluation, the following are three key reasons:
- To understand the impact a program and its components are having on clients, families, and the community
These "outcomes" evaluations are necessary to see the program's impact on the community. It is better to rely on feedback from individuals to draw conclusions. A more formal evaluation can more accurately and reliably understand where things are working well and where there are issues that need to be addressed.
- To improve the delivery of services to increase quality and improve spending of resources
Public, private and non-profit organizations all share a common goal - to maximize their effectiveness. It is only natural that all involved look to be as efficient as possible in delivering the program at the national, regional, and community level.
- To confirm that you are doing what you think you are doing
Evaluations can verify if a program is really running as originally planned. These are sometimes referred to as "process" evaluations. There may be lots of good reasons why it might not be, but those gaps must be identified for future planning.
Evaluating FNI HCC at the Community Level
It is not an excuse to point fingers.
Some organizations, or individuals within organizations, may not embrace a program evaluation because they think it will be used as a reason to position individuals or departments against one another. (If this occurs, the issue is not the program evaluation but signals there are likely other problems within an organization.)
It is not an excuse to cut funding.
This is a common fear - that if program sponsors find out that the program is not working as well as it could be in the community, it will result in a decreased financial commitment in the future. The goal is to make the best use of the financial and human resources dedicated to the FNI HCC Program for the benefit of the community - not to see what can be cut or eliminated.
It is meant to see if the plan is right and if not, how it should be changed.
It sounds simple because it is simple. If everything is working perfectly, then no changes need to be made. While that would be wonderful, it is more realistic to expect that some areas are working better than others. Based on this information, one can continue to do the things that are working and modify the areas that require changes.
National and regional evaluations cannot gather the same information
that a community evaluation obtains.
The reason for evaluating the FNI HCC Program at the national, regional, and community level is that each plays a unique role in the program, has a unique perspective, and requires different information to understand what is working and what modifications may be needed.
The information at the community level is conducted by community representatives for community purposes.
It allows for ongoing program information about program performance.
By communicating, educating, sharing and listening to/ with community leaders, HCC eligible populations, and service providers on a regular basis we can act as a medium of information. Therefore the cycle of information from planning, implementing, and evaluating will be continuous.
Too Many Evaluators Not Enough Doers!
In both the public and private sectors, some organizations appear to struggle with the importance of planning versus the importance of implementing (the "doing"). Both are clearly important. And yes, one can spend too much time planning and evaluating.
For the FNI HCC Program, evaluations are being conducted at the national, regional, and community level. Why so many evaluations by so many different people? The FNI HCC Program represents a huge commitment, not only on the part of the federal government but also other stakeholders including First Nations and Inuit communities and individuals within these communities. Again, all of this learning can help communities and administrators be more effective in meeting the goals of the program.
The national, regional, and community evaluations review different components from different perspectives. All are relevant and all are necessary. From the community perspective, the goal is that community stakeholders will take the information obtained from the community evaluations to understand what is working well and should be continued and to identify where changes could be made.
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