Learning Brief: Making Strategic Decisions from Programmatic Results

Over the past 3 years, GOAL has developed and deployed an information system capable of storing and processing any type of result from monitoring, evaluation, accountability, and learning (MEAL) - to maximise opportunities for evidence-based decision-making and adaptive management. This learning brief reviews the critical considerations made at the design, build, deployment, maintenance, and review stages to ensure the system was and continues to be fit for purpose. It highlights the change management process required to embed not just a new organisation-wide information system but instil a new culture within it, embracing successes and failures presented by the results, and encouraging different ways of working and staff behaviours. Timely MEAL information is vital for increasing the impact of an international non-governmental organisation (INGO) such as GOAL, and its humanitarian and development programmes. However, technology and data are only part of the solution - people remain at the heart of it.