Empowerment Evaluation
Empowerment Evaluation is a participatory approach to evaluation in which the people who run and take part in a programme assess it themselves, with an evaluator acting as coach and critical friend instead of outside judge. David Fetterman introduced it in 1993. Its simplest form is a three-step group process: establish the mission, take stock of where the programme stands, and plan for the future.
Facilitation script
- 1
Introduce the approach, the three steps and the facilitator's role as critical friend. Confirm who is in the room and whose views are missing.
10 min - 2
Mission: individual notes on what the programme is for, sharing, and agreement on a short statement of purpose.
25 min - 3
Taking stock, part one: list the programme's main activities and have each person give their own assessment of how each is going.
25 min - 4
Taking stock, part two: discuss the assessments, starting where views differ most, and note the evidence behind each view and where evidence is missing.
30 min - 5
Planning for the future: for the areas the group wants to improve, agree what it aims for, what it will do and what will show whether it worked.
25 min - 6
Assign owners, record the plan and set the date for the next stock-take.
5 min
Tips
Act as a critical friend: support the group's ownership and also ask the uncomfortable follow-up question when an assessment sounds too generous or has no evidence behind it.
Give the discussion of differing assessments more time than the assessments themselves, because that conversation is where a team learns how its members see the work.
Make sure people with less formal power in the room, such as service users or junior staff, are heard before managers.
Book the follow-up stock-take before the session ends.
Common pitfalls
Assessments that flatter the programme: without a critical friend asking for evidence, the session confirms what the team wanted to believe and nothing changes
Managers assessing first or loudest: others adjust their views upward and the differences worth discussing disappear
Leaving out the people the programme serves: the stock-take reflects the staff's view only and misses how the work is experienced
Running it once: without a repeat there is no comparison over time and the plan is not checked against results
Presenting the result to funders as an independent evaluation: it is a self-assessment, and blurring that damages credibility when it is noticed
Variations
Getting To Outcomes: a second, ten-step approach, set out in a manual by Chinman, Imm and Wandersman (2004), takes a group through ten accountability questions from needs assessment and goals to implementation, outcomes, quality improvement and sustainability. Fetterman's practice also uses an evaluation dashboard to track progress against the group's goals between sessions. Split format: run mission and taking stock in one meeting and planning in a second, which gives time to collect missing evidence. Remote version: a shared document or online whiteboard with one area per step and breakout rooms for the stock-take discussion.
Where it fits
When to use it
A programme team wants to improve its own work and is willing to look at it honestly
A funder or board accepts or encourages self-evaluation as part of reporting
Staff, volunteers and community members hold different pictures of how the programme is doing
The organisation wants its people to learn evaluation skills instead of depending on outside evaluators
A programme is ongoing, so the stock-take can be repeated and progress compared
When not to use it
An independent verdict is required for accountability or a funding decision; commission an external evaluation, because self-assessment is open to self-serving bias
The group wants to review a single event or sprint; an After Action Review or a retrospective is lighter
The team has no say over the programme's future; planning without authority to act produces frustration
Trust is so low that people will not rate their own work honestly in front of colleagues; work on safety first or collect assessments anonymously
You need to measure outcomes rigorously; this approach has been criticised for a weak focus on outcomes, so pair it with outcome measurement
Related methods
Frequently asked questions
What is Empowerment Evaluation?▾
Empowerment Evaluation is an approach in which programme staff and participants evaluate their own programme, supported by an evaluator who coaches the process. David Fetterman introduced it in 1993. It is usually run as three steps: establish the mission, take stock of the current state and plan for the future.
What are the three steps of Empowerment Evaluation?▾
First the group agrees its mission, meaning the core purpose of the programme. Then it takes stock by reviewing where the programme currently stands. Finally it plans for the future by deciding what to improve and how. The cycle is repeated so progress can be followed.
What does the evaluator do in an Empowerment Evaluation?▾
The evaluator works as a critical friend. They do not deliver a verdict; they give constructive feedback and help the group keep the evaluation organised, rigorous and honest. In a workshop this means asking for evidence and making sure all voices are heard.
What are the criticisms of Empowerment Evaluation?▾
Critics, among them Michael Scriven, point to the risk of self-serving bias when people evaluate their own programme. Others have questioned how clearly it differs from related participatory approaches, whether it pays enough attention to outcomes, and whether it empowers participants or mainly builds capacity. These points are a reason to be clear about what the results can and cannot be used for.
How is Empowerment Evaluation different from a retrospective?▾
A retrospective looks back at a short period of team work and agrees a few improvements to the way of working. Empowerment Evaluation looks at a whole programme against its mission, involves people beyond the core team and asks for evidence. It is designed as a repeated evaluation cycle, not a single meeting.
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Try it freeMethod descriptions on Workshop Weaver are original content written by our team, based on established facilitation practices. This method was inspired by work from David Fetterman.