This study aimed to enhance understanding about the difficulties in evaluating health research capacity strengthening initiatives and to make recommendations about how to make such evaluations more effective. Through discussions and surveys of health research capacity strengthening funders, the researchers identified themes important to funders. The themes were then used to systematically analyse eighteen evaluation reports, written between 2000 and 2013, representing 12 evaluations ranging from individuals and institutions to national, regional and global levels. Analysis identified tensions around how much stakeholders should participate in an evaluation, the appropriate balance between measuring and learning; and between a focus on short-term processes versus longer-term impact and sustainability. There were tensions around the degree to which funding recipients should be involved in the evaluation of their own health research capacity strengthening efforts. Reasons given for promoting an external, non-participative approach were that this improved accountability, assessment of value for money and gave quick results. Other reasons given for choosing non-participatory approaches were the lack of expertise among funding recipients’ in setting testable goals and measurable targets, or in evaluation techniques. In contrast, the reasons given for why recipients should participate in the evaluation were that it promoted ownership, learning and implementation of recommendations. Funding recipients were perceived to have better in-depth knowledge about the project, the stakeholders and the context than external actors. Such knowledge was considered important for problem solving and sustainability. The report recommends early and ongoing stakeholder engagement in planning and evaluating health research capacity strengthening, modelling of impact pathways and rapid assimilation of lessons learned for continuous improvement of decision making and programming. Sharing learning about how to do robust and useful health research capacity strengthening evaluations should happen alongside, not after, health research capacity strengthening efforts.1
1. Bates I, Boyd A, Aslanyan G, et al. Tackling the tensions in evaluating capacity strengthening for health research in low- and middle-income countries. Health Policy & Planning 2015;30(3):334-44. http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/heapol/czu016.