Page 90 - AERC Strategic Plan 2 July2020

THE AERC 2020–2025 STRATEGIC PLAN

Process

Activity-level ME covers four main steps:

Step 1: Ex ante quality assessment

This should be understood as quality assurance for the selection and design of activities/
programmes implemented by AERC, which is important, both to ensure that activity
concepts and designs meet minimum standards, as well as to ensure that activity-
level performance monitoring and assessment can feed into AERC-wide performance
ME. In implementing this, the team responsible for ME will support AERC management
to conduct a structured assessment of activity concepts and/or activity proposals. Key
elements will include:

An assessment of the relevance and strategic nature of the activity, in terms of the
expected opportunities for the activity to:

» Contribute to AERC’s end-of-strategy outcomes (as contained in the ToC);

» Leverage existing or future funds from donors and other parties;

» Influence economic policy decision-making;
» Contribute to the achievement of donor priorities;

» Facilitate collaboration between AERC and other economic institutions; and

» Target under-represented groups and geographies.

A review of the quality and completeness of the activity design, including:

» A review of the basic ‘logic’ of each, ensuring that programme interventions,
expected results (both immediate results and medium-term outcomes), and key
assumptions and risks are described with enough clarity and completeness and
are logically sound;

» An assessment of whether the activity appropriately considers gender and social
inclusion issues;

» A review of expected performance monitoring and assessment requirements,
and the budget (and, where relevant, performance incentives) related to those
requirements; and
» A review of whether the activity appropriately incorporates lessons learned from
previous implementation experience by AERC.

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