Performance Evaluation: Proven Approaches for Improving Program and Organizational Performance

KEY POINTS

• Data are documented records of something of interest to the evaluation.
• For data to be useful, they must be relevant, reliable, and valid.
• Hard and soft data are different, and both can be useful. The same is true of collecting methods for qualitative and quantitative data.
• Data can be measured on nominal, ordinal, interval, or ratio scales. These scales of measurement have significant impact on how the data are analyzed later and the soundness of the conclusions drawn.
• The data collected are based on true measurable indicators of the results of interest for the evaluation study.
• The quality of collected data and their relevance to the evaluation questions will have an important effect on the quality of the evaluation.