If you have created a logic model and are in the process of developing indicators of success as part of your evaluation plan, you must understand the process of setting baselines and targets.
Targets
Targets are pre-established goals set for the program, and they help create a path and end destination for what you hope to achieve with a program or service (the intervention). Often defined in numbers or percentages, they indicate success. Include these numbers in your logic model to help all stakeholders see how success is measured. For example, if your team is creating a STEM career internship for girls, a sample target might be that 90% of participants completed the full three-month internship. This completion rate target is SMART and indicates success in the short term. If you want a target that helps you show long-term impacts of the intervention -the internship- you might wish to a follow-up interview after five years, where you look for 50% of interns to have entered a STEM career or STEM secondary education program.
There are a few other things to consider when establishing targets. You will want to have a strong understanding of your stakeholder’s expectations. Knowing what they expect will be extremely helpful in setting realistic targets and ensuring that the necessary resources are provided to ensure you reach those. In the example of the STEM career internship for girls, if you know that your funder expects all participants to complete the program, it would not be wise to set a 90% completion rate as your baseline. You will either need to dedicate additional resources to ensure that you can hit his target or return to your funders or stakeholders and have a direct conversation about the rationale behind this target.
Baselines
The next things to be aware of when setting your targets are your baseline data or reference points. These are pre-determined points in time in the program where you will observe change over time. Usually, they include the start of the program (pre-intervention), soon after the completion of the program (post-intervention), and sometimes a measurement set out into the future to help determine the program’s long-term success. If you are unable or do not have the resources to track participants to do a measurement five years in the future, you will need to make sure that you do not set targets that will require this kind of data.
Finally, when setting targets, you will want to consider the existing body of knowledge in this area. What are the recent research findings that might impact your program? What are the accomplishments of other comparable programs? If you can find information on analogous programs that have been implemented under similar conditions, they can provide critical input on setting targets.
**Adapted from https://www.thecompassforsbc.org/how-to-guides/how-develop-indicators
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