7.6 The activity to be evaluated needs to be clearly specified. The evaluation might be of a project, programme or policy, particular aspects of the activity, or of key common issues affecting a number of activities. It might also be a pilot designed especially for evaluation.
7.7 Objectives, outcomes and outputs should be defined and quantified as precisely as possible for use in step three below.1 It is important to distinguish between the objectives and outcomes, and the outputs and targets.
7.8 The availability of output and performance measures and targets, and other monitoring data, and how they relate to the objectives should be reviewed. If this information is inadequate, consideration should be given to the collection of additional data, although ideally, data needs would have been considered at the outset of the project.
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1 The objectives, outcomes and outputs of a policy, programme or project should have been identified and documented during appraisal. See Chapter 4 for more detail.