Outcome Based Evaluation (OBE) Overview
Why use OBE for your grant project?
- OBE provides a framework for your grant project
- OBE increases the grant project's effectiveness by providing focus
- OBE generates information for decision making
- OBE changes the focus from activities to benefits
What is OBE?
Outcome based evaluation is a systematic way to determine if a program or project has achieved its goals. The organized process of developing a project using OBE helps to establish clear benefits (outcomes), to measure those benefits (indicators), clarify the individuals or groups for which the project's benefits are intended (target audience). Outcome Based Evaluation will answer:
- Who is your target audience?
- What kinds of resources are needed?
- When are the resources needed?
- Where do I get the resources?
- What actions do I need to take?
- How did my patrons benefit?
Basic OBE Terms
Inputs
Resources used as part of your grant project. For example:
- people
- equipment
- facilities
- people's ideas
- people's time
Activities
Actions taken to achieve the desired results of your grant project. For example:
- purchased 300 Playaways
- installed 5 Dell computers, including software and licensing
- contacted 3 local newspapers
- provided 4 trainings on PIONEER database access
Outputs
Measures of a project's activities; usually stated as numbers. For example:
- 40% of 300 sixth grade students will complete training
- 4 workshops will be held
- 42 staff members will receive CEU's
Outcomes
Actual impacts, benefits or changes to your target audience, usually stated in terms of new knowledge, skills, behaviors. For example:
- Students will demonstrate information literacy skills
- Patrons will report high satisfaction with the automated ILL service
- Library staff will provide faster, and more accurate, answers to reference questions
The Difference between Outputs and OutcomesOutputs are measures of the volume of a project's activity: products created or delivered, people served, activities and services carried out; the "things" of a project. They are almost always expressed in numerical formats. Outcomes are the "people" part of the project. What was the change or benefit to people because of the outputs. They are almost always expressed as a statement of change or benefit to your target audience. |
Indicators
Specific, observable, and measurable characteristics, actions or conditions that tell if the desired change or benefit has happened. They must be concrete, well-defined, and observable; they are also usually countable. For example:
- the # and % of participating students who can bring up an Internet search engine, enter a topic in the search function, and bring up one example of information within 15 minutes.
- the # of % of patrons who say they are "very satisfied" or "satisfied" with the automatic ILL service, after using the service and who use the service more than 1x per month over 6 months.
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Report on change in: |
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| Specified quantity and specified timeframe or circumstance |
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Data Sources
Sources of information about the conditions being measured. For example:
- survey
- assignments
- statistics
Data Intervals
When the data is collected. For example:
- after training session
- before installation and again after installation
Logic Model
A step-by-step approach for defining and measuring outcomes. It is an evaluation plan for your
project.
Other Resources on OBE
- Utah State Library: Applying OBE to Your Grant Project
- IMLS Grant Applicants: Outcome Based Evaluation