Learning through evaluation: the missing link in governance of projects

This chapter illustrates the importance of project evaluations in harvesting the benefits of having a working project governance framework. It presents necessary principles and qualities required to achieve desired learning effects. The chapter looks into literature on learning organizations, learning from projects, and how evaluations may be a source of lessons learned. Based on 29 Norwegian cases, all evaluated with the same generic evaluation framework, results show that most projects are successful in some perspectives and less so in others. There is vast potential for learning within and across sectors and types of projects, but for learning to happen the evaluations need to be of good quality, with clear recommendations for the intended target groups, be available, and ultimately be used to make improvements. Having facts in the form of documented experiences, not only ad hoc evaluations of individual projects, but systematic evaluations of numerous projects in the past, will support planning and decision-making in future projects. Embedding such good practices in governance frameworks helps spread the effect across organizations and projects.