Impact evaluation, social performance assessment and standardisation: reflections from microfinance evaluations in Pakistan and Zimbabwe

Heterogeneity associated with the microfinance and financial inclusion sector discourages the application of ‘one-fits-all’ evaluation models. However, under certain conditions, there can be advantages in adopting a ‘common project approach’ to evaluation. This paper is based on my participation as academic consultant on a project led by the crowdfunding platform Lendwithcare, which aimed to assess the outcomes at client level of two microcredit programmes developed by its partner microfinance institutions in Pakistan and Zimbabwe. Applying qualitative methodologies, including participant-observation and interviews, I analyse the conditions in which some degree of standardisation is feasible, its advantages and limitations and how this experience can add to the knowledge on impact evaluation and social performance assessment in the sector. In doing so, I establish a parallel with previous evaluation projects in the sector, namely the AIMS, Imp-Act and Microfinance for Decent Work projects. The findings show that the approach followed in the Lendwithcare project contributed to change mind-sets regarding evaluation and trigger the process of social performance management in the participating institutions, which had incipient experience in measuring social performance and were not familiar with the evaluation process. It attracted also the attention of other Lendwithcare partner MFIs whose managers showed interest in replicating the process in their institutions.