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  • Our Approach
      • Social Impact
      • Thought Partnership
      • Accessible Information
      • Commitment to Equity
  • What We Do
      • Strategy Development
      • Theory of Change
      • Evaluation
        • Advocacy & Policy Evaluation
        • Network Evaluation
        • Systems Evaluation
      • Measurements Learning Evaluation Practice (MLE)
        • MLE Development & Support
        • MLE Lab
  • About Us
      • Team
      • Board
      • Clients
      • Careers
      • Connect
  • Blog
  • Publications
  • Our Approach
    • Social Impact
    • Thought Partnership
    • Accessible Information
    • Commitment to Equity
  • What We Do
    • Strategy Development
    • Theory of Change
    • Evaluation
      • Advocacy & Policy Evaluation
      • Network Evaluation
      • Systems Evaluation
    • Measurements Learning Evaluation Practice (MLE)
      • MLE Development & Support
      • MLE Lab
  • About Us
    • Team
    • Board
    • Clients
    • Careers
    • Connect
  • Blog
  • Publications

What We Do

We excel in situations where our clients are engaged in innovative social change, are committed to learning, and view measurement as a method to propel their thinking and strategies around future practices.


Advocacy & Policy Evaluation

ORS Impact has consistently been in the lead in helping to measure and evaluate questions related to advocacy and policy change.

 

 

A Leader in the Field

For more than a decade we’ve been committed to supporting our clients who use advocacy to advance the social good. We’ve been a leader in the field of advocacy and policy evaluation since there’s been a field. We wrote an internationally- recognized guide in 2007, A Guide to Measuring Advocacy and Policy, and have followed that with an array of resources for the field. Our advocacy-related projects include theories of change, retrospective and prospective advocacy evaluations, evaluations of coalition-led advocacy efforts, and initiative-level strategic learning efforts related to advocacy capacity and champion development. Our work has included evaluation of advocacy aimed at local, state, national and federal priorities, including those specific to the U.S. domestic landscape as well as other nations.

We believe that advocacy evaluation must be based on a solid understanding of the work that advocates actually do. That’s why we have spent decades working with advocates and funders across a wide spectrum of issues and contexts. That’s also why we have grounded our work in theories about how policy is made and implemented. This combination of practical and theoretical understanding infuses our evaluation practice.

The Challenge of Advocacy Evaluation

Advocacy occurs in a dynamic political and partner-oriented context where strategies and outcomes are often fluid and subject to change in response to external factors. Good advocates know that their strategies and tactics will not stay fixed. In fact, they may have to turn on a dime.
The dynamic nature of advocacy creates interesting demands on evaluators, causing us to consider our roles, methods and approaches. It forces us to confront questions like:

  • What are realistic and meaningful outcomes?
  • What methods are best suited to assess advocacy outcomes?
  • How do we assess advocacy at different points in the policy lifecycle?
  • How do evaluators adapt as conditions change and strategies evolve?
  • How can evaluation practice and data best inform strategy?
  • How can evaluation be relevant to both advocates and funders?

What We Offer

We have developed briefs, frameworks, and tools that help the field be more responsive to the needs of advocacy and we consistently use these frameworks and tools to help our clients work through the messy middle in their theories of change, learn from advocacy evaluation, and achieve clarity of vision and direction.

When clients engage ORS Impact to support an advocacy strategy, they can be confident that they’ll have a partner that will systematically and smartly navigate and deliver actionable insights that help clients further their causes and advance their impact.

 


Contact us to learn more about our approach. 

Contact us


Publications

Related Resources & Publications


Feature Report

Beyond The Win: Pathways for Policy Implementation.

When a policy moves from “the win” to implementation, the opportunity is ripe to inform and impact the policy outcomes. This brief provides strategies and tactics for advocates, funders, and evaluators to achieve and measure desired policy outcomes during the implementation phase.

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Our Work

Learn more about our related projects


Feature REPORT

Methodology Deep Dive: Applying Process Tracing to Policy Advocacy Evaluation

The primary audience for this brief is the evaluation field, particularly evaluators considering applying process tracing to a policy advocacy evaluation. Our hope is that sharing our approach and lessons learned can make it easier for others to implement this method with high quality for other advocacy and policy change evaluations.

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206.728.0474     ors@orsimpact.com