Outcome Harvesting: A Powerful Tool to Capture Change That Matters
In the world of social impact, change is rarely linear. Traditional monitoring and evaluation methods often fall short when it comes to capturing complex, unexpected, or unplanned outcomes—especially in advocacy, empowerment, and rights-based programs. That’s where Outcome Harvesting (OH) comes in. Outcome Harvesting doesn’t begin with predetermined indicators. Instead, it looks back and asks: “What changed? Who changed? How did we contribute?” What is Outcome Harvesting? Outcome Harvesting is a participatory evaluation approach that helps organizations identify, verify, and learn from outcomes —after they’ve occurred. It’s ideal for complex programs where change emerges in unpredictable ways. Instead of measuring progress against a rigid logframe, OH allows you to map out the ripple effects of your work—even those you didn’t plan. When Should You Use Outcome Harvesting? Outcome Harvesting is especially useful when: ✅ You don’t have baseline data ✅ You want to uncover ...