Summary

Purpose

The Evaluation Strategy 2024–2028 sets out the Department of Industry, Science and Resources' vision for evaluation from 2024 to 2028.

Evaluation helps us meet our purpose: building a better future for all Australians through enabling a productive, resilient and sustainable economy, enriched by science and technology. 

Evaluation is a tool of public governance. It improves policy outcomes by letting us learn from experience, test policy options and embed lessons learned. Good evaluation supports evidence-based policy decisions and continuous improvements.

The government has a renewed focus to improve the volume, quality, and impact of evaluations across the Australian Public Service (APS). This includes through establishing the Australian Centre for Evaluation.

The strategy is grounded in the principles of the Commonwealth Evaluation Policy. It provides a framework to encourage and support using evaluative practices in everything we do.

The strategy builds on our previous evaluation strategies and continues our commitment to best-practice evaluation. This strategy also recognises monitoring as an important evaluative activity and part of the evaluation cycle. 

Scope

Evaluation is relevant to everything we do as a department. This includes policy development, program design and delivery, and corporate activities.

The strategy and its governance arrangements apply directly to policy and program activities in the department. However, staff can apply evaluative thinking, evaluative practices and the pillars and principles of the strategy to a broader range of activities in the department. For example, property, business services and IT projects.

This supports our broader commitment to continuous improvement and achieving value for money. This strategy’s scope does not limit the role of other assurance functions in appropriately managing and overseeing all types of department activities.

The strategy does not apply to portfolio entities. However, we will work across our portfolio to coordinate and align evaluation approaches and activities.

Pillars for success

Pillar 1: Establishing evaluative practices

We embed systems for continual review and improvement to ensure we learn from experience.

Principle 1.1

We integrate evaluative practices into our end-to-end processes to build a culture of continuous improvement.

Principle 1.2

We learn from experience by deliberately seeking out, acting on and sharing evaluation evidence.

Pillar 2: Evidence and accountability 

We take responsibility for understanding the impact of our work through best-practice evaluation.

Principle 2.1

Our approach to evaluation aligns with government requirements.

Principle 2.2

We prioritise evaluation effort strategically and efficiently to maximise its utility.

Principle 2.3

We integrate oversight and accountability into our evaluation practices to produce credible and robust evidence.

Pillar 3: Increasing capability

We invest in staff capability as the foundation for effective evaluation.

Principle 3.1

We understand our current evaluation maturity and target areas for growth. 

Principle 3.2

Evaluation is most effective when the whole organisation understands its value and embraces shared responsibility for integrating evaluative practices.