Overview

M&E is used to: 

• Inform decision-making by providing timely feedback to management on intervention context, risks, challenges, results, as well as successful approaches;
• Meet accountability obligations by informing donors, beneficiaries and other stakeholders on IOM’s performance, progress made in the achievement of results and the utilization of resources; 
• Draw lessons learned from experience to provide feedback into the planning, design and implementation of future interventions and improve service delivery _^*1

This section only highlights critical consideration for M&E in distributions. For guidance on M&E please refer to MONITORING AND EVALUATION (M&E) IN EMERGENCIES entry. 

Key considerations

• Monitoring and evaluation (M&E) is a vital to ensure the distribution of items has produced the intended outcomes and was implemented according to agreed standards.
• M&E should be incorporated as a part of programme cycle from the planning and proposal stages.  Indicators and sources of verification need to be defined to enable measuring the programme progress. The Results Matrix is IOM’s strategic management tool that facilitates the “planning, monitoring, evaluating and reporting on the implementation of a project and progress towards achieving its results. _^*2
• Note that Results Matrices are sometimes communicated to donors and constitute a reporting requirement against the project agreement. The Results Matrix for any given project can be found in that project’s space on PRIMA, and programme support units can indicate whether the indicators are internal, or constitute a reporting requirement agreed with the donor.
• M&E activities should be conducted by a diverse team.

Distribution Monitoring

What, how, and when do we monitor?

• The identification and selection of beneficiaries to ensure an equitable and transparent selection processes (see Beneficiary Selection, Verification, and Registration entry)
• The process of distribution itself including: 
  • The quality and quantity items
  • The information provided to beneficiaries and non-beneficiaries (e.g. host-community)
  • Treatment of beneficiaries by the distribution team and vice versa 
  • Observation of any protection issues and concerns related to the distribution or the items received 
• Monitoring is done through:
  • Observation by a monitoring and program teams
  • Exit interviews with sample beneficiaries
  • Simple surveys of satisfaction with the process 
  • Reviewing feedback and complaint data 

Post Distribution Monitoring (PDM)

• PDM helps evaluate the process and outcome of distributions to improve interventions in the future. 
• Program staff are accountable for the results of a distribution and therefore must work with M&E staff to design and implement a PDM that will help inform future programming.
• Both male and female staff should be present to conduct or facilitate PDM discussions, to ensure discussions are conducted by members of the same sex as the beneficiaries (as appropriate)
• As with any data gathering exercise, collect as little data as possible, only collect data that will be used and use the data you have collected.  
• PDM can be designed to be anonymous 
• Work with your M&E team to define the PDM sampling methodology and adequate sample size.  An online sample size calculator (external) can also be used by considering the confidence level and the sampling error, particularly when larger number of respondents are required. _^*3 A ‘good enough’ sample is talking with 20% of the people (for distributions smaller than 200 households), 10% (distributions between 200 and 750 distributions) and 5% (distributions greater than 750 households) - Note that this may not be a representative sample and will not allow you to make assumptions on the overall beneficiaries.  
• PDM is usually carried out between 2 weeks and 4 months after the distribution, depending on the purpose of the PDM and the items distributed. E.g. For items delivered for a winterization, you may choose to conduct PDMs after winter to capture their effectiveness.     
• What can be monitored through PDMs:
  • Did people know why they were selected
  • Did people receive the intended items?
  • Were the items useful to meet their needs?
  • Issues with the packaging of the items?
  • Were they able to carry items home without issues?
  • Were they able to use the items without issues?
  • Satisfaction with the quality and quantity of items 
  • Satisfaction with the performance of IOM 
  • They may also provide an opportunity for identifying further needs of assistance
  • Were the CFM mechanisms safe, accessible, and effective (for those who used them)
• Conducting PDM:
  • As households’ surveys, and/or as focus groups. If focus groups are to be used, they should be done carefully with appropriately trained facilitators to ensure that the appropriate voices can be heard during the session.
  • If there are any sub-groups of concern, interview more people and aim for a proportional number of respondents who are members of that sub-group.
  • Prior to asking if beneficiaries consent to participating facilitators should clearly outline why they are collecting the information and what it will be used for.
  • PDM can take place in following several forms depending on the context:
    • Household surveys with beneficiaries
    • Sex and age group segregated focus group discussion with beneficiaries
    • Sex and age group segregated focus group discussion with non-beneficiaries
    • Key informant interviews _^*4

PDMs and people on the move

When distributions are carried out for people on the move/in transit or in rapidly changing contexts, a rapid distribution monitoring or a beneficiary satisfaction survey can be conducted during and immediately after the distribution.

This process will not provide feedback on the use of the item received or purchased after but can provide information on the assessment and beneficiary selection process, and the distribution process itself. 

It may provide relevant information on:

• Are the items packaged in an adequate manner to carry?
• Did people leave items behind? 

Alternatively, surveys and key informant interviews can be conducted via phone interviews, web or SMS-based surveys. For these remote and mobile engagement, survey questionnaires must be adapted in a very concise way comprised of no more than 5 questions. _^*5

Contacts

For more information, please contact the Shelter and Settlements Unit in Geneva: ShelterSupport@iom.int.

Please also find the contact information to the IOM Shelter Reference Group: ShelterReferenceGroup@iom.int.