The Department of Finance is calling on members of the Australian Public Service to join a new community and help build up a culture of evaluation and learning in their Agencies.
Issuing the call, the Department said its new Commonwealth Evaluation Community of Practice (CoP) would give members from other Agencies access to regular events, including Community Forums and Targeted Collaborative Workshops.
“Members with a GovTeams account will also have access to online chat and collaborative features outside of scheduled events,” Finance said.
“The CoP aims to bring together people who have a desire to work collaboratively to learn, share and build the evaluation capability of its members,” it said.
“A key objective is to provide a networking mechanisms to help embed the Commonwealth Evaluation Policy and the Evaluation Toolkit, by creating opportunities for colleagues from across the Commonwealth to share perspectives and experiences about how the Policy and Toolkit are being operationalised in different contexts.”
Finance said the December 2021 Policy had been developed to support entities to improve evaluation practices and capability (including the quality of performance reporting), while the Toolkit provided anyone new to evaluation with an overview of evaluation concepts and approaches.
It said the CoP would operate under a hybrid model, including both online and face-to-face communication and engagement methods.
“The CoP is open to all Commonwealth officials with a role or an interest in evaluation,” Finance said.
It said PS staff could join the CoP by completing a member registration questionnaire, covering contact details and their roles, preferences and areas of interest.
The Department’s CoP member registration questionnaire can be accessed at this PS News link.
