By Julian King and Zack Petersen
Welcome back!
This is Part 2 of our two-part series on navigating philanthropic and private donor wants and needs in evaluation.
Part 1 unpacked how well-intentioned demands for measurable impact can drift into impact theatre, where NGOs chase metrics that look good on paper at the expense of real progress. We explored the pitfalls when tools like social return on investment (SROI) are misused, the sometimes distorting effects of donor psychology, and we introduced the 1000 Days Fund in Indonesia, explaining how it offers a compelling counterpoint.
Now, in Part 2, we move from critique to construction: modelling the development of a framework that allows organisations like the 1000 Days Fund to generate evidence that is rigorous, contextually relevant, stakeholder-driven, and genuinely useful for learning, decision-making and accountability, without sacrificing their mission to performative metrics.
Defining and evaluating value propositions
The big idea behind this framework is deceptively simple: social investments have value propositions, and if we can define the value proposition, we can evaluate how well it is being met.
This simplicity carries profound implications:
Valuing begins with description: Before deciding how to measure impact and value, it is essential to describe the value proposition in words.1
Thinking beyond measurement: To evaluate how well the value proposition is met, we need more than just numbers; we must understand the story behind the numbers, and the story beyond the numbers - requiring an intentional blend of quantitative and qualitative evidence.
Thinking beyond methods: Evaluation requires more than just reliable mixed-methods evidence about what happened and why; it involves making defensible judgements about significance, importance, value. Such judgements require a transparent framework and process, using explicit criteria (aspects of value) and standards (levels of value). This helps ensure judgements are well formed, and helps stakeholders trace the path from evidence to judgements and decide whether the conclusions are credible.
Value is located in people: Things don’t have value; people place value on things. Different groups value the same things in different ways. This means that questions of who to involve in designing the evaluation, making sense of evidence, and judging value - and how to involve them - are central to the whole endeavour.
To illustrate, we’ll start by describing the value proposition of the 1000 Days Fund. This can be done by addressing an intuitive sequence of questions.
1. To whom is 1000 Days Fund valuable, and how?
The 1000 Days Fund generates value for the most underserved: mothers and children in resource-limited Indonesian communities, along with the community health workers (CHWs) who serve them. By focusing on cost-effective, scalable interventions - such as targeted CHW training and low-cost technologies for growth monitoring - the Fund ensures donor resources translate into tangible reductions in stunting and measurable improvements in early childhood health outcomes. For funders and government, the value lies in a model grounded in evidence, with proven results and a clear theory of change connecting inputs to impact.
The 1000 Days Fund also delivers subtler forms of value. By partnering with local communities, village health committees, and government agencies, it strengthens health infrastructure and drives system-wide improvements in maternal and child health. Health leaders, midwives, clinicians, and partner NGOs gain training, support, and collaboration opportunities, while policymakers access evidence to guide effective interventions. These partnerships build lasting local capacity, shape public health policy, and create ripple effects that enhance wellbeing across Indonesia for current and future generations.
2. What inequities does 1000 Days Fund tackle, for whom, and how?
The Fund addresses deep-seated inequities: rural families’ limited access to quality maternal and child healthcare, and the chronic undervaluation of predominantly female CHWs. The approach is to close these gaps systematically through equity-focused resource allocation and targeted CHW support that amplifies local capacity. This means not just offering “access,” but ensuring meaningful use and empowerment. Equitable distribution requires tracking who benefits, where, and how, using data to prevent the most vulnerable from being left behind.
Additional inequities in rural and remote regions - such as geographic isolation, financial constraints, and limited maternal education - restrict access to skilled care and essential supplies. The 1000 Days Fund addresses these inequities by working with local communities and health systems to strengthen infrastructure, provide targeted training, and support village clinics. Its evidence-driven approach builds capacity, distributes growth-monitoring tools, and uses technology and multi-channel education to help CHWs reach even the most under-served families.
3. What resources are invested, and by whom? What does good stewardship of resources look like?
The Fund stewards donor capital, government partnerships, in-kind contributions, and, critically, the time and expertise of CHWs on the ground. Stewardship is demonstrated through careful monitoring, transparent reporting, and rigorous analysis. Every investment is scrutinised for efficiency and outcomes, with regular feedback loops and open datasets ensuring accountability and adaptability.
Beyond these resources, the effectiveness of the 1000 Days Fund also relies on intangibles: trust built with caregivers and local communities, the credibility and leadership of village health workers, professional motivation, and a culture of continuous learning. By actively investing in social capital, empowering local champions, and fostering open communication, the Fund sustains lasting improvements in health literacy, system resilience, and equitable maternal and child health outcomes - demonstrating stewardship that extends beyond money and metrics to other resources equally essential to genuine community impact.
4. What ways of working maximise value?
The 1000 Days Fund approach prioritises disciplined execution, evidence-driven iteration, and continuous learning. Interventions are scaled only when found effective, frontline training and supervision are routine, and implementation data is regularly analysed to identify and resolve bottlenecks. Local leadership is elevated to sustain value beyond the program’s direct involvement, with multidisciplinary teams - including health workers, policy advocates, data analysts, and community leaders - collaborating to rapidly respond to needs and co-create context-sensitive solutions. Transparent sharing of results, successes and setbacks, ensures that lessons learned fuel ongoing improvement and adaptation.
Value creation is further amplified by investing in the motivation, confidence, and wellbeing of frontline teams. Emotional support and professional recognition boost retention and trust, while fostering genuine partnership with families and stakeholders ensures sustainable buy-in. Data-driven productivity strategies - optimising resource allocation, appointment scheduling, and supply chain management - enable outreach to remote areas and timely delivery of services for those with the greatest medical urgency. Innovative digital tools support real-time feedback and monitoring, minimising wasted effort and reducing bottlenecks.
Importantly, enduring value flows from participatory, flexible approaches and transparent accountability to all stakeholders. Programs are designed and adapted with local input, ensuring responsiveness to shifting needs and context. Success is measured not only by quantitative improvements - such as reduced stunting and improved health indicators - but by the empowered agency of health workers, strengthened health systems, and enduring improvements in maternal and child wellbeing. By rigorously linking inputs to outcomes, remaining humble about what works, and sharing power with communities, the 1000 Days Fund continues to unlock human, economic, and social potential at scale.
5. What real changes in people, groups, places, systems, and things, are brought about by the 1000 Days Fund?
The 1000 Days Fund brings about real changes at multiple levels - among individuals, groups, health systems, and communities. Its measurable impacts include:
Significant reductions in child stunting, tracked through validated before-and-after data, with target districts seeing rates drop by up to 30% in just three years.
Improvements in healthy birth outcomes and early childhood indicators, such as increased exclusive breastfeeding rates, iron supplementation, and immunisation coverage, all far above national averages.
Enhanced retention, capability, and confidence among CHWs, who are now treated as skilled agents of change at the center of local health systems, rather than peripheral volunteers.
The Fund also catalyses systemic improvements that endure beyond the direct intervention period:
Health system practices are strengthened and integrated, with local clinics and government supported to continue delivering high-quality care and training.
Communities and caregivers are empowered with health literacy, improved nutrition behaviours, and access to practical tools, driving long-term gains in maternal and child wellbeing.
The program’s participatory and evidence-driven approach provides actionable data for government and other partners, bolstering advocacy and policy change for stunting eradication.
Long-term value depends on ensuring these effects are not only significant but sustained, underpinned by credible causal evidence linking the Fund’s activities to demonstrable improvements in life outcomes. The ripple effects through empowered health workers, responsive local systems, and healthier families shape entire communities - unlocking human, economic, and social potential for generations to come.
The value proposition of the 1000 Days Fund in a nutshell
The 1000 Days Fund delivers cost-effective, scalable solutions that demonstrably reduce childhood stunting and improve maternal and child health outcomes in Indonesia’s most under-served communities. By focusing on rigorous training and empowerment of community health workers, leveraging innovative tools, and building strong partnerships with local stakeholders and government, the program creates sustainable, systems-level change. Its participatory, data-driven approach ensures interventions reach those most in need, drive enduring improvements in health, and catalyse broader societal and economic gains that last beyond the program itself.
Now that the value proposition of the 1000 Days Fund has been unpacked in detail, and summarised in a nutshell, we are ready to move to identifying criteria: critical bits of the value proposition to focus on in the evaluation. For example, what factors will make the greatest difference to whether the program creates a lot of value or a little?
Criteria: aspects of the value proposition to include in an evaluation framework
The value proposition questions above align with the 5Es framework, providing a scaffold to develop contextualised definitions of: cost-effectiveness (creating worthwhile value), equity (addressing inequities fairly), effectiveness (causing real changes in people, groups, places, systems, or things), efficiency (ways of working and productivity) and economy (stewardship of resources). While the value proposition goes wide in scoping the Fund’s value, the criteria narrow down and define what the evaluation should focus on. Here are some examples.
Cost-effectiveness (creating worthwhile value)
Now that we’ve articulated the value proposition, we can see that cost-effectiveness is more than a ratio like average cost per unit of outcome. If we are to understand whether and how the 1000 Days Fund creates worthwhile value that justifies the resources invested in it, we need to consider multiple sub-criteria, such as:
Stakeholder-defined value: The degree to which interventions create value as experienced by children, families, CHWs, and communities.
Demonstrable health and wellbeing gains: Measurable increases in healthy birth, child growth, and family health indicators; cost per disability-adjusted life year (DALY) averted compared to established benchmarks for stunting interventions in low-middle income countries.2
Catalytic effects and sustainability: Ability of low-cost approaches to scale, persist, and unlock longer-term savings or returns across the public health system.
Equity (addressing inequities fairly)
To evaluate the performance of the 1000 Days Fund in addressing inequities, we can see from the value proposition that we’ll need to do more than count beneficiaries. We need to evaluate multiple factors, such as:
Empowerment and voice: Degree to which vulnerable groups - especially women and CHWs - have agency, recognition, and decision-making power.
Inclusive reach: Effectiveness in reaching the most disadvantaged (e.g., rural, remote, lowest-income, gender-marginalised).
Reduction of disparities: Demonstrable narrowing of geographic, gender, and socioeconomic gaps in health outcomes.
Effectiveness (real changes in people, groups, places, systems, or things)
Effectiveness in bringing about real change requires examining multiple pieces of evidence. From the value proposition, we can prioritise areas of inquiry to understand the Fund’s impacts. Examples include:
Behavioural change: Shifts in key behaviours (e.g., exclusive breastfeeding, regular antenatal visits, handwashing, nutrition practices).
Population health outcomes: Reduction in stunting rates, improvements in maternal and child health, increased health literacy, and heightened CHW capability.
Systems change: Evidence of lasting improvements to local health systems, policy, and practice that persist beyond the program.
Efficiency (ways of working and productivity)
Efficiency is sometimes defined as “maximising outputs from a given level of inputs”. Technically true, but not practically very helpful. By unpacking the value proposition, we have clarified that ways of working to get the most value from the 1000 Days Fund investment include:
Collaboration and productivity: Evidence of trusted relationships, productive partnerships, communication and collaboration processes for service delivery.
Adaptability and learning: Speed and effectiveness with which insights from data analysis and stakeholder feedback are integrated to refine approaches and address bottlenecks.
Dynamic resource allocation: Distributing available funds, staff, tools, and time efficiently so that the intervention responds to needs on the ground, avoids unnecessary waste or delays, and ensures resources go where they are needed most to achieve the greatest impact.
Economy (stewardship of tangible and intangible resources)
Economy is often described as buying the right inputs at the right price, or horrendously, “spending less” as if cheapness somehow paves the way to valuable impact. The value proposition clarifies the breadth and quality of resources that are necessary for the 1000 Days Fund to tackle stunting at scale, and what it really means to look after those resources. Aspects of economy worth evaluating include:
Intangible capital: Development of local leadership, motivation, and community ownership as assets essential to success.
Financial accountability: Evidence of high-quality financial management, audit processes, and cost control measures.
Transparency and reporting: Open sharing of results, challenges, and changes in resource use with stakeholders and the public.
Standards: levels of value
If the above aspects of value are to be included in the evaluation framework, we will also need a transparent basis to judge the level of performance, success, or value of each. In other words, to borrow a phrase from E. Jane Davidson, we need to describe “what the evidence would look like at different levels of performance”.
Generic standards (applicable to any criteria)
First, we define a generic set of standards. Here we will adopt the ones from OPM’s guide to assessing value for money (p. 25):
Excellent: The intervention is not only meeting all reasonable expectations/targets bearing in mind its context, but is substantively exceeding some of these. There may be room for incremental improvements.
Good: The intervention is generally meeting reasonable expectations/targets, allowing for a few minor exceptions. Some improvements may be needed.
Adequate: The intervention, though not meeting all expectations/targets, is fulfilling minimum ‘bottom-line’ requirements and is showing acceptable progress overall. Significant improvements may be needed.
Poor: The intervention is not fulfilling minimum ‘bottom-line’ requirements and/or not showing acceptable progress overall. Immediate and major improvements are needed.
Specific standards (tailored to individual criteria)
Next, for each of the criteria and sub-criteria above, we would define specific standards aligned with the generic definitions. Here’s an example to illustrate, for the stakeholder-defined value sub-criterion of cost-effectiveness:
Excellent: All stakeholder groups experience high value from the 1000 Days Fund’s interventions. Reported benefits are consistent across locations, with few or no negative experiences identified.
Good: Most stakeholder groups experience clear value from the 1000 Days Fund’s interventions. A small number of groups or regions may report moderate or delayed value, but the overall pattern remains strongly positive.
Adequate: Some stakeholders experience value from the 1000 Days Fund’s interventions, but perceptions are uneven, with some expressing uncertainty about the Fund’s value.
Poor: Stakeholder groups report little or no perceived value, or negative experiences predominate.
This framework of criteria and standards will support rigorous evaluation, while also honouring the pragmatic realities the 1000 Days Fund faces in diverse contexts. It supports evaluators to make actionable evaluative judgements from multiple pieces of evidence that respond appropriately to the real-world contexts in which the Fund operates.
But how are you going to measure that?
This is an important question, and to answer it we first need to note that the standards above do not (and nor are they supposed to) represent a specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, time-bound (SMART) indicator. Quite to the contrary, we want to ensure we are not relying on one piece of evidence alone when we can triangulate multiple evidence sources (quantitative and/or qualitative) to strengthen our conclusions. Those data sources may include indicators, among other things - but selecting methods, indicators and data sources is a separate step from defining criteria and standards. This approach hinges on first clarifying what matters (steps 1-3 of the following diagram) before considering what evidence to collect (step 4).
Evidence sources and methods
Now that we have a set of criteria and standards, we can start to determine what mix of methods is needed and will be credible to address them. To ensure the evaluation is feasible and conducted at reasonable cost, we are particularly interested in identifying existing evidence that is already being collected and robust methods that can be integrated with existing practices. However, additional methods can also be developed and implemented where needed.
The evaluation would draw on a mix of quantitative and qualitative methods. Examples include:
Analysis of routinely collected health indicators and service coverage data (e.g., stunting rates, birth outcomes, program reach). To support causal inference, it may be feasible to compare regional stunting data in districts where interventions were introduced (such as Manggarai Barat and Rote Ndao in East Nusa Tenggara) with comparable districts not yet covered.
Review of process measures from program monitoring systems (such as numbers trained, services delivered, service timeliness, and resource utilisation).
Secondary analysis of survey data on health and equity outcomes, using existing national or regional benchmarks.
Cost and efficiency analysis using available financial data tied to service outputs.
Stakeholder interviews, focus groups, and beneficiary surveys to assess empowerment, satisfaction, process quality, and stakeholder-defined value.
Review of documented resource use and financial data to support economic analysis (including cost-utility calculations).
Document review of policies, reports, and previous evaluations to assess systems change, transparency, and reporting practices.
Where existing evidence doesn’t address the criteria and standards, additional approaches may be incorporated. For example, targeted data collection may be added such as rapid surveys or brief follow-ups to fill evidence gaps. Gaps in routine data collection can be addressed by modifying existing data collection systems and tools.
Implementing the evaluation
The steps above illustrate the design of a Value for Investment framework - value proposition, criteria, standards, and evidence. Now what remains is to implement it - gather the evidence, analyse it, synthesise it through the framework of criteria and standards, to make and report well-informed, well-formed judgements. Like the design process, these steps would involve stakeholder engagement to help make sense of evidence, validate, contextualise and challenge findings, strengthening the credibility and usefulness of the evaluation.
Conclusion
The challenges of philanthropic and private donor-driven impact theatre are well documented: when evaluation demands are shaped more by funders’ needs for headlines and metrics than real change, organisations risk losing sight of their mission and reducing complex, systemic progress to surface-level numbers.
In Part 1 of this series, we saw how these pressures distort programs, undermine genuine impact, and can create insidious incentives for performance theatre and impact washing.3 We also introduced the 1000 Days Fund as a powerful counter-narrative - a program built on deep local engagement, rigorous evidence, and a commitment to advancing equity and sustainable health outcomes for the hardest-to-reach communities.
Part 2 laid out a constructive alternative to impact theatre: a transparent evaluative framework grounded in a clearly articulated value proposition, with explicit criteria and standards. The framework presented is a conceptual example designed to show possible structure and content. In practice, a framework of this type would be co-developed with substantial stakeholder input.
This framework demonstrates that sustainable change goes far beyond what can be captured in a few indicators. It articulates how health gains, equity, systems change, and efficiency interconnect. It highlights the importance of using a blend of existing evidence, routine monitoring, qualitative insights, and economic analysis - focusing evaluation on what matters most, and making judgements that are both transparent and contextually fair.
Importantly, headline findings can be communicated directly and clearly, without sacrificing meaning - e.g., “Performance on [equity] meets the standard for [excellence] because [evidence] and [rationale].”
The 1000 Days Fund itself demonstrates how discipline in execution, continuous learning, and shared leadership can produce measurable reductions in stunting, strengthen health systems, and catalyse enduring improvements for families and whole communities. Its approach to creating value from its investment is both rigorous and responsive, not just counting reach and outcomes, but tracing how benefits ripple outward - transforming systems, behaviours, and lives.
As the development sector continues to wrestle with the tension between donor expectations and developmental reality, the evaluation approach outlined here offers a practical, adaptable framework for honest, contextually relevant evaluation. By prioritising stakeholder voice, integrated evidence, and quality of judgement over just measuring and counting things, organisations can restore meaning to impact measurement - showing donors, partners, and communities alike not just that their programs “work”, but how, for whom, and why it matters.
Reclaiming the integrity of evaluation begins with reclaiming the meaning of value.
Thanks for reading!
Zack Petersen is the Founder, former CEO and now Chief Strategist at the 1000 Days Fund. Julian King is an independent public policy consultant, specialising in evaluation and Value for Investment capability building. While Julian has donated to the 1000 Days Fund (you can too), he has no other relationship with the organisation.
This post was written on a voluntary basis and reflects the views of the authors alone; it does not represent the views of any other individuals or organisations they work with.
The authors thank Fred Carden for helpful peer review. Any errors or omissions remain our responsibility.
Learn more about the 1000 Days Fund’s impact
Learn more about the Value for Investment approach here
Here we define value as the merit, worth, or significance that people and groups place on something, and impact as real changes in people, places, systems, or things, caused by a set of organisational actions (policies, programs, services, etc).
Cost-utility analysis (CUA), expressed as cost per disability-adjusted life year (DALY) averted, is a widely-accepted and policy-relevant method for evaluating cost-effectiveness of maternal and child health interventions, especially in low- and middle-income settings. CUA enables direct comparison of health and economic impacts across different interventions by expressing health benefits in terms of years of healthy life gained, with DALYs representing years lost due to premature mortality and morbidity combined. This facilitates transparent investment decisions and prioritisation across health programs by providing a standardised metric for resource allocation. For stunting reduction and related programs, a robust global and regional evidence base demonstrates that CUA provides meaningful benchmarks and actionable insights for policy makers and funders to assess whether observed health gains justify program costs relative to established thresholds and comparable interventions. In this context, benchmarks indicate that costs below $1,500 per DALY averted are considered highly cost-effective and costs below $5,000 per DALY averted are considered cost-effective, based on WHO-CHOICE methodology and regional GDP-based thresholds for Indonesia and similar settings. This approach enables funders and policy makers to assess value for money and compare program performance against global good practice. As an extension to CUA, Realist Economic Evaluation Methods (REEM) could be applied to understand how and why cost-effectiveness varies between groups, settings and circumstances. This could inform future resource allocation and program design decisions that help improve value for money.
This critique focuses on philanthropic and private donors. While all funding relationships create accountability demands, major government and multilateral donors have established standards that emphasise learning, rigour, and capacity-building, rather than simple headline numbers. Problems described here are most acute in the philanthropic sector, where evaluation expectations are often less formalised.