Request for proposals: Evaluation of 'systems capabilities in government' workshops

The Royal Academy of Engineering is seeking a supplier to evaluate the impact of its systems workshops which take a systems approach to tackle complex policy challenges. The evaluation will provide qualitative evidence of the impact of there workshops and understand the value of its methods and processes from the perspective of policymakers.

The Academy's evaluations should aim to evaluate causality (i.e., that out work had (or lacked) real impact) and provide evidence of change. Our funders expect us to 'demonstrate/evidence value for money of our programmes or impact compared to a counterfactual'.

Through this evaluation the Academy wishes to learn:

• About the needs of policymakers with regards to the understanding and use of systems thinking/approaches in policy/government.
• How successfully the Academy's workshops offer is increasing the understanding and use of systems thinking/approaches in policy/government.
• In what way the Academy's workshops offer is supporting policy teams to develop better policies.
• How successfully the lessons from the Academy are being passed on from direct participants to other policymakers.
• How the systems workshops and wider systems offer can be improved.
• What indicators can be used to measure the impact of the Academy's systems offer and how to improve our monitoring and evaluation activities.

We expect the following deliverables from the evaluation:

• A Theory of Change/logic model showing the inputs, activities, outputs, outcomes and impacts of the workshops.
• A report expanding on:
• The intended and unintended impacts of the workshops
• The relative importance of inputs, activities and outputs in achieving outcomes and impacts
• Recommendation for how the programme itself can improve
• Recommendation for how the programme can improve its monitoring and evaluation activity including the data it needs to collect or access to be able to demonstrate causality in future evaluations
• A summary of the evaluation, suitable for publication, written in an engaging style that is suited for a non-specialist audience.

A full invitation to tender can be found here: https://raeng.org.uk/media/gf2dwz0g/scottish-government-evaluation-commission-itt_v3.pdf

Deadline for proposals: 12pm on 23 March 2023

Please send submissions with subject line ITT: Evaluation of 'systems capabilities in government' workshops to: calum.savage@raeng.org.uk