Choosing Indicators | What Works (2024)

FAQs

Choosing Indicators | What Works? ›

Good ideas when selecting indicators include:

When selecting indicators, it is important to consider both the long-term as well as the short-term objectives and how each will be measured. “Benchmark” indicators, which measure progress made toward achieving greater outcomes, are key to ensuring programs and initiatives are on-track to reaching long-term goals.

The ability to select meaningful and useful performance indicators relies on a clearly articulated theory of change and set of expected results. With those in place, ideas for potential indicators of the expected results should begin to emerge from the review of the design documents.

While selecting indicators, it should be ensured that they are clear, precise, feasible, and best reflecting the outputs and outcomes of your results.

Features of useful indicators

CRITERIA DESCRIPTION Communicates well Clear and easy to understand. Relevant or centrally important to the result or project Is directly linked with the result. Reliable Different people can measured it and reach the same results.

Useful: Can be used for program improvement and to demonstrate program outcomes. Adequate: Can measure change over time and progress toward performance or outcomes. Understandable: Easy to comprehend and interpret. Practical/feasible: The data for the indicator should not be too burdensome to collect.

Indicators are statistics used to measure current conditions as well as to forecast financial or economic trends. In the world of investing, indicators typically refer to technical chart patterns deriving from the price, volume, or open interest of a given security.

What is a smart indicator? ›

SMART is an acronym that stands for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound. These are the criteria that make an indicator effective and useful for M&E. An indicator is a quantitative or qualitative measure that shows the change or outcome of an intervention.

They typically include measures of: cost performance, such as actual cost (money spent) against budgeted cost (in the initial budget) project progress, such as percentage of work performed, project milestones completed, or actual time spent on the project so far. financial profit, such as return on investment.

Indicators should generate data that are needed and useful. They should be technically sound. They should be understandable, practical and feasible. In addition, they should have a proven record of performance.

The choice of indicator depends on the nature of the acid-base reaction and the pH range at the equivalence point. An ideal indicator should have its endpoint color change occur within the same pH range as the sharp pH change at the equivalence point on the titration curve.

We have stated that a good indicator should have a pKin value that is close to the expected pH at the equivalence point. For a strong acid–strong base titration, the choice of the indicator is not especially critical due to the very large change in pH that occurs around the equivalence point.