Results without theater
Idea. A results framework that records what broke.
Contents
Why§
The logframe, results-based management and the gender with age marker were built to show impact. In practice they become a performance. A project manager fills the form with defensible garbage to win four million. The form is satisfied, and the change it was meant to record goes missing.
Why the UN fails might be answered in lowercase: un, the prefix that undoes. Undo, unlearn, unsay.
A first shape§
A ledger in three columns, borrowed from my archive: what we assumed, what broke, what remains. Each row is one assumption a project made at the start. The ledger is filled at the end, and again a year later.
Beside it, a word check. It reads a proposal and marks the words that have turned into jargon. Gender-responsive, disability inclusive, trauma informed and survivor centric are words that once prevented harm. Repeated without their work, they become the next layer of humanitarian and development jargon. The check asks for the work behind each word.
Open§
- Who fills the ledger, and who is safe saying what broke?
- Would any donor accept a report that leads with failure?
- Can a word check avoid becoming one more compliance form?