How we work
Method chosen for the question
The practical arrangements behind an assignment: how designs are chosen, how fieldwork is run, how quality is controlled, and what a client is left holding at the end.
Delivery
How an assignment runs
Scope before method
We agree what question the work has to answer and what the evidence will be used for, then choose the design. A question about reach needs a different study from a question about effect, and we say which one we are doing.
Fieldwork in the language of the district
Enumerators are recruited in the districts where the work happens and work in the local language. Field teams are mobilised and supervised from Tamale. Where a telephone interview is the right instrument, as it often is in graduate tracing, we use it and say so.
Quality control while collection is still running
Validation built into the instrument, supervision in the field, back-checks on a fixed share of interviews, and a discrepancy log, so issues are raised and resolved during collection rather than left to surface at analysis.
Evidence reviewed and reported transparently
Findings are separated from interpretation, limitations are stated plainly, and recommendations are written so a programme team can act on them. Where the evidence does not support a conclusion, the report says what it does support.
Built to be handed over
Instruments, codebooks, datasets and documentation are written for the client to reuse. On system work the handover includes training, a named owner and an agreed maintenance arrangement.
Inclusion designed in
Sampling, instruments and field protocols are set up so that women and less reachable groups are represented in the evidence, not added as a section at the end.
Who does the work
How an assignment team is assembled
One named lead accountable for delivery, independent quality assurance alongside rather than underneath, the specialist roles the study actually needs, and field teams recruited in the zones where the fieldwork happens. The roles are constant; who fills them depends on the assignment.
Scroll the diagram sideways to see the whole structure.
In practice
What a client receives
A sampling note that can be handed to a reviewer. It sets out the frame, how it was built, the stratification, the reserve rules and the response outcome for the units drawn.
Instruments with validation built in, so that out-of-range entries are caught at the point of entry, and a codebook explaining every variable.
A documented dataset, a discrepancy log, and back-check results by enumerator.
A report that separates findings from interpretation, states the limits of what the evidence supports, and sets out recommendations a programme team can act on.
Independence
Where we verify
On verification assignments we are engaged to give an outside account of what is being reported. That means building the participant frame from source records rather than accepting a supplied list, observing what can be observed, and reporting the response outcome for every unit drawn, including the ones that could not be reached.
It also means being clear about method. A verification exercise establishes whether reported activity and results can be confirmed. It is not the same as an impact evaluation, and we do not describe it as one.
Ask for the method note
We will send the sampling and quality-control approach we would apply to your assignment before you commit to anything.