August 27, 2018

MERL Tech Jozi Feedback Report

MERL Tech Jozi took place on August 1-2, 2018. Below are some highlights from the post-conference survey that was sent to participants requesting feedback on their MERL Tech Jozi experience. Thirty-four percent of our attendees filled out the post-conference survey via Google Forms.

Overall Experience

Here’s how survey participants rated their overall experience:

Participants’ favorite sessions

The sessions that were most frequently mentioned as favorites and some reasons why included:

Session title	Comments
Conducting a Baseline of the ICT Ecosystem – Genesis Analytics and DIAL	…interactive session and felt practical. I could easily associate with what the team was saying. I really hope these learnings make it to implementation and start informing decision-making around funding! The presenters were also great. … interesting and engaging, findings were really relevant to the space. …shared lessons and insights resonated with my own professional experience. The discussions were fruitful and directly relevant to my line of work. …incredibly useful. The study confirmed a lot of my perceptions as an IT developer in the MERL space, but now I have some more solid backup. I will use this in my webinars and consulting on “IT for M&E”
Datafication Discrimination — Media Monitoring Africa, Open Data Durban, Amandla.mobi and Oxfam South Africa	Linked both MERL and Tech to programme and focussed on the impact of MERL Tech in terms of sustainable, inclusive development. Great panel, very knowledgeable, something different to the usual M&E. interactive and diverse. … probably most critical and informative in terms of understanding where the sector was at … the varied level of information across the audience and the panel was fascinating – if slightly worrying about how unclear we are as an M&E sector.
When WhatsApp Becomes About More Than Messaging – Genesis Analytics, Every1Mobile and Praekelt.org	As an evaluator, I have never thought of using WhatsApp as a way of communicating with potential beneficiaries. It made me think about different ways of getting in touch with beneficiaries of programme, and getting them to participate in a survey. The different case studies included examples, great media, good Q&A session at the end, and I learnt new things. WhatsApp is only just reaching it’s potential in mHealth so it was good to learn real life lessons. Hearing about the opportunities and challenges of applying a tool in different contexts and for different purposes gave good all-around insights
Social Network Analysis – Data Innovators and Praeklelt.org	I was already very familiar with SNA but had not had the opportunity to use it for a couple of years. Hearing this presentation with examples of how others have used it really inspired me and I’ve since sketched out a new project using SNA on data we’re currently gathering for a new product! I came away feeling really inspired and excited about doing the analysis.

Least favorite sessions

Where participants rated sessions as their “least favorite it was because:

The link to technology was not clear
It felt like a sales pitch
It felt extractive
Speaker went on too long
Views on MERL or Tech seemed old fashioned

Topics that need more focus in the future

Unpack the various parts of “M” “E” “R” “L”

Technology across MERL, not just monitoring. There was a lot of technology for data collection & tracking but little for ERL in MERL
More evaluation?
The focus was very much on evaluation (from the sessions I attended) and I feel like we did not talk about the monitoring, research and learning so much. This is huge for overall programme implementation and continuously learning from our data. Next time, I would like to talk a bit more about how organisations are actually USING data day-to-day to make decisions (monitoring) and learning from it to adapt programmes.
The R of MERL is hardly discussed at all. Target this for the next MERL Tech.

New digital approaches / data science

AI and how it can introduce biases, machine learning, Python
A data science-y stream could open new channels of communication and collaboration

Systems and interoperability

Technology for data management between organizations and teams.
Integrations between platforms.
Public Health, Education. Think of how do we discuss and bring more attention to the various systems out there, and ensure interoperability and systems that support the long term visions of countries.
Different types of MERL systems. We focused a lot on data collection systems, but there is a range of monitoring systems that programme managers can use to make decisions.

Scale and sustainability

How to engage and educate governments on digital data collection systems.
The debate on open source: because in development sector it is pushed as the holy grail, whereas most other software worldwide is proprietary for a reason (safety, maintenance, continued support, custom solution), and open source doesn’t mean free.
Business opportunities. MERL as a business tool. How MERL Tech has proved ROI in business and real market settings, even if those settings were in the NGO/NPO space. What is the business case behind MERL Tech and MERL Tech developments?

Ah ha! Moments

Learning about technology / tech approaches

I found the design workshops enlightening, and did not as an evaluator realise how much time technies put into user testing.
I am a tech dinosaur – so everything I learned about a new technology and how it can be applied in evaluation was an ‘aha!’

New learning and skills

The SNA [social network analysis] inspiration that struck me was my big takeaway! I can’t wait to get back to the office and start working on it.
Really enjoyed learning about WhatsApp for SBCC.
The qualitative difference in engagement, structure, analysis and resource need between communicating via SMS versus IM. (And realising again how old school I am for a tech person!)

Data privacy, security, ethics

Ah ha moment was around how we could improve handling data
Data security
Our sector (including me) doesn’t really understand ‘big data,’ how it can discriminate, and what that might mean to our programmes.

Talking about failure

The fail fest was wonderful. We all theoretically know that it’s good to be honest about failure and to share what that was like, but this took honest reflection to a whole new level and set the tone for Day 2.

I’m not alone!

The challenges I am facing with introducing tech for MERL in my organisations aren’t unique to me.
There are other MERL Tech practitioners with a journalism/media background! This is exciting and makes me feel I am in the right place. The industry seems to want to gate keep (academia, rigourous training) so this is interesting to consider going forward, but also excites me to challenge this through mentorship opportunities and opening the space to others like me who were given a chance and gained experience along the way. Also had many Aha moments for using WhatsApp and its highly engaging format.
Learning that many other practitioners support learning on your own.
There are people locally interested in connecting and learning from.

Recommendations for future MERL Tech events

More of most everything…

More technical sessions
More panel discussions
More workshops
More in-depth sessions!
More time for socializing and guided networking like the exercise with the coloured stickers on Day 1
More NGOs involved, especially small NGOs.
More and better marketing to attract more people
More demo tables, or have new people set up demo tables each day
More engagement: is there a way that MERL Tech could be used further to shape, drive and promote the agenda of using technology for better MERL? Maybe through a joint session where we identify important future topics to focus on? Just as something that gives those who want the opportunity to further engage with and contribute to MERL Tech and its agenda-setting?
The conversations generally were very ‘intellectual’. Too many conversations revolved around how the world had to move on to better appreciate the value of MERL, rather than how MERL was adapted, used and applied in the real world. [It was] too dominated by MERL early adopters and proponents, rather than MERL customers… Or am I missing the point, which may be that MERL (in South Africa) is still a subculture for academic minded researchers. Hope not.
More and better wine!

Kudos

For some reason this conference – as opposed to so many other conferences I have been to – actually worked. People were enthused, they were kind, willing to talk – and best of all by day 2 they hadn’t dropped out like flies (which is such an issue with conferences!). So whatever you did do it again next time!
Very interactive and group-focused! This was well balanced with informative sessions. I think creative group work is good but it wouldn’t be good to have the whole conference like this. However, this was the perfect amount of it and it was well led and organized.
I really had a great time at this conference. The sessions were really interesting and it was awesome to get so many different people in the same place to discuss such interesting topics and issues. Lunch was also really delicious
Loved the lightning talks! Also the breakaway sessions were great. The coffee was amazing thank you Fail fest is such a cool concept and looking to introduce this kind of thinking into our own organisation more – we all struggle with the same things, was good to be around likeminded professionals.
I really appreciated the fairly “waste-free” conference with no plastic bottles, unnecessary programmes and other things that I’ll just throw away afterwards. This was a highlight for me!
I really enjoyed this conference. Firstly the food was amazing (always a win). But most of all the size was perfect. It was really clever the way you forced us to sit in small lunch sizes and that way by the end of the conference I really had the confidence to speak to people. Linda was a great organiser – enthusiastic and punctual.