Impact evaluation methods of training programs and active employment measures

To increase the awareness of institutions in BiH about the importance of conducting program evaluations and their redesign based on evaluation results, which would increase the effects of budget money invested on such programs, the InLearn Center of Excellence in Non-Formal Education on April 28, 2021 realized a workshop on methods of assessing the impact of training programs and active employment measures. This workshop was led by Dr. Nermin Oruč, who has many years of experience in conducting evaluations of various programs in practice. Due to the current epidemiological situation, the workshop was held online, via the Zoom application. The workshop was attended by over 20 representatives of various institutions and organizations, including representatives of the BiH Labor and Employment Agency, entity employment bureaus, and cantonal employment services.

Participants who attended the workshop were shown the key methods used in impact assessments of employment support programs. In addition to the theoretical approach, dr. Oruč presented examples from the practice of the CREDI Center, which has very successful experience in assessing the impact of various programs, introduced the ways of conducting evaluations of employment programs, which can serve to improve their design and effectiveness, thus ensuring more effective spending of public funds. Following the practical examples, the manner and stages of implementation of the impact assessment project itself are described, from planning and design, methods of providing data, and ways of designing future measures based on the results of assessments.

These presented topics encouraged participants to discuss and exchange different experiences from practice. After the discussion, the participants had the opportunity to ask questions that remained unanswered and to resolve possible dilemmas related to this topic, and that can be very useful for institutions and organizations an their future experiences with methods of evaluating training programs and active employment measures.