How to set objectives and evaluate

The objectives are the foundations of any communications strategy, and it’s worth taking time to get them right.

Having clear objectives is essential to the success of your undertaking. After all, if you don’t know what you’re trying to achieve, it’s very difficult to achieve it! Objectives are also vital when evaluating, as they provide the criteria against which to measure your achievements.

Aim
Some activities will have an overarching aim as well as objectives. The aim is probably best thought of as a ‘big picture’ objective, for example:

• Substantially increase public use of the Victorian Government's Internet portal;
• Explain and promote the benefits of the new recreational fishing licence;
• Ensure women over 50 years of age are informed about the availability of free mammograms.

Objectives
The example aims above are very broad. They give a good sense of what the activity is intended to achieve, but don't specify exactly what needs to be achieved, or how it will be achieved. The next step is to define objectives that will provide these details.

The key to developing objectives is that they should be SMART:
- Specific
- Measurable
- Achievable
- Realistic
- Time-bound

A good final test of the relevance of your objectives is to consider two questions:
1. Do the objectives flow logically from the aim? (If not, is there a more logical way of achieving your aim?)
2. If all the objectives were achieved, would the aim have been achieved? (If not, the objectives probably need to be revised, or added to).

Evaluation

Evaluation is a critical, but often overlooked, aspect of communications.

The two main reasons for evaluating are:

• Accountability: without evaluation, you can't really know what you've achieved, and hence you can't justify the expenditure of time, energy and public funds you have made.
• Improvement: if you don't evaluate, you don't know what worked and what didn't. You won't learn anything from the experience, and you may well keep making the same mistakes.

It is very tempting to make subjective judgments about the effectiveness of a communications program - and people (including communications practitioners and their clients) frequently do. Unfortunately, there are countless examples where such subjective judgments have proven to be wrong. For this reason, it is crucial that evaluation of communications be as rigorous and objective as you can make it.

The Victorian Government strongly supports evaluation of communications activities, and the market research activities underpinning it.

Evaluation Guidelines (Word 55kb)
Template - Setting Objectives (Word 27kb)