Evaluation

For complete information on the eleven leadership competencies, order Resources for Leadership.

This competency enables the learner to:

• List the three essential steps of evaluation.
• List three reasons evaluation is important.
• Described three characteristics of effective evaluation.
• List five criteria for writing clearly stated objectives.
• List three characteristics of goals.
• List five characteristics of a vision statement.
• List four things to consider when evaluating the task.
• List four things to consider when evaluating the group.
• List five ways to evaluate alternatives.
• List two blocks to effective evaluation.

Evaluation is the constant companion of the White Stag learner and staff member. We constantly strive to improve ourselves, so we continually evaluate how we are doing. We call this the "Evaluation Attitude." This attitude, it turns out, is one of the five founding principles of the White Stag program. (See Follow the White Stag, Chapter 2 - "Program Principles" for a description of these concepts.)

In almost any situation, except when responding to purely mechanical systems, we must consider the task and the people.

About Evaluation

Ask a Patrol Member Development candidate at the end of the summer camp, "When do you evaluate?" and he'll tell you, "Always."

Ask another candidate from Patrol Leader Development "what do you look for when you evaluate?" and he'll say, "The strong and the weak points, possible improvements, and things to keep."

Ask a third candidate, a young woman from Troop Leader Development, bowed under a large pack, "What is evaluation?" and he'll tell you everything the others have said and add, "We evaluate how well the group is keeping itself together and how well we're getting the job done."

Evaluation is a continual process, either informal or formal, of judging a situation against a standard.

Evaluation is, in essence, two things:

• An attitude of continuous striving for higher goals.
• A process for judging an individual's or group's completion of a task against previously identified standards.

Our desire is to improve our evaluation skills so that we evaluate in the same manner a eagle soars on the winds: constantly testing, consciously and unconsciously, wind current, flow, our altitude, strength, time, direction, position relative to our target, etc., all the elements that affect our reaching and surpassing the next mountain peak.