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Beyond BASIC Episode 2: Evaluation findings – Relevance and Outputs
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Calling all findings fanatics! It’s time for the first of two episodes that go behind the scenes of the insights generated by evaluating a complex global research and technical assistance programme.
Beyond BASIC is a new Integrity Matters podcast mini-series sharing learning and innovation from Integrity’s endline evaluation of the UK Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office’s £23.5m Better Assistance in Crises (BASIC) programme.
Hosted by Niki Wood, Integrity’s Head of Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning, Episode 2: Evaluation findings: Relevance and Outputs focuses on the relevance of BASIC’s work and what the programme delivered in practice.
Three guests join Niki: Nick Maunder who led the evaluation; Heather Kindness from FCDO who leads work on social protection; and Consulting and Research Team Leader Cathy Shaw from DAI, one of the organisations involved in implementing BASIC. They unpack these results and reflect on what they mean for future crisis assistance programming.
Look out for the rest of the series, launching here every Thursday:
- 9 July – Evaluation findings: The future of social protection programming
- 16 July – Behind the evaluation: Relationships, transparency and trust
Hello and welcome to Beyond Basic, a podcast series showcasing learning and innovation from evaluating the UK Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office's £23.5 million Better Assistance in Crises, or BASIC, program. My name is Nikki Wood, and I am the head of Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning, or MEL for short, at Integrity. I will be your host for this podcast mini-series where we will be talking about integrity's endline evaluation of the Better Assistance in Crises Basic program, exploring the methods used, diving into some of the key findings, and reflecting on the relationship between the evaluators and the program team. In today's episode, we're taking a deep dive into the findings of the evaluation. We'll focus on the relevance of the basic program and what the programme delivered in practice, its outputs. I'm joined by three guests today who each bring a different perspective on the program and its evaluation. Could I ask you all to introduce yourselves?
SPEAKER_02Sure, and thanks for having me. I'm Heather Kynis from the Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office, FCDO, where I lead our work on social protection. I was part of the team responsible for designing, overseeing, and funding the BASIC program and for using the evaluation findings to shape its delivery.
SPEAKER_03Hi, I'm Kathy Shore from DAI, one of the organisations involved in implementing BASIC. I head up DAI's consulting and research team, and I was programme director for STAR, the technical assistance component of BASIC.
SPEAKER_00Thanks. Great to be here. I'm Nate Maunder and I was the team leader of the independent evaluation of BASIC. I worked across the baseline, midline, and endline devaluation phases, helping to assess how the program performed over its full implementation period.
SPEAKER_01Thank you all so much for joining. To set the scene, Heather, could we briefly remind listeners what BASIC set out to do?
SPEAKER_02Absolutely. So BASIC is a centrally managed FCDO program that's been running from 2018 to date, with the goal of strengthening the use of social protection approaches in crisis contexts, particularly in fragile and conflict-affected settings. It delivered this through three main work streams: technical assistance, research, and knowledge management and learning. Together, the aim was to strengthen systems, build evidence, and improve coordination so that people affected by crises could better meet their basic needs and cope with shocks.
SPEAKER_01Thank you so much, Heather. Now let's dive into the findings. Nick, starting with the relevance of the design, from the perspective of the evaluation, how well did BASIC respond to stakeholder needs and priorities?
SPEAKER_00Sure. For the BASIC evaluation, relevance meant looking at whether BASIC was aligned to FCDO's priorities. Did it offer a good balance of strategic and demand-led support? And how well did it respond to shifts in context? What we found was that BASIC remained highly relevant throughout its lifetime. It aligned closely with the key FCDO priorities, including gender and social inclusion goals. The technical assistance was highly responsive to demand from FCDO at all levels, with a high level of satisfaction among users. And over time, BASIC also became increasingly relevant to UN agencies and international organizations working on social protection in crises. However, relevance to national governments was more variable. In fragile and conflict-affected settings, political constraints, capacity limitations, and access challenges made it harder to fully engage with national authorities.
SPEAKER_01I see. Heather, does that align with how you perceived its relevance?
SPEAKER_02It does, very much so. So from our perspective, BASIC has been highly relevant to our strategic priorities. It's helped position social protection as a key tool for preventing and responding to crises, and it gave our teams access to flexible, high-quality technical expertise. Crucially, BASIC helped identify where and how social protection approaches can be used to reduce reliance on humanitarian assistance and reinforce national systems as a more cost-effective and sustainable model. We saw the programme become increasingly relevant to influencing global agendas. This came together in an impressive way last year, with BASIC providing the secretariat and contributing substantially to the evidence for a high-level panel on social protection in fragile and conflict settings, which set a shared agenda for global action over the next decade.
SPEAKER_03And Cathy, what about from an implementation perspective? Well, for STAR, BASIC's technical assistance work stream, relevance was really driven by the demand-led model. Most assignments were initiated by FCDO posts or partners, so there was a strong sense that support responded to real-time needs. Over the course of the programme, we worked hard to build awareness of and trust in the staff facility, which helped to cultivate increasing demand from UN agencies and global actors for support on coordination, policy, and systems. Engaging national governments directly was sometimes more complex, but where conditions allowed there was strong interest in the kind of support BASIC could offer. And where direct engagement with government wasn't always possible, working through partners with a more permanent presence in country helped ensure BASIC remained relevant to national priorities, providing an indirect route to influencing strategies and plans.
SPEAKER_01One of the evaluation findings was that BASIC was only partially successful in maintaining its relevance to shifting humanitarian needs. The program clearly adapted really well in some cases. For example, during COVID-19, when the space helpline was rapidly launched to provide technical assistance to more than 30 countries. Though in some crises, support was more limited, and often because of access constraints or political sensitivities in fragile and conflict-affected settings. So my question is, how well did BASIC adapt to a rapidly changing crisis landscape? And what were the main constraints? Let's start with your perspectives, Nick.
SPEAKER_00Well, from the evaluation perspective, we saw clear evidence of BASIC responding to emerging crises. The space helpline that you mentioned is a good example of that responsiveness, and overall most of the technical assistance assignments and research aligned with some of the world's largest humanitarian crises.
SPEAKER_02We also saw the global context shift dramatically over the life of the programme, with the COVID pandemic, escalating crises, and tightening aid budgets. In that environment, BASIC remained useful because it offered a flexible technical support at relatively low cost. At the same time, tighter budgets globally meant a stronger focus on immediate humanitarian priorities, which can create tension with the longer-term work on system strengthening, which is where social protection approaches often sit.
SPEAKER_03And from the implementation side, adaptability was essential. In many ways, facilities like STAR enable genuinely adaptive programming because any one assignment is small enough to stop, pivot, or scale up depending on what the context allows. This flexibility also helped us respond to immediate humanitarian priorities while gradually supporting the longer-term strengthening of social protection.
SPEAKER_01I see. So while BASIC showed strong adaptability, this finding really highlights the complex reality of working in conflict settings and the necessity to adapt to shifting needs and donor priorities. Let's talk now about what BASIC actually delivered. Nick, what did the evaluation find?
SPEAKER_00So BASIC delivered a substantial volume of outputs across all three work streams. This included more than 100 technical assistance assignments and over 130 research products, alongside extensive knowledge management and learning activities. Even for a multi-year program, that's a lot. These products responded to country and global needs across a wide range of areas. One important area was helping FCDO to build innovative programs to respond to crises, such as in Jordan and Yemen. BASIC also conducted primary research, built capacity, strengthened coordination, and advocated for increased political commitment. And importantly, these outputs were consistently seen as high quality and technically robust.
SPEAKER_01Cathy, how did those impressions match your impressions of delivery from an implementation perspective? It was a very active program.
SPEAKER_03The demand-driven nature meant there was a steady flow of assignments, and the flexibility of the model allowed us to respond quickly. One of the strengths was the mix of outputs, from rapid technical advice to longer-term analytical and policy work. This allowed STAR to support immediate needs while also contributing to longer-term system development and learning. So in Nigeria, for example, targeted short-term technical assignments were used to complement longer-term embedded advisory and coordination roles over several years, all of which collectively informed Nigeria's national cash and voucher assistance policy.
SPEAKER_01I can really see how the blend of activities was essential here. Nick, what would you say were the key factors that enabled BASIC to deliver? And where did constraints make things harder?
SPEAKER_00Well, from an evaluation perspective, two enabling factors stood out. First was the agile design of the program, particularly the technical assistance facility, and that flexibility meant that teams could pivot quickly, scaling work up or down, shifting countries, or re-sequencing activities as context changed. For example, BASIC rapidly mobilized following the onset of war in Ukraine and adapted engagements in Ethiopia and Yemen as political conditions shifted. The second was the quality of the technical assistance. Across both technical assistance and research, stakeholders consistently highlighted the credibility and depth of the experts involved. BASIC had assured access to cutting-edge technical expertise across the work streams, and that helped ensure outputs remained strong, even in very challenging contexts. But there were also real constraints. Access challenges in conflict settings, funding changes, and limited time for synthesis sometimes meant that while outputs were delivered, there were fewer opportunities to step back and connect the learning across the whole portfolio.
SPEAKER_02I'd agree with that. The flexibility of the technical assistance model was extremely valuable. It allowed us to respond quickly to emerging priorities and to provide support in stages, while the research brought depth on key topics in fragile countries. But the evaluation also points to some real constraints, particularly time to fully consolidate learning, disseminate findings, or follow through with partners. Bringing the technical assistance and research work streams together so that they were more than the sum of their parts also took time. A joint knowledge, learning, and uptake strategy really helped with that.
SPEAKER_01So the overall picture that emerges is that while the programme delivered a large number of outputs, whether those translated into measurable uptake often depended on the surrounding context. Things like strong relationships with partners, clear demand from decision makers, or moments where policy discussions were already moving. The evaluation suggests that where those conditions were present, basics advice and evidence were much more likely to feed into real change. Kathy, does that ring true with you?
SPEAKER_03Yes, absolutely. From the implementation side, STAR tried to be quite intentional about that. We looked for places where there was real demand and where conversations were already moving and shaped our support to help move those discussions forward. We also tried to design assignments in ways that strengthened those conditions over time. Sequencing pieces of work, engaging the right partners, or bringing evidence in at the right moment in a policy discussion. It wasn't an exact science, of course, and sometimes outputs still ended up sitting on shelves, but being deliberate about those dynamics from the start helped reduce that risk and allowed the technical assistance to play a genuinely catalytic role.
SPEAKER_01Thank you so much for those reflections. Before we close this episode, I would like to ask for one quick reflection from each of you. What stands out most from these findings on relevance and outputs? Kathy, to you first.
SPEAKER_03For me, it's the value of having a flexible demand-led mechanism that could support both country teams and global engagement and really connect the two. Insights from country programs could feed into global discussions, and those global conversations would then shape where support was most useful on the ground.
SPEAKER_02For me, it's the basic focused on an agenda that was already important and has only become more pressing over time. And while crisis and conflict settings are inherently challenging and progress takes time, meaningful change is possible with the right approaches.
SPEAKER_00And from my side, it's how consistently relevant the program remained despite a rapidly changing global context. That adaptability was a key strength.
SPEAKER_01Thank you all so much. That's all for part one of our conversation on the findings from the basic evaluation. In our second findings episode, we will explore what these outputs achieved, looking at effectiveness, impact, and efficiency, and what this means for future programs. There are four episodes in this series, and they'll be available on the integrity website as well as our LinkedIn. Thanks for listening to Beyond Basic.