Practitioners Exchange · 7–9 July 2026 · Arusha, Tanzania
Programme at a Glance
ⓘ Hover over a session to see more details (facilitators & session brief).
8:00
Beginner-friendly yoga session designed to help you ground your mind, build core strength, and stretch your body through a gentle progression of floor and standing poses.
Dress in comfortable clothing or workout attire. We will meet at the gym and then walk to the football field near the playground.
9:00
Welcome
Awuor Ponge (African Policy Centre) | Patrick Sando (CIFOR-ICRAF) | Goele Scheers (OH Community Facilitator) | Carmen Wilson-Grau (OH Community Facilitator) | Conny Hoitink (OH Community Facilitator)
OH: How it started
Goele Scheers (Goele Scheers Consultancy) | Barbara Klugman (Barbara Klugman Concepts)
Food Market Tour & Traditional Tanzania Cooking Class including lunch. We will be picked up at 9:00 am at the center and return around 2:30 pm.
What is this session about?
Artificial intelligence is rapidly changing the way we work. But what does this mean for Outcome Harvesting? Where can AI add value, what should remain uniquely human, and how can we use AI responsibly in ways that align with the principles of Outcome Harvesting?
Whether you are already experimenting with AI or are simply curious, this session invites practitioners to collectively explore the opportunities, limitations and implications of AI for OH practice.
What will you do?
Reflect on your own experiences with AI, engage in interactive discussions with fellow practitioners, and contribute to shaping a shared vision for AI-enabled Outcome Harvesting. Short provocations by the facilitators will introduce key ideas and stimulate discussion on AI capabilities, human judgement, and responsible use in OH.
What will you take away?
Participants will leave with concrete ideas for using AI in OH, a clearer understanding of what human roles remain essential, and a set of emerging principles and open questions to guide the responsible use of AI in Outcome Harvesting.
What is this session about?
Our facilitators will share how they combined Outcome Harvesting with other methods and the lessons they learned from it. Together with participants, we will unpack the question around when combining methods strengthens OH, and when it dilutes its value. Related to this is the question about “OH light”, a less time-intensive application of OH, and whether this can be treated as a strategic compromise rather than a standard default.
What will you do?
Engage in conversations with peers and learn from more experienced OH practitioners to refine our approach on combining OH with other methods. In the second half of the session, we will require your collaboration in a first attempt to develop a list of non-negotiables when applying Outcome Harvesting and to respond to the question of whether OH light is possible.
What will you take away?
Key insights into combining OH with other methods and whether, when doing that, you can apply a light version of the method while still staying true to the OH principles.
What is this session about?
A foundational principle of OH is that an “outcome” is defined as an observable change in behaviour. And yet, we also encounter types of change that are not observable, such as changes in attitude, new knowledge or understanding, a belief that one has gained new skills without demonstrating using those skills or a shift in sense of self. When we find ourselves in a context where those intangible changes are important, what do we do? We will explore the improvised solutions many of us have and thus strengthen our capacity as a community.
What will you do?
Subgroups share the intangible changes encountered and why they were important. Together we will make an inventory of the various solutions used on what to do with these intangibles. Four subgroups will each analyse a solution, including the identification of pro’s and con’s of the solution, possibly concluding with some precautions.
What will you take away?
Practical suggestions of how to deal with intangibles while using outcome harvesting.
What is this session about?
If there is anything that defines Outcome Harvesting, it is the principles. In this session, we will ground the discussions of the coming 3 days in the values of OH and explore together what they mean. In addition, we will identify what principles are important for how we work together during this exchange.
What will you do?
Values are close to heart and so is art. Four groups will each work with a few principles and represent them in a creative way. The results will be shared in plenary.
What will you take away?
A sense of what matters, a compass amidst the overwhelming richness that will be shared in the days to come.
What is this session about?
This session explores how Outcome Harvesting can support adaptive management in programmes operating in complex and changing contexts. We will start by briefly grounding the conversation in what we mean by adaptive management, and then look at two practical examples of Outcome Harvesting processes that were designed or adjusted to inform ongoing learning and decision-making. Together, we will explore what makes Outcome Harvesting useful for adaptive management, what conditions need to be in place, and what practical adaptations might be needed in the OH process itself.
What will you do?
You will start by sharing your own experiences with adaptive management, followed by two short case presentations. Then we engage in a group discussion on the critical aspects that enable adaptive management within an OH process.
What will you take away?
Participants will leave with a clearer understanding of how Outcome Harvesting can be designed and used to support adaptive management.
What is this session about?
The session is about using Outcome Harvesting data in project / programme reporting to donors and other stakeholders. It will contain examples from both end-of-project reporting and annual reporting. Moreover, we will showcase examples of how to use Outcome Harvesting data in project indicators.
What will you do?
This will be an experience-sharing session based on a presentation from the Danish Institute for Human Rights and supplemented with experience from various practitioners. There will be plenty of time for questions and answers.
What will you take away?
Participants will leave with concrete ideas for using Outcome Harvesting data in narrative and indicator-based reporting. Including how to use data-based visuals (bar charts, pie charts) in reporting.
Open Space is a self-organising session format where you as participants create the agenda together around the questions, ideas, and challenges that matter most to you. Anyone can propose a topic they would like to explore, host a conversation, or invite others to think with them. The aim is to create space for peer learning, unexpected connections, practical ideas, and collective sensemaking.
Multiple sessions are organised simultaneously during the Open Space. A session is hosted by 1–2 participants; other participants choose where they can contribute most meaningfully. You are free to join, move between, or leave conversations, following the principle that you take responsibility for your own learning and engagement.
Presenters: Barbara Klugman (workshop) | Brian Palmer (staff & partners as they observe them) | Michelle Garred (interviews)
What is this session about?
This session aims to explore opportunities and challenges arising from different approaches to harvesting outcomes.
What will you do?
Hear three short descriptions of very different approaches to harvesting outcomes that set the frame for the session, and use the ideas these stimulate, as well as your own experience, to discuss opportunities or challenges in small groups on topics such as ‘enabling conditions’, ‘ensuring contributors’ ownership over outcomes’, ‘constructing significance statements’, ‘criteria for a successful harvest’.
What will you take away?
New ideas on how to strengthen the quality of your harvests in different evaluation contexts.
What is this session about?
Digital tools are increasingly shaping how we design, facilitate, document, analyse, and communicate Outcome Harvesting processes. This tool market offers an opportunity to discover the software, platforms, AI applications, and other digital solutions that practitioners are using in their work.
What will you do?
Explore which tools could strengthen your Outcome Harvesting practice. Visit different tool stations, watch short demonstrations, ask questions, and exchange experiences with fellow practitioners.
What will you take away?
A practical overview of digital tools used across the Outcome Harvesting community, ideas for integrating them into your own work, and contacts with practitioners who have hands-on experience using them.
At least one organization will present their case to explore how Outcome Harvesting can be applied credibly, feasibly, and usefully in a particular context while emphasizing peer learning and practical problem-solving rather than showcasing finished results.
Harvesting Peace and Social Cohesion Outcomes in Triple Nexus Programming: A Case Clinic from Moyale, Ethiopia
Facilitated by Kristel Casimiro, Gerben Visser, Blen Alemu, Noreen McGrath and Winfrida Peter Mushi (Dorcas Aid International)
What is this session about?
The Moyale Triple Nexus Pilot Project in Ethiopia — implemented by Dorcas Aid International in partnership with CORD — was designed as a learning pilot to explore how humanitarian assistance, development, and peacebuilding can be integrated in a conflict-affected and drought-prone context. Within this pilot, Outcome Harvesting is applied selectively to capture peacebuilding and social cohesion outcomes that are difficult to measure through conventional indicators, such as trust, willingness to collaborate across communities, and peace actors acting on early warning signs. This session presents the Moyale pilot as a live learning case and invites participants to collectively sharpen Outcome Harvesting practice in complex Triple Nexus settings.
What will you do?
Participants will explore how Outcome Harvesting can be applied credibly, feasibly, and usefully in Triple Nexus programming, with a particular focus on peacebuilding and social cohesion outcomes. The session emphasises peer learning and practical problem-solving rather than showcasing finished results.
What will you take away?
As one of the final sessions of the exchange meeting, this Case Clinic will draw on the knowledge and insights generated by participants throughout the event and apply them to several learning questions presented by the facilitators.
What is this session about?
Participation lies at the heart of Outcome Harvesting, but making it meaningful and inclusive is not always straightforward. How do you engage different stakeholders throughout the harvesting process? Which approaches work well in different contexts, and where do challenges remain? This session explores practical ways to maximise participation while maintaining the quality and credibility of the harvest.
What will you do?
Share your own experiences, explore different participatory approaches used by fellow practitioners, and reflect together on what enables or limits meaningful participation in Outcome Harvesting. Through interactive exchanges, you’ll discover ideas that can be adapted to your own context.
What will you take away?
Fresh perspectives on participatory practice, concrete ideas for involving stakeholders more effectively, and inspiration from how others are navigating similar challenges.
What is this session about?
Substantiation, step 4, is guided by the OH principles Ensure credible-enough outcomes and Establish plausible influence of the intervention. Its application in outcome harvests varies greatly, including not doing it at all and deviations from the original intentions. This session will address the challenges many of us encounter: the time it takes to do it well; confidentiality of outcomes that makes sharing with substantiators difficult; different views on the importance of independence of informants; and different views on what is ‘credible-enough’.
What will you do?
The session will largely be a conversation where participants share their experiences, the reasons why they did what they did, the challenges encountered and how they dealt with them. Depending on the number of participants, we might break out into smaller groups.
What will you take away?
Practical suggestions for the decision on substantiation as well as solutions for how to go about it. A better understanding, like a compass, of designing substantiation.
What is this session about?
Applying Outcome Harvesting as a monitoring approach requires some adaptation of the method but varies with each organization’s needs and existing MEL Systems. Our three facilitators will share their experiences implementing OH for monitoring in three different organizations and the obstacles they faced. Participants will be engaged in a discussion to clarify doubts and address remaining challenges. Collectively, we will discuss potential pathways to embed OH in MEL Systems.
What will you do?
Bring your questions around OH and Monitoring to the session and actively participate in an in-depth discussion about existing challenges. During an interactive exercise, you will be able to bring in your own experience and collaborate in co-creating practical insights on positioning OH within MEL systems.
What will you take away?
Increased understanding and key takeaways on the challenges of implementing OH for monitoring, and concrete ideas for embedding OH in existing MEL Systems.
(at own expense)
* This programme is indicative and may still evolve based on input from participants.
Programme Sessions & Clusters
The event opens with a plenary session on the foundations of Outcome Harvesting, followed by 2 main clusters of topics developed on the basis of input received from our community members. Each cluster contains several sessions built together with participants.
The development of this programme is being coordinated by a programme committee consisting of: Goele Scheers (OH Community Facilitator) | Carmen Wilson-Grau (OH Community Facilitator) | Conny Hoitink (OH Community Facilitator) | Patrick Sando (CIFOR-ICRAF) | Steff Deprez (Voices That Count) | Barbara Klugman (Barbara Klugman Concepts) | Maria Selde (Humanity United) | Julius Nyangaga (Right Track Africa) | Awuor Ponge (African Policy Centre).
As a utilisation-focused approach, OH values tailoring each harvest to the needs of its users and making each harvest unique. Rather than fixed rules, OH has a set of 9 principles that guide you in your application. This session will unpack the principles and we will share experiences on how these principles guide us in making design decisions.
From small NGOs to large international organisations, from peacebuilding to climate justice to governance reform, Outcome Harvesting is being applied in a diverse range of contexts worldwide. With that breadth comes a wealth of practical experience which participants will share in this cluster. It also brings shared challenges: questions about rigour, participation, sensemaking, and how to do this work with integrity in difficult conditions.
This cluster brings together sessions on the practical craft of Outcome Harvesting: the concrete choices, dilemmas, and techniques that practitioners navigate in their daily work. From harvesting approaches and maximising participation, to formulating complex or sensitive outcomes and substantiating them with credibility, these sessions dig into the how of doing OH well. We will also explore how to organise sense-making, how OH feeds into reporting, and what it means to apply OH through a feminist and power-aware lens. The Tool Market gives participants space to share and explore databases, analysis software, AI tools, guidelines and other practical resources.
Since its development, OH has been implemented both for monitoring as well as for evaluations in diverse and creative ways. Due to its added value in capturing unexpected changes, identifying smaller outcomes that can lead to significant impacts, and the ability to harvest directly from social actors, OH has been embedded in MEL systems by project or programme implementers. Its focus on behavioural change among social actors has proven useful when combined with other methods or approaches, such as causal pathways, contribution analysis, and systems change.
During this cluster, we will share experiences and discuss the challenges that have arisen when using OH for evaluations, as a monitoring tool, or in combination with other methods. For example, is there something like OH “light” (an application of OH that is less time-intensive), and can that be used at all? During the different uses of OH, have the OH principles always been followed? If not, is it OH, and does this matter? What are the core essentials of the method? If you were to link OH with other methods, what would you need to include so it remains OH?
We will discuss how participants have integrated OH into their MEL work. Participants will present specific challenges, and together we will address those important questions.