Krutika Katre | Published: 28 March, 2025

Capturing social change has always been like navigating an endless maze, where each turn reveals new challenges. India’s development sector stands at a critical juncture in this maze. Moving beyond input tracking and basic monitoring, the focus is now on outcomes and impact—dimensions that are harder to measure. Over time, Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) has evolved as a critical tool to make sense of this complexity, acting like a compass in the chaos. While it has taken new forms such as MEL (Monitoring, Evaluation & Learning) and MEAL (Monitoring, Evaluation, Accountability & Learning), challenges remain. From technical and methodological hurdles to capacity and resource constraints, the key question is: Which challenges should we solve first? A recent report, Impact or Illusion, published by the Center for Innovative Finance and Social Impact (CIFSI), suggests that the latter is the real bottleneck.

The answer lies in shifting focus from fixing inadequate methods to leveraging soft skills that drive the effective management of social change. While measuring social change is complex, existing methods are sufficient if applied systematically and rigorously. No framework can replace a critical and adaptive approach to impact measurement. As an M&E expert with over a decade of experience in Evaluation puts it, “A lot of what exists today is more than adequate. What perhaps is lacking is that approach of the way I am able to engage with information to think about action.”

The Tension Between Action and Long-Term Change

The sector is torn between the urgency to act and the need to achieve long-term societal change. Impact, by its nature, is long-term, but the funding and the program cycles are often too short to capture the full process of change. As a result, the energy and resources are being directed towards optimising on-the-ground operations and demonstrating immediate results. While choosing the right tools, frameworks, and methodologies is essential, what truly matters is the rigour with which these tools or methods are applied.

The rigour in practice should be grounded in foundational practices that precede fieldwork, such as:

• Asking the Right Questions at Each Program Stage: “Data-driven decision-making” is often reduced to merely crunching numbers to validate predetermined outcomes. Instead, what’s needed is a continuous reflection at every stage of a program. This means using data not just to report results but to deepen understanding, identify insights beyond existing data, and enable course correction. While technical expertise is needed, it is just a means to an end. True impact lies in strengthening the sector’s ability to critically engage with data and ask contextually relevant questions. For example, a leading healthcare organisation striving for health equity since the 1990s expanded its maternal and child health programs to include domestic violence support and a male engagement strategy after identifying strong correlations in their data. As their leadership shared, "The whole male engagement strategy came from the teams and the community. The need to talk to husbands about family planning came from the community, and the program team responded by hiring male staff to work with male stakeholders"
• Recognising the Gradual Process of Change and the Various Milestones to Impact: This complex nature of change can’t be captured in simplistic metrics, but it can be achieved through strong causality between simple metrics. Success comes from breaking down complex outcomes into clear impact pathways and establishing meaningful connections between simple measurable indicators. Capturing milestones along this path is critical. Some organisations have adopted this approach to balance short-term vs long-term funding requirements. For example, a newly established organisation leveraging Direct Cash Transfers for social and economic prosperity says, “Our impact metrics remain the same and the focus shifts between short-term and long-term goals depending on the funder. For example, short-term funders may prioritise output-based results, such as the number of training sessions conducted, while long-term funders are more interested in outcomes that evolve over time, such as changes in community behaviour or policy influence.”
• Prioritising Qualitative Aspects of Change: As the sector embraces community-led development and participatory approaches to M&E, misconceptions about qualitative data being subjective or unverifiable must be challenged. Rigorous qualitative and mixed-method approaches can be just as reliable as quantitative approaches when applied thoughtfully. For instance, an education organisation integrating community-based systems within mainstream schooling combines quantitative tools like surveys with qualitative methods such as classroom observations to get a comprehensive view of their impact. As they explain, “We do teacher appraisals, baseline, midline, and endline assessments with set parameters through surveys that track overall progress of the program. Student-level decisions are guided by daily classroom observations which inform preschoolers’ report cards. Every three months, each student is systematically observed, and the data is reviewed to guide programs.”
• Contextualising Tools and Methods: India’s development landscape is highly diverse, making a one-size-fits-all approach impractical. Existing tools were not designed with India’s development context in mind, so M&E practitioners must engage with communities and adapt these tools to local realities. This facilitates more effective learning from the ground. For example, an organisation working to transform government schools across states tailors its strategies to meet region-specific. As they highlight, “In Uttar Pradesh, our focus is on foundational literacy and numeracy, while in Karnataka, it’s about reducing dropout rates and improving 10th-grade performance. While our overarching strategy remains consistent, the indicators and outcomes are adjusted to match the local context.”

At the core of M&E, challenges are simple, practical solutions that are within our control. Yet, implementing these solutions requires an ecosystem that encourages learning and reflection instead of demanding rapid, large-scale impact within tight timelines. The sector must redirect resources, particularly M&E-specific funding, which remains the sector's biggest constraint.

Only by fostering a culture of critical thinking, adaptive learning, and contextual responsiveness can we navigate the maze of social change and truly measure impact.

This article is authored by Krutika Katre, Research Associate, Centre for Innovative Finance and Social Impact, Indian School of Development Management (ISDM)

About author:

Krutika KatreResearch Associate

Krutika is a development sector professional with over 6 years of experience in the areas of education and skilling.

She has initiated, implemented, and led projects in the areas of out of school learning, digital learning and training of trainers. She has contributed towards vocational education goals of NEP 2020.

She has collaborated with a diverse range of stakeholders, from community members and field personnel to government offices under Samagra Shiksha.

She is currently leveraging her research and analytical skills to develop a niche in Impact Assessment in development sector. Krutika is passionate about large scale sustainable social impact and loves to work in systems and with frameworks.

| Published: 24 March, 2025

Winners of the second edition of Code4Change, Teams Harmony and Level Up, talk about tackling real-world challenges with data-driven solutions

The second ISDM CDSSI Code4Change event, held on 17th February 2025 at Bangalore International Centre, crowned two winners!

Six shortlisted solutions were judged by a panel of experts from the social sector and technology space. The jury included Chirag Singla (Founder and CTO, FIGR), Uthara Narayanan (Co-Founder, Buzz Women), Arati Krishnan (Head, Sattva IPN), Raman Kumar (Research Associate, ICTD Lab, IIT Delhi), Prashant Mehra (Co-Founder, Platform Commons) and Ravali Pidaparthi (Co-Founder and CEO, Esther Foundation).

For this edition of the social sector hackathon, CDSSI partnered with Common Ground - Living Landscapes, The CoRE Stack, Platform Commons, and Esther Foundation to co-create problem statements around two themes: youth employability and climate resilience.

With two themes, there were two winning teams. Team Harmony, with Tara Rajendran and Veena Krishna, won for climate resilience. Team Level Up, with I V Srichandra, Pathange Omkareshwara Rao, Kavya Sakthivel, Srikar Vamsi Kottakki, and Harish Vijay Victor (from Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham, Coimbatore), was the winner for youth employability. In this interview, both the winning teams talk about their experience with this hackathon:

Why did you participate in the hackathon?

Team Harmony: We participated because this was a rare opportunity to work with real-world data alongside organisations that operate on the ground. Coming from an academic background, we are used to research staying in reports and papers. This was a chance to see the challenges firsthand and learn how to make data usable in real-world settings.

Team Level Up: We’ve been to three or four hackathons before, and we’ve won some of them. But those were more about building projects, not solving real-world problems. Code4Change is different. It is about contributing to society. We are in our third year at college, and we’re also looking for jobs, internships, and fellowships. The problems with job searching, such as unclear descriptions, irrelevant postings, fake listings - they were something we could relate to. If we, with our education and resources, struggle to find the right opportunities, what about those who don’t have access to the same networks?

What kind of use-cases do you see for your solution in the social sector?

Team Harmony: Our solution focuses on ecosystem classification. Right now, classifications are mostly based on landscape features, but they don’t account for local social and economic factors. We believe that bottom-up classifications, ones that include sociological processes, are crucial for designing interventions that actually work. A grassland may look the same in two different regions, but the way people interact with it varies. Solutions need to reflect that local context.

Team Level Up: Our project is designed for unemployed women in rural areas. The goal is to connect them with NGOs and local employers based on their skills and education level. Security is a key aspect, so users can safely interact with employers in their own communities. This way, job opportunities don’t just stay on platforms - they reach the people who need them the most.

What did you learn from the hackathon?

Team Level Up: We are AI students, so we know how to work with data. But this hackathon taught us how to analyse it properly. We didn’t just run models - we had to find patterns, understand them, and then use those insights to refine our approach. That was something new for us.

What are your thoughts on Code4Change?

Team Harmony: We really liked the name - it captures what the hackathon is about. The problem statements were all real and relevant, and the platform gave us exposure to the kinds of challenges organisations are dealing with. The jury panel was fantastic. They asked tough questions, which was helpful because when you’re working on a solution, you can get caught up in details and forget the bigger picture.

Team Level Up: This hackathon was different from others because it focused on real-world implementation. It’s not just about building something and moving on - the goal is to create something that can actually be used. We think more people from different backgrounds should participate. When data scientists, social workers, and policymakers come together, they can create innovative solutions that wouldn’t happen otherwise. It’s a win-win for everyone.

Code4Change is a bi-annual social sector hackathon conducted by ISDM CDSSI.

Learn more about the hackathon here: https://www.isdm.org.in/cdssi/projects/code4change