Recently, we hosted a Communi-tea Live exploring something that is on a lot of our minds: what does it mean to evaluate ethically?
Joined by 11 colleagues working across public engagement, researcher development and impact roles in higher education, we spent an hour unpacking the principles, practices and challenges of conducting evaluation in ways that are careful, compassionate and ethical. We explored this not only from the viewpoint of paperwork and processes, but also the values that underpin how we work with people.
So, what came up in the conversation?
- Ethical evaluation starts with how we show up
One of the strongest messages from the discussion was that ethical evaluation is fundamentally a way of working. While ethics approval processes, consent forms and information sheets all have an important role to play, ethical evaluation begins with our attitudes and intentions.
Participants highlighted several guiding principles:
- Being open and honest about evaluation activities.
- Ensuring people know they are being evaluated and understand why.
- Acting with care, compassion and respect.
- Being mindful of the burden placed on participants.
- Evaluating only when there is a genuine need.
- Ensuring the evaluation is proportionate to the activity.
For example, if someone has participated in a ten-minute interaction, is it reasonable to ask them to complete a ten-minute survey afterwards? Ethical evaluation requires us to continually reflect on these decisions and consider whether the value of the information we seek justifies the demands we place on participants.
2. Reciprocity: making the evaluation process nourishing for the participants
Evaluation can feel like a one-way process: evaluators collect information, participants provide it, and the interaction ends there. However, we started to explore what evaluation would look like if it were mutually beneficial. How can we ensure evaluation is not simply a process of taking information, but one that is nourishing and valuable for participants too?
This might involve:
- Creating opportunities for participants to reflect on their own experiences.
- Sharing findings back with those who contributed.
- Offering debrief sessions.
- Involving participants in shaping evaluation questions and approaches.
- Ensuring people understand how their contributions will make a difference.
Building evaluation processes with reciprocity in mind will shift evaluation from an extractive exercise towards an interchange that can be nourishing and nurturing for all involved.
3. Trust and transparency
People emphasised the importance of being clear about:
- Why data is being collected.
- Who will have access to it.
- How it will be stored and used.
- What decisions, policies or projects it might inform.
- Whether responses will be anonymous.
These questions may seem straightforward, but they sit at the heart of ethical practice. People deserve to understand what happens to the information they share and what consequences may follow from their participation.
The question “Who and what is this evaluation for?” emerged as a useful touchstone. Being transparent about the purpose of evaluation helps build trust and enables participants to make informed decisions about whether and how they wish to engage.
4. Practical ways to strengthen ethical evaluation
Alongside broader principles, the group discussed practical approaches that can support more ethical evaluation practices.
These included:
- Participant information sheets.
- Consent processes.
- Debrief sessions.
- Advisory groups.
- Co-creating evaluation approaches with partners, collaborators and participants
- Reflective checkpoints built throughout the evaluation process.
- Panels or critical friends to provide challenge and oversight.
Many of these approaches help ensure that evaluation is not something done to people, but something developed with them.
5. What role does ethics approval play?
A key discussion point was the role of formal ethics approval. Most agreed that ethics approval serves an important purpose. It can help protect participant wellbeing, encourage evaluators to weigh potential risks and benefits, and provide structured processes for reviewing proposed activities.
However, participants also recognised that ethics approval alone does not guarantee ethical practice. Ethical evaluation is rooted in values, behaviours and decision-making. It is reflected in how we design evaluations, engage participants, handle data and respond to emerging issues. Formal approval processes can support this, but they do not replace it.
6. Sensitive data and working with care
The conversation also highlighted the importance of care when collecting information relating to protected characteristics, sensitive topics or potentially intrusive personal data. Simply asking certain questions can feel uncomfortable or invasive for people.
As evaluators, we should therefore continually ask:
- Do we genuinely need this information?
- What will it be used for?
- Have we clearly explained why we are collecting it?
- Are we handling it appropriately and in line with GDPR requirements?
7. The challenge of evaluation infrastructure
One area of frustration shared by participants was the lack of infrastructure supporting evaluation compared with research. In many institutions, researchers undertaking formal research projects have access to well-established ethics processes, guidance, training and support. This is not the same for evaluation practice, however.
Participants described a lack of:
- Clear guidance.
- Formal support structures.
- Institutional infrastructure.
- Agreed standards or codes of practice.
This raises an important question: how can we support staff and researchers to evaluate ethically when the frameworks surrounding evaluation remain unclear?
8. Is it time to formalise ethical evaluation?
There was a sense that the sector may be ready for greater formalisation of evaluation practice.
Suggestions included developing:
- Codes of practice for evaluation.
- Standard templates and documentation.
- Institution-wide guidance.
- Senior leadership support and buy-in.
- Communities of practice where learning can be shared.
Formalising these elements could help provide clarity, consistency and confidence for those leading evaluation activities while ensuring participant wellbeing remains at the centre of the process.
Final reflections
Our discussion reinforced that ethical evaluation is not simply about compliance, forms or approvals. It is about values. It is about trust, transparency and reciprocity.
It is about recognising that the people who contribute to our evaluations are not simply data sources, but partners whose time, experiences and perspectives deserve care and respect.
Perhaps the most important takeaway was this “Are we doing right by the people involved in our projects?”
That question may not always have a simple answer, but it is one worth returning to throughout every stage of the evaluation journey.
Engagement with Impact 