Independent Consulting

Best of aea365 week: Judah Viola on Building Capacity to Succeed as an Independent Consultant

My name is Judah Viola and I am a Community Psychologist at National Louis University in Chicago. I also manage an independent consulting practice specializing in program evaluation and collaborative community research. Whether boom or bust economy, it is never a bad time to build your own evaluation skills and capacity to provide value for clients. Fortunately, …

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Sharon Wasco on Practice-Based Evidence: Another Frame for Evaluation

My name is Sharon Wasco, and I am a community psychologist and independent consultant. I describe here a recent shift in my language that underscores, I think, important trends in evaluation: I used to pitch evaluation as a way that organizations could “get ahead of” an increasing demand for evidence-based practice (EBP); Now I sell …

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IC Week: Jan Upton on The Independent Consultant Life Cycle

Hello! I’m Jan Upton and have over 25 years of consulting experience; the past 13 spent creating and running Institutional Research Consultants, Ltd. (IRC). Below are lessons for each business life cycle stage that I wished I had known when I started out, and recently learned ones. Lesson Learned: Inception: Evaluation has a wonderful culture …

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IC Week: Marty Henry and Keith Murray on Who Owns the data?

We are Marty Henry and Keith Murray, lead evaluators for M.A. Henry Consulting, LLC in Fairfax, Virginia, and St. Louis, Missouri. The issues noted here stem largely from math and science education program evaluations we have done, but they apply to many evaluation contexts. The federal funding programs supporting these projects aim at improving teacher …

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IC Week: Norma Martinez-Rubin on Working Solo vs. Subcontracting

Hello, I’m Norma Martinez-Rubin, an independent program evaluator, public health practitioner, and occasional trainer and lecturer. This post is about working solo vs. on subcontracts. Lessons Learned: As an independent consultant, working solo presents challenging opportunities to apply experiences and formal training that meet client expectations. Doing so affords you additional experience for even greater …

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IC Week: Matt Feldmann on Performing the Balancing Act

Hello, I am Matt Feldmann, the principal researcher and owner of Goshen Education Consulting, Inc. (http://www.goshenedu.com).  My company focuses on educational evaluation and data support for clients in Southern Illinois. As a company of one I have to do a lot of balancing (aka “hat wearing”) to support the many activities that go with coordinating …

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IC Week: Carlisle Levine on Finding Community as an Independent Evaluator

Hello! I’m Carlisle Levine, an independent evaluator specializing in organizational and advocacy evaluation, evaluation systems and evaluation capacity building. Having worked for international non-governmental organizations and the U.S. government, I am relatively new to consulting. One of my biggest concerns in making the shift was finding community. Lessons Learned: The Importance of Community Very quickly …

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IC Week: Gail Barrington on Still Crazy After All These Years

Hi there! My name is Gail Barrington from the Barrington Research Group, Inc. I’m an independent evaluation consultant and I have a perspective to share with you. The first time I attended an AEA conference, I had one burning question in mind. Should I take the risk and go out on my own? I attended …

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Promoting Your Consultancy Week: David Merves on Building a Niche Business and its Implications for Branding

Hello, my name is David Merves and I work for Evergreen Evaluation & Consulting, Inc. (EEC) in Jericho, Vermont. What is a MARKET NICHE? Black’s Law Dictionary defines it as “a small, profitable market segment suitable for focused marketer attention.” Entrepreneur magazine says, “Niche marketing can be an extremely cost-effective method that targets carefully pinpointed …

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Promoting Your Consultancy Week: Gail Barrington on Big, Small, or Something in Between—How Large should your Consultancy be?

Hi there! My name is Gail Barrington and I’ve been an independent evaluator for over 25 years. It seems to me that three factors help determine the size of your consultancy: Your Vision—what do you see when you dream of yourself as an independent consultant? Are you on your own, working closely with clients on …

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