The first pilot of the peer-to-peer advisory sessions took place during the gLOCAL Evaluation Week 2019. The initiative is being organized under a partnership between EES, EvalYouth, and IDEAS to promote knowledge exchange among focal groups of young and emerging evaluators. In total, there were three sessions, attended by an average of 10 participants and moderated by Mariana Branco, Alena Lappo, Taiwo Adesoba, Rose Mary Nderito, Claudia Olavarria, and Gerardo Sanchez Romero. At the end and after the meetings participants congratulated the relevance of the activity. Among other testimonials, participants highlighted the uniqueness of the initiative: “I am based in London and I am thrilled because I have never seen a similar session as this one where people share their challenges. Thanks for setting this up”.

This initiative, as a two-folded set of goals. First it aims at providing advice on how emerging evaluators can grow their careers; second, it intends to provide a space where YEES can share their work challenges. The format of the sessions is bottom-up, demand-driven and consists of Q&A between participants and to 2 moderators. The sessions are confidential and non-judgemental — meaning that all participants commit to hold a respectful and supportive attitude towards each other and to keep personal information private.

There range of questions posed by participants was wide, covering three main topic areas. The first one were career related challenges, coming from YEES who are discovering your career purpose, making a career choice, and trying to understand different career possibilities. The second, were networking challenges, where YEES wonder how to improve their professional connections and to understand how the evaluation community works. A final set of questions has mostly to do with work life challenges, which included requests on methodological/technical orientation and support in dealing with institutional, ethical, and evaluation implementation related challenges.

The peer-to-peer conversations do not end in the session day. Moderators follow up after the sessions providing additional insights and information on key questions raised. Moreover, from September 2019 onwards EES, IDEAS, and EvalYouth LAC will hold sessions every month. The organizers are also planning to offer these sessions in more than one language. The current plan, subject to additions depending on the language skills of incoming moderators, is to offer the sessions in English, Spanish, and Portuguese. Stay tuned!