Obstacles to conducting program evaluations: implications for public health evaluators

This article presents a number of obstacles to conducting program evaluations which include: the "word" evaluation itself, the politics of evaluation, inadequate resources, the tendency of organizations to resist change, and a lack of understanding of the context of program evaluations. Underpinning these obstacles is the longstanding definitional dilemma between program evaluation and social science research. Although the article's implications are directed toward public health evaluators, they are generalizable to other evaluators in other disciplines. These obstacles highlight the fact that a major role of any evaluator is to confront and negotiate successfully around them.