EIGE’s approach to Good Practices
Methodology
EIGE has developed its own approach to Good Practices, including a set of basic criteria for the identification of practices with potential, and is applying the same methodology for the identification and dissemination of good practices in all selected areas. The aim of the project – building capacity of the Member States for effective implementation of gender mainstreaming strategies and gender equality policies - is achieved by providing relevant stakeholders with examples of gender mainstreaming tools and methodological approaches (identified as good practices), as well as enhancing networking and competence development and increasing the opportunity for peer learning.
The main steps of EIGE’s work on good practices are:
1. Identification of a specific topic: The topic is either chosen by the Presidencies of Council or through a consultation process with relevant stakeholders, as thematic networks, Expert’s Forum or consultation meetings.
2. Identification of specific type of methods or tools: Specific methods or tools related to the selected topic (gender training, competence development, awareness-raising, monitoring, self-regulation, networking, funding, benchmarking) are selected.
3. Collection of information.
- Launch of a study to collect information from the Member States on methods and tools, used to support the implementation of gender mainstreaming strategies;
- Development of specific qualitative criteria for the identification of good practices in the selected areas;
- Collection of practices with potential, consistent with EIGE’s general criteria for identification of good practices and the specific criteria for the specific topic.
- Processing of information:
- Assessment of practices with potential, through a consultation process that involves stakeholders (experts related to the implementation of GM tools in their own context - sector, country, company).
4. Dissemination and follow up on the achievements, in order to promote further networking and capacity building on the effective implementation of gender mainstreaming strategies at national level. The dissemination is done through:
- Peer review meeting;
- Publishing the collected resources on EIGE’s website and within the forthcoming webpage of Gender Mainstreaming;
- Publications and factsheets on the main results of the project;
- Presentation of the results within European events related to the topic.
Criteria
EIGE’s approach is based on the assessment of practices with potential through the analysis of set of criteria.
Those criteria are divided in three groups:
- Basic criteria
- Common criteria
- Specific criteria
Basic criteria
The basic elements for defining a practice with potential are:
- It works well
- It is transferable
- It shows a learning potential
- It is embedded within wider gender mainstreaming strategy
- It has provided achievement in terms of gender equality
Those elements are common to all good practices collected and assessed and represent the basis for the identification of the practices with potential. They are the frame of EIGE’s good practices.
The basic elements have to be present so that a practice can be considered as a ‘practice with potential’. The basic criteria are presented below.
The first two criteria – ‘works well’ and ‘transferability’ – are general good-design and efficiency criteria. In particular, in the assessment of the efficacy of the practice, the criteria ‘works well’ focuses on:
- Relevance: objectives are consistent with beneficiaries’ gender-equality needs and priorities.
- Efficiency: the minimum necessary amount of resources/inputs (funds, expertise, time, etc.) are used to produce results.
- Effectiveness: gender equality objectives initially set for the intervention have been achieved and intended beneficiaries are able to take advantage of the changes.
- Impact: it can be demonstrated that a significant increase in gender equality took place.
- Sustainability: regarding both the intervention's continuation and the permanence of the results it has produced after the end of the initiative.
The third criterion highlights the potential as learning tool that may build capacity of stakeholders.
The fourth criterion requires that a practice is embedded in a wider gender mainstreaming strategy and that could guarantee a structured approach and continuity over time and possibly rely on or attract financing.
The last criterion requires that it is possible to provide evidence of the effective achievements in terms of gender equality, either as support and enhancement of gender equality or as reduction of gender inequalities.
Common criteria
The common criteria are designed and developed specifically for an area of concern (women and the media, women’s entrepreneurship, reconciliation of work, family and private life). These criteria represent the key elements of the next level to assess the content, design, implementation and outcomes of the practices. They are developed to allow more in-depth assessment of the examined examples as they reflect and are focused on the specificity of the topic. They cover the assessment of practices, as well as methods used and linkages to gender equality outcomes. These criteria are common to all specific areas of concern related to the specific topic.
Specific criteria
The specific criteria are directly related to the single areas of concern, on which the identification of good practices is focusing (ad es, networking, funding and training for the area of women’s entrepreneurship). They allow the identification and the assessment of a good practice, focusing on one single specific dimension and they characterise the good practice. The specific criteria identify and support the features of effectiveness of the good practice. They represent the reason why the approach has proven to be effective and has provided achievements in terms of gender equality. The development of the specific criteria allows the identification of the guidelines to support the effective implementation of gender mainstreaming strategies, on the specific topic.They, as well, are the necessary feature of the check list of features that are requested in order to achieve the expected results, in terms of removal of specific gender inequalities and support to gender equality.