ALAE: Evaluation for people who want to change the world
In this blog series, we’ll explore the core elements of ALAE: Align, Learn, Adapt, and Embody. Each of these interconnected principles serves as a guide for driving transformation and navigating complexity with clarity and purpose.
Introduction
We work in a complex social system and its surrounding environment. Much like a natural ecosystem, in a social ecosystem, no one element or process can change the whole: social transformation happens only if there is collaboration.
The ALAE (ah-LAY) approach emphasizes holistic personal and collective change, using the central metaphor of a tree to guide the interdependent acts of engagement and evaluation.
Evaluation Roots
The ALAE blends several important evaluation methods to support real-time learning and social change.
Developmental evaluation (Patton, 2011) helps us adapt in complex systems, making it easier to adjust our strategies in the moment.
Culturally responsive evaluation (Hood, Hopson, & Frierson, 2015) ensures that marginalized voices are heard and valued
Transformative evaluation (Mertens, 2009) addresses power imbalances and advances social justice.
Principles-focused evaluation (Patton, 2018) emphasizes guiding principles that shape our work, ensuring that we remain anchored to our core values while navigating change.
Origin Story
ALAE originated as an evaluation process detailed in our book, Creative Evaluation & Engagement: The Essentials (2022) (CE&E), which emphasizes 4 core strategies: Align, Learn, Adapt, and Embody.
The CE&E book — and the strategies it proposed — was born out of my experiences working with changemakers in diverse contexts — from reducing human rights violations to fostering community health equity to education reform. Across the globe, I saw a gap between what people learn in evaluations and their ability to take actionable steps toward transformative change. That gap inspired me to create a framework that bridges the inner and outer work needed for sustainable impact.
As a trained biologist, I have always drawn inspiration from nature. When I started sharing nature-based metaphors in my work, I realized that they connected intimately with people’s experiences and allowed them to “play” with the metaphor in a way that felt expansive rather than scary. The tree became a central metaphor for ALAE because it symbolizes interconnectedness, growth, and resilience — qualities essential for personal and systemic transformation. By drawing on nature as our teacher, we create a framework that is not only practical but also deeply resonant, encouraging people to explore and implement ALAE with curiosity and creativity.
These strategies expanded the idea of traditional evaluation to include personal growth, leadership development, and social change.
Today, ALAE applies these strategies to both evaluation and engagement with an explicit focus on both inner work and outer action to foster sustainable, transformative change.
A Framework For People Who Want to Change the Work: AKA Changemakers
Changemakers — anyone committed to creating lasting positive change — are active participants shaping systems to foster critical thinking, adaptability, and equity. This includes evaluators who overtly or covertly work as changemakers.
It’s a journey I’ve taken alongside so many inspiring individuals: high school math and science teachers working to engage students in underfunded schools, nonprofit leaders navigating the complexities of systemic oppression, and parents striving to create a better future for their children. These changemakers remind me daily that the work of transforming systems starts with transforming ourselves.
This requires a commitment to learning and adapting in real-time to what is being learned. ALAE equips changemakers with the tools to do just that — connecting values with actions, questioning assumptions, embracing flexibility, and embodying the change they seek to create.
Ready to take your transformative journey to the next level? Join Club ALAE, a community for changemakers who want to align their values with action and make a lasting impact.
