• Acceptability: Will the activities of the plan result in positive, effective and sustainable change?
Have actions been taken to ensure that people can engage honestly and without repercussions?
• Adaptability: Are activities of the plan flexible and have they been adapted for the specific
context of the NHRI and groups within the NHRI?
Implementing a gender mainstreaming strategy
STEP 5: REVIEW/MONITOR HOW WELL ACTIVITIES
ARE PROGRESSING THE OUTCOMES AND ADJUST
ACCORDINGLY
Monitoring and reviewing progress toward outcomes is critical to the success of the plan.
Monitoring is a systematic process of keeping track of how activities are progressing, identifying potential
problems and taking action if necessary, to ensure that progress is being made toward achieving the
outcomes on time and within allocated budget.
The monitoring process will let the NHRI know:
• What is working well and why
• What is not working so well and why
• What is being learned about how to improve progress
• Any changes that are needed.
Information gained from the monitoring process enables the NHRI to report on the progress it is making
toward its outcomes and identify changes that may be required to in order to improve progress
The monitoring results will most likely require some adjustment to the gender mainstreaming plan or
certain components of it, such as scope, activities, personnel, resource allocations, timing and/or the
communications. It may even require a review of the outcomes. This is natural and to be expected.
Monitoring is an ongoing progress of reviewing, planning and acting and reviewing again.
Although not always the case, monitoring is usually undertaken against the short-term and mediumterm outcomes whereas the evaluation process (discussed in the next section) assesses the long-term
outcome.
Regular time should be set aside for this. Milestones will have been identified during the development of
the gender mainstreaming plan and they will provide the opportunity to review what achievements have
been made to date and whether the work is on track.
Teams, including the NHRI members, may have the gender mainstreaming strategy as a standing
agenda item at their meetings where they can discuss and report on progress. It will be the gender
mainstreaming team’s role, along with the senior executive officer, or their delegate, to monitor and
document progress and to communicate that across the NHRI.
There are many monitoring tools available. Some of these are included in the Tool Kit and resource links
in the appendices.
OUTPUT
The successful implementation of an effectively facilitated, resourced and monitored outcomesbased gender mainstreaming plan.
Section 2: Developing an NHRI gender mainstreaming strategy | 27