In the quest to improve projects, project actors rely on sound project evaluation. However, project evaluation can be complex and challenging. This study aims to explore and define project evaluation and reveal how it can promote continuous improvements within and across projects and organizations. A review of extant literature finds four constitutive properties for project evaluation: criteria, times, evaluands, and evaluators. Based on the action design research of 75 projects in 21 organizations, the study finds three evaluation perspectives: process, outcome, and learning. Understanding the multidimensionality of project evaluation through the seven identified dimensions offers a meaningful conception of project evaluation.
The overall results are that nine out 13 pilot projects seem to have had high or medium impact from using the HDM and 13 out of 15 pilot projects have fulfilled some or most of their success criteria. These consolidated results are promising regarding the use of HDM, but they also indicate that no methodology is applicable for everything.
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