By Jennifer Worrell, Sylta Georgiadis, and Agnes Nyaga
Strategic Planning, Programme Management, Evaluation and Change Service (SPECS)
UN Human Rights
Youth inclusion in evaluation should never be a checkbox. Youth bring fresh ideas, innovative solutions, and the eagerness to learn and contribute to an organization. Their energy, insights, and ability to spot opportunities others may overlook are invaluable assets for any organization. At the same time, youth, often face systemic barriers to participation and decision-making. Yet, the question remains, are we creating enough spaces for them to contribute meaningfully?
Our journey so far
At UN Human Rights, we recognize that empowering youth isn’t only about recruiting young professionals or engaging youth as stakeholders. It’s about building a culture where their voices are heard and truly valued, their growth is supported, and directly influence decision-making processes. As a small evaluation function, our journey towards building a youth inclusive evaluation culture started with small, determined steps, and has grown into a culture that prioritizes mentorship, knowledge creation, capacity building, and opportunities for the next generation of evaluation professionals.
More recently, we have taken intentional steps to ensure youth participation by incorporating young evaluators into our evaluation teams and consultancy pool, and engaging youth as key stakeholders in evaluation processes. In December 2023, we revised the evaluation policy, aligning it with the United Nation’s "Leaving No One Behind" commitment and using an intersectional lens to evaluate if our interventions reach the most marginalized populations, including youth.
However, challenges remain. While youth are prioritized in our organizational management plan (OMP), many programmes still do not explicitly include youth as a target population. This gap, evident in several evaluations, hinders assessing youth engagement or impact. To address this, the evaluation function adopts a forward-looking approach to ensure that youth are considered as key stakeholders, and that evaluations include specific recommendations to inform future programming.
Our key enabling pillars
Building our youth-inclusive evaluation culture has required a comprehensive framework centred around four key pillars:
Policy, strategy, programme and process integration: In line with our evaluation policy, insights from our evaluations have refined our methodologies, ensuring that our programmes target youth populations and our evaluation practices are evidence-based and reflective of the diverse communities we serve. Youth are also now specifically prioritized in frameworks such as OMP and the High Commissioner’s vision: A path for solutions and the Declaration on Future Generations as part of the Summit for the Future. The need to hear from young people, both nationally and internationally, is well acknowledged. But as the Human Rights 75 Youth Declaration makes so clear, access must also come with the ability to influence outcomes, for all young people, in all their diversity.
Guidance and quality assurance: Guided by international standards such as those by the United Nations Evaluation Group (UNEG), we have developed internal guidelines to ensure high-quality, youth inclusive evaluations. The standards for meaningful youth engagement in evaluation has also been very instrumental, offering practical guidance for youth inclusion and tools like an assessment sheet for accountability reporting.
Capacity building: This has been the most critical component. UN Human Rights focuses on building capacity from within, nurturing youth through mentorship and facilitating professional development training.
Senior leadership support: Securing senior leadership support has been crucial to providing the resources and enabling conditions necessary to fully integrate youth inclusive evaluation practices.
Championing a youth inclusive evaluation culture
Our youth engagement efforts have gained momentum, particularly through active participation in inter-agency initiatives. For instance, our involvement in the UNEG Young and Emerging Evaluators (YEE) working group has strengthened our approach to youth engagement, and fostered inter-agency collaboration and learning. We have been an active member of the working group since its establishment in 2023 and a co-coordinator alongside UNFPA, OIOS, and UNESCO in 2024.
In 2024, we conducted our first self-assessment on implementing the Youth in Evaluation standards, which enabled accountability, identification of areas for improvement, and sharing lessons learned. We also received the "Emerging Super Champion Award" from EvalYouth Global Network which recognized our leadership in upholding Youth in Evaluation standards. In addition, we were recognized as a champion for upholding youth engagement in evaluation practice and a champion for advancing young professionals in evaluation jobs. These awards highlight our dedication and commitment to supporting YEEs, even within the constraints of a small evaluation function.
"Our team’s collective commitment has been instrumental in driving this progress. Every team member has embraced their role as a champion for youth in evaluation, creating a ripple effect across the other functions. In addition, YEEs have taken an active leadership role in promoting the use and dissemination of evaluation results through designing visuals and innovatively developing relevant evaluation products for dissemination. Their contribution has not only enhanced transparency and accountability, but also supported learning and evaluation capacity development across the office."
-Sylta Georgiadis, Senior Monitoring and Evaluation Officer, Strategic Planning, Programme Management, Evaluation and Change Service (SPECS), UN Human Rights
Creating pathways to evaluation jobs
One of the most significant challenges facing youth, especially those in the Global South, is transitioning from education to the workforce. At UN Human Rights, we view evaluation as more than just a technical role; it’s a career path with transferable skills that prepare young professionals for broader opportunities. Evaluation requires critical thinking, data analysis, communication, and problem-solving skills, all of which are highly valuable in any sector.
"Having grown up in the Global South, I’ve seen firsthand the barriers youth face in accessing international opportunities and building careers. At the United Nations in Geneva, there is an over-representation of interns from Western countries. Without some form of remuneration, a majority of students from the Global South are unable to apply for United Nations internships, putting them at a significant disadvantage compared to their peers in developed countries. This lack of access perpetuates inequities and limits diversity in the organization.
My team with the support of human resources developed an innovative programme to ‘Promote Diversity and Inclusion for Youth in UN Human Rights,’ also known as ‘Ditch UNfair Internships’ which addresses barriers preventing students from the Global South from accessing internships at the United Nations in Geneva through the provision of a stipend to support their participation in the programme. This project won our innovation challenge in 2019, and the Secretary-General Award for 2021 in the category “Diversity and Inclusion”.
-Jennifer Worrell, Chief, SPECS, UN Human Rights
This initiative has transformed our evaluation function by creating opportunities for young professionals from the Global South and broadening our talent pool, eliminating systemic barriers that previously excluded talented individuals from pursuing international careers. The results have been inspiring as many of these young professionals have excelled in their subsequent roles, with others successfully transitioning to other positions within UN Human Rights and the United Nations system, including to mid-level professional roles. We continue to implement this initiative and have scaled it up further by being part of the UNEG and United Nations Volunteers programme which deploys young M&E professionals as United Nations Youth Volunteers and United Nations Specialist Volunteers across the United Nations system.
Capacity building, knowledge sharing and mentorship for young and emerging evaluators (YEEs)
To ensure young evaluators thrive in this profession, we prioritize mentorship, capacity building, and knowledge sharing. YEEs benefit from professional training opportunities tailored to develop their evaluation skills. We also facilitate participation of YEEs in the international evaluation forums/events, to enable them to connect with experienced evaluators, gain practical insights, and build lasting professional relationships. We also prioritize YEEs’ participation in the management of evaluations from start to finish. This hands-on experience equips them to take on leadership roles in future evaluations and ensures their contributions are recognized, building their confidence and making them feel valued.
“Coming from a legal background, I never imagined becoming an evaluator. My experience at UN Human Rights has sparked my interest, broadened my expertise and enhanced my knowledge and skills in evaluation. Through the professional development opportunities by the evaluation function- including certification in Evaluation Management (UNSSC) and Monitoring and Evaluation (ITCILO), I’ve gained the competence to fully manage evaluations. Mentorship from my team has been pivotal in my growth, boosting my confidence and helping me see the value of my contributions. I now trust in my skills and the impact of my work.”
-Agnes Nyaga, Associate Human Rights Officer, SPECS, UN Human Rights
Looking ahead
We’ve made significant strides in building a youth-inclusive evaluation culture, but much remains to be done. We believe in the transformative role young professionals and youth-led initiatives can play in shaping the future of evaluation. Looking ahead, we are committed to continue expanding opportunities for young professionals in evaluation particularly from the Global South, scaling up mentorship, training and development opportunities, advocating for increased financial support for YEE initiatives, and ensuring youth inclusion remains central to every evaluation process.
Jennifer Worrell is currently the Chief of the Strategic Planning, Programme Management, Evaluation and Change Service (SPECS) where she leads office-wide processes to define and implement the strategic focus for UN Human Rights' four-year programming cycle. She is also responsible for office-wide programme management, leading internal processes to convert the High Commissioner’s vision into operational programmes that focus on results. She provides leadership for organizational change including culture change; evaluations, risk management, leadership and the development of a culture of results within UN Human Rights. She is a passionate advocate and champion for diversity and inclusion.
Sylta Georgiadis is coordinating the evaluation function in UN Human Rights’ Strategic Planning, Evaluation and Change Service. She has helped to build up an evaluation culture in UN Human Rights which is now conducting around fifteen evaluations per year, spanning from strategic evaluations to programme and country evaluations. She attaches great importance to including youth in every step of conducting evaluations.
Agnes Nyaga is an Associate Human Rights Officer working with the evaluation function of the UN Human Rights Geneva. She is a young evaluator with four years of progressive experience in managing evaluations. Her passion and expertise in human rights, gender equality, disability and youth inclusion has enabled her to robustly integrate these principles into evaluations, ensuring that marginalized voices are heard and no one is left behind.
Disclaimer: The content of the blog is the responsibility of the author(s) and does not necessarily reflect the views of Eval4Action co-leaders and partners.
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