ISA² Interim Evaluation: 129 responses received

The European Commission has completed the consultation activities conducted as part of the ongoing Interim Evaluation of the ISA² Programme. Running from December 2018 to 1 March 2019, the consultation activities resulted in 129 individual responses. The aim of the evaluation is to assess how well ISA² has performed since its start in 2016 and whether its existence continues to be justified.

The Commission contracted the Centre for European Policy Studies (CEPS) to collect feedback from stakeholder groups such as programme governance stakeholders, ISA² action owners, solution users, stakeholders responsible for related EU programmes or policies, standardisation organisations and the wider public.

The results of the consultation activities include:

• 20 targeted interviews
• 80 responses in the targeted online surveys
• 14 answers in the public consultation*
• 15 responses to the questionnaire distributed during the ISA² Mid-Term Conference and ISA² Interim Evaluation Kick-Off Workshop

Although the number of replies remained rather low, the expertise of involved stakeholders is impressive: 71% of respondents are familiar with digital public services and interoperability to a high extent or to the fullest extent. The low response rate to the public consultation is also telling: it reflects the technical nature of the programme. While interoperability is a key enabler of digital transformation, public administrations tend to address the related work in their back offices. 

Based on the collected data and desk research, CEPS will formulate its independent interim evaluation study by the end of April 2019, in which it will assess ISA² against seven evaluation criteria (relevance, effectiveness, efficiency, coherence, EU added value, utility and sustainability). Learn more about CEPS’ findings and key recommendations at the ISA² Interim Evaluation Final Workshop on 7 May 2019. Details will follow soon!

After that, the Commission will draw its conclusions based on the CEPS study. They will be presented in the form of a report to the European Parliament and the Council of the EU by 30 September 2019.