Evaluation – the systematic determination of quality, value and importance - is a political exercise – recognising power relationships, decision making, the distribution of power and resource, and who and who is not involved. At the intersection between theory and practice of evaluation lie the potentialmobilisers or instruments for change – evaluators. Exploring evaluators as instruments of change, where evaluation is required to “be a rhythmic alternation between attacking the causes and healing the effects”1 of colonialism, inequity, social justice, and dismantling states of ‘doing to’ is critical. The potential contribution of evaluators to those we serve through evaluation could be amplified.

Accepting an invitation to explore and voyage into and through wayfinding, in the context of this rangahau (to seek out, pursue, research) has paralleled embarking on any new expedition. What has emerged through traversing bodies of knowledge and knowing is that values are at the heart of evaluation and drive the actions we take. The centrality of values is shared within leadership and evaluation and is fundamental to what drives approaches to leadership just as much as our values underpin our evaluation practice and positioning. However, the explicit discussion of leadership in evaluation has been almost silent. So, it has been necessary to turn our gaze and explore this ‘silence’ by resonating with the hearts and minds of those who have expressed their commitment to and hopes for the people they serve, and their global evaluation community. Members of our evaluation community of practice have for decades been resolute in their elevation of evaluation use and influence, along with advocacy and activism in our role as evaluator. What is affirmed is that if leadership is at its most fundamental level a trilogy of being-knowing-doing, then it follows that there are clear signposts on this wayfinding journey towards evaluative leadership – a state of being that leads to action through evaluation.

Feeling the gravitational pull to Indigenous shores, this wayfinding journey returned to the enduring Indigenous knowledge systems gathered and woven together through time and through space. Taking refuge in the “effulgent radiance”2 of Indigenous peoples, where the spiritual, the place where some believe our true and foundational intelligence lies, enabled re-search, to re-present, re-claim, re-assert and re-member3. It is the spiritual domain where aroha resides with vitality, that we amplify through the actioning of valued practices; and solidify in our evaluation practice: aroha ki te tāngata, evaluation with aloha.4 I elevate the challenge and opportunity to “awaken to the potential of ourselves, others and situations and to then consciously manifest that potential” 5 through evaluative leadership by actioning the capacity of aroha through the conscious practice of disruption to create positive change.

1 Martin Luther King. (1958). Stride Toward Freedom, p.214 2 A term shared by Manulani Meyer at the Indigenous Evaluation Conference, Rotorua, 2019, reflecting a bright, joyful radiance 3 Cram, 2014, para.5 4 Recognising the bond between indigenous knowledges, aloha is a Hawai’ian term allied with aroha. Refer to Spiller et al, 2015, p. 82. 5 Spiller, Barclay-Kerr and Panoho, (2015), p.44