Leveraging AI to Democratize Data-Driven Management

AI has the potential to widen existing inequalities in evaluation, with tools built predominantly for well-resourced organizations, leaving under-resourced governments, small utilities, and community groups further behind. But applied thoughtfully, AI can also be a powerful equalizer. This webinar makes that case through both philosophy and practice.

We begin with the foundational question Glocal 2026 raises: how do we ensure AI serves evaluation's purpose rather than undermines it? For us, that means asking who gains access to rigorous, data-driven management, and who doesn't. Over 14 years building mWater and Solstice, free Digital Public Good platforms used across the developing world, we've seen firsthand where the ceiling sits for under-resourced evaluators and program managers: data tasks that require dedicated expertise, developer support, or time that most users simply don't have.
We then demonstrate how AI is breaking through that ceiling in four concrete workflows: (1) guided survey design for data collection, (2) automated integrity checks for data cleaning, (3) prose-based commands for creating complex visualizations, and (4) agentic AI for seamless integration with external data sources, requiring no developer or code. Each demonstration is grounded in real use cases from governments, utilities, and NGOs who previously lacked access to these capabilities.

Participants will leave with a clear picture of where AI genuinely adds value in evaluation workflows, where it falls short, and how to identify entry points in their own practice, regardless of technical background or organizational resources.