Table 2.

Potential best practices for policy development and management by stage.

Policy stage(s)	Potential best practices
1	Conduct robust situation analysis
1,2	Facilitate ideas and feedback from key stakeholders (e.g., providers, clients, & researchers) to policymakers
1,2	Develop clearly defined problem statements
1,2	Provide policymakers access to resources with current evidence (e.g. eLibrary access, access to researchers)
1,2	Conduct stakeholder analysis
2	Brainstorm possible interventions to address problem statement
2	Analyze potential interventions using expressly defined criteria (e.g. multi-criteria decision analysis)
2,3	Develop stakeholder engagement plan to ensure input from all relevant stakeholders (e.g., geographic, key populations, implementers)
2	Model implementation to identify potential implementation barriers
2	Model policy implementation on work load burden
2	Consider impact of staff turnover on policy implementation
2	Conduct a policy conflict analysis
2	Estimate potential change in resource needs over time
2,4	Identify sources of funding
2	Policies should be clear and areas of flexibility should be expressly acknowledged
2,5	Clearly define targets, objectives, goals and indicators
2,5	Include clear implementation targets with timelines
2,5	Establish consistent framework for M&E plans
2,5	Identify and coordinate M&E system(s)/data sources
3	Standardize definitions & adoption processes for different types of policies
3	Establish consistent requirements for who should review and who must adopt different types of policies
4	Disseminate policies through push and pull mechanisms to all relevant stakeholders
4	Provide sufficient role-specific training on policy details
4	Educate all key stakeholders on policy components (e.g., implementers, consumers, traditional practitioners, private sector)
4	Verify knowledge of policy details by key stakeholders
4	Empower managers to provide guidance and support to front line implementers
4	Empower frontline implementers to engage in policy development and implementation processes
4	Designate champions/ leaders responsible for implementation at each level
4	Ensure strong financial management throughout implementation
5	Engage in regular implementation monitoring using implementation indicators identified in monitoring plan
5	Monitor availability of inputs/supplies/drugs for Policy compliance
5	Conduct evaluation when required by policy
5	Ensure evaluation is transparent and verifiable
5,1	Use results of policy evaluation to inform policymaking processes