Michael Quinn Patton

Who is Michael Quinn Patton?

Michael Quinn Patton is an independent organizational development and program evaluation consultant, and former President of the American Evaluation Association.

After receiving his doctorate in sociology from the University of Wisconsin–Madison, he spent 18 years on the faculty of the University of Minnesota, including five years as Director of the Minnesota Center for Social Research and ten years with the Minnesota Extension Service.

Patton has written five books on the art and science of program evaluation, including Utilization-Focused Evaluation, in which he emphasizes the importance of designing evaluations to ensure their usefulness, rather than simply creating long reports that may never get read or never result in any practical changes. He has written about evaluation, and worked in the field beginning in the 1970s when evaluation in the non-profit sector was a relatively new development.

His book, Getting to Maybe: How the World is Changed, was a collaboration with Frances Westley and Brenda Zimmerman.