needs assessment research paper examples

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Needs assessment: step-by-step through practical examples.

Through Extension, we aim to improve people’s lives by responding to their needs through research and education-based efforts. The first step in offering effective and efficient educational programs that address people’s needs is identifying and prioritizing the community’s needs, which we call a needs assessment. A needs assessment allows you to construct a more objective picture of needs than you would receive depending on one person’s perspective. As Extension professionals (agents and specialists), a needs assessment is crucial for informing your educational program decisions and enhancing their effectiveness and value.

This publication aims to help Extension professionals get started with needs assessments, illustrated through practical examples.

Needs Assessment Step-by-Step

1. clarify the reasons for conducting the needs assessment..

Outline the purpose and planned use of the results.

The purpose of conducting a needs assessment is to identify topics for 4-H programs and activities. The results will be used to determine the three programs that will be implemented during summer break.

Keep in mind!

• What is the purpose?
• What do you aim to accomplish?
• Who will use the results?

2. Identify the individuals who play a significant role before, during, and after conducting the needs assessment.

Identify individuals who: a) share their perspectives on current issues; b) hold decision-making power; c) assist in prioritizing the gathered needs; d) aid in reaching out to the community or target audience and share the findings from the assessment; and e) communicate results to key stakeholders.

Create a list of individuals, sponsors, administrators, interest groups (Farm Bureau, CREATE Foundation, United Way, or the Minority Farmers Alliance), and the county advisory board. These groups or individuals need to be included because they can share their perspectives on current situations, communicate the results of the assessments, directly influence the community’s priorities, and be part of the decision-making process.

• Identify the stakeholders.
• Build your networks.
• Reach out to your community.

3. Gather existing information to decide if a needs assessment is warranted.

Understand the history of the problem and what information/data already exists in your county by seeking expert advice, visiting the area (if possible), establishing local contacts, and building community relations (attending local events and town hall meetings, partnering with local organizations, forming an advisory council, etc.).

Consider attending a community event such as a farmers market; observe the participants, meet people, and collect information from as many individuals as possible.

• A needs assessment takes time, energy, money, and other resources.

4. Identify secondary data (what is known) and pinpoint what you still want to know.

Secondary data will give you a quick sense of what is going on in your community.

Agriculture and natural resources agents rely on county data from the Agricultural Census, where data such as age, race, and sex are listed for all the counties in Mississippi. The Agricultural Census is a helpful source for assessing needs in your county. However, primary data should be collected directly from those individuals connected to the community problems, ranging from clients and advisory groups to opinion leaders, to enhance an understanding of community needs. Example sources of secondary data include the following:

• U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
• Census of Agriculture
• U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
• National Center for Education Statistics
• Food and Nutrition Information Center
• USDA Economic Research Service
• Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
• Mississippi State University Extension Service
• National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
• Mississippi Department of Education
• United States Department of the Interior
• Mississippi State Department of Health
• World Factbook
• Mississippi Department of Agriculture and Commerce
• Health and nutrition statistics
• Local and regional media reports that have stories that impact your communities
• Regional and county level data at local libraries or chambers of commerce
• Using a mix of primary and secondary sources provides a rich and comprehensive assessment.
• Secondary data provide detailed information from a large sample size that would be difficult and unrealistic for you to collect independently. They also provide information over several years, helping to identify trends.
• It is important to look at county-level statistics and not just statewide data because each county might have hidden issues.

5. Determine the data-collection technique to gather the needed data.

Choose methods that help discover more specific issues and gain different perspectives from various sources.

Use techniques you are comfortable with and that are applicable to the target audience. An older population may prefer a written survey or an interview, while a younger population may prefer an online survey using a QR code. The information you are attempting to gather may also determine the method. A roundtable discussion may be more successful for Extension agents when collecting data from their advisory council. A roundtable discussion is a more personal method of gathering data, helping to establish group relationships.

Keep in mind

• A needs assessment must consist of several methods. Looking at only one dataset will not accurately reflect what is happening in a community.
• Many methods can be used to gather data, including individual methods (surveys and key informant interviews) and group methods (focus groups, advisory committees, and the Delphi method). The key is to be aware of the pros and cons of each technique to ensure their effective use.

6. Analyze the data you collected and prioritize needs.

Analyzing data means breaking down the collected information to identify key findings, areas of agreement or disagreement, and agreed-upon conclusions about the identified needs. Sorting and prioritizing needs means organizing and ranking each identified need and determining which ones to address first.

• Participants in the prioritization process should include volunteer staff, community leaders, legislative leaders, and representatives of funding organizations.
• Establish and develop criteria to evaluate each issue, and then determine the priority issue (e.g., using propriety, economics, acceptability, resources, and legality—the PEARL test).

7. Use the data to set program priorities, create an action plan to address the needs, and share the results.

According to a review of secondary data, beekeeping is a growing industry in Lee County, Mississippi. County residents also reported that it is a growing hobby and expressed interest in both beginner and advanced beekeeping. To address and identify the needs of Lee County residents, we planned two different beekeeping workshops. We created priorities related to beekeeping topics of interest and implemented a program to address them. We selected speakers based on the education necessary for each group, chose dates for each workshop, made promotional materials, ordered complementary publications for the topic, and secured a location at the back of our office. After promoting the workshops, we waited for individuals to sign up, effectively putting our plan into action.

• A needs assessment is only completed once the results are shared and used.
• Create an action plan, accept that plans may change, and be prepared to adapt and modify the action plan as needed.
• There are several ways to share the results with stakeholders, including a detailed report or executive summary. These could be sent via email or posted on the organization’s website for everyone to see.

When considering needs assessments in your community, listen closely, be observant, and be diligent. Set your goals and act with enthusiasm. Feel free to ask for help. Including your community increases the likelihood of buy-in regarding the action plan.

Benge, M., & Warner, L. (2019). Conducting a needs assessment #2: Using needs assessments in extension programming .

Caffarella, R. S., & Daffron, S. R. (2013). Planning programs for adult learners: A practical guide ( 3rd ed.) Jossey-Bass.

Israel, G., Harder, A., & Brodeur, C. W. (2021). What is an Extension program? EDIS .

Jimenez-Marty, B. (2018). Community resources: Why use community resources ?

Mississippi Department of Agriculture and Commerce. (2023). Mississippi Agriculture Snapshot .

United States Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service. (2023). Agriculture and its related industries provide 10.4 percent of U.S. employment .

Publication 3983 (POD-03-24)

By Warner Creekmore, Extension Agent, Lee County, and Nesma Osman, PhD, Assistant Professor, School of Human Sciences.

The Mississippi State University Extension Service is working to ensure all web content is accessible to all users. If you need assistance accessing any of our content, please email the webteam  or call 662-325-2262.

Select Your County Office

Ms. Mildred Warner Poindexter Creekmore

Dr. Nesma Osama Abdelrahm Osman

Related news, related publications.

Needs Assessments Processes, Methods and Examples: Annotated Bibliography

Western region evaluation network (wren).

• University of Alaska, Fairbanks; Alda Norris
• University of Arizona; Michele Walsh
• University of California, Davis; Vikram Koundinya
• Colorado State University, Cary Weiner
• University of Idaho; Nav Ghimire
• Montana State University; Steven Siegelin
• University of Nevada, Reno; William Evans
• New Mexico State University; Lajoy Spears
• Utah State University; Lendel Narine
• Washington State University; Rebecca Sero
• University of Wyoming; Kim Reaman

Introduction

One of the first priorities for a new Extension educator or agent is to conduct a needs assessment to inform their programming (Caravella, 2006). Needs assessment involves ascertaining the current circumstances and understanding what is desired in the future, and comparing the two (Altschuld & Watkins, 2014).  Altschuld and Watkins (2014) further state that needs assessment also includes judgments related to prioritizing the identified needs to guide programming and planning decisions. Angima, Etuk and King (2014) state that a solid needs assessment is the foundation of a successful Extension program. Needs assessment is an essential step in the program planning, development and evaluation cycle (Etling & Thomas, 1995). Needs assessment also has been identified as one of the key educational competencies for Extension educators (Ghimire, 2010; Koundinya, 2010). The value of needs assessment for Extension programming relies on its ability to succesfully identify stakeholder needs, and be empowered with the necessary information to design programs, products and services to meet those needs (Garst & McCawley, 2015).

Many state Extension systems require Extension faculty to conduct a systematic and thorough needs assessment, and document the results in their reviews. In this context, it is important to have an annotated bibliography focused on needs assessment processes and methods with relevant examples for Extension professionals. This annotated bibliography is Extension-centric with examples from other state Extension systems and community-based needs assessments related to Extension programming.The first section has studies related to processes, methods and types of needs assessments. The second section contains examples of needs assessments of various types, scopes and focuses. This bibliography is part of a larger set of educational and training resources on needs assessment, program development, program evaluation, and impact writing and storytelling developed by the Western Regional Evaluation Network (WREN).

Needs Assessment Processes and Methods

Batsche, C., Hernandez, M., & Montenegro, M. C. (1999). Community needs assessment with Hispanic, Spanish-monolingual residents . Evaluation and Program Planning, 22(1), 13-20 .

The authors argue for the importance of needs assessment to ensure representation of the diverse population that live in the community. The authors describe methods to increase participation of Hispanic residents in community needs assessment activities, based on their experience with needs assessment activites in Tampa, Florida. These suggestions are in regards to: 1. Defining the population, 2. Estimating the population size, 3. Selecting the sample, 4. Translating the survey, 5. Gaining access to respondents, 6. Designing and administering the survey, 7. Timing of interviews, 8. Location of interviews, 9. Interpreting the results, 10. Summary of findings, 11. Disseminating the findings, and 12. Strength-based assessment.

Bridges, C. (2008). Identifying agriculture and forestry educational needs using spatial analysis techniques. Journal of Extension, 46(3), 3TOT6 .

The author argues for the use of spatial analysis techniques to identify agriculture and forestry educational needs. The author argues that needs assessments are important to prioritize educational programs toward producers, and that given the need for onsite instruction in agricultural education, understanding spatial variation in agriculture is key. This article presents a simple method to combine needs assessments with spatial analysis techniques such as Geographic Information Systems. The author argues that this method has potential to identify changes in agricultural practices and to prioritize where Extension efforts should be targeted.  

Caravella, J. (2006). A needs assessment method for Extension educators. Journal of Extension, 44(1), 1TOT2.  

This article presents various needs assessment methods used by the family living Extension agent in rural Wisconsin. Needs assessments or situational analysis are presented as the first step in an ongoing plan to evaluate the local environment in which Extension functions to identify priority program focuses. The article describes the methods used in this needs assessment, which include: census data, existing local needs surveys and conducting interviews with key informants (n= 25). The key informants included people from county government departments, law enforcement, the court system, not-for-profit agencies and religious organizations.

Donaldson. J., & Franck, K. (2016). Needs assessment guidebook for Extension professionals. The University of Tennessee Extension Publications. PB 1839 . 

This publication is a guidebook on how to organize needs assessments. It provides details of the three phases of conducting an effective needs assessment: exploration, assessment, and utilization. Different methods for each phase are provided, such as document reviews, individual and group methods (such as key informants, personal interviews, questions for interview, or committees, focus groups, surveys, open listing sessions, brainstorming, concept mapping, among others), interpretation of results and communicating the results of the needs assessment. Each section contains useful tools to design, conduct and interpret effective needs assessments.

Ekins, J. (2018). Extension involvement in collaborative groups: An alternative for gathering stakeholder input. Journal of Extension, 56(2). 2IAW5 .

The author proposed an alternative for community educational needs assessment to focus group research, which consists of participant observation research with collaborative stakeholder groups. The author compares focus group research with collaborative stakeholder group observation in different dimensions, provides different examples of published work with this method, and concludes that the method provides a robust assessment, and in addition, offers great networking opportunities and collaborative sources of information.

Ennis, G., & West, D. (2010). Exploring the potential of social network analysis in asset-based community development practice and research. Australian Social Work, 63:4, 404-417 . 

This article makes the case for the incorporation of key concepts from social network theory on asset-based community development practice. The authors propose that the focus should be on community “assets” instead of “needs,” and that social network analysis is a methodology for understanding the efficacy of asset-based community development (ABCD) projects. The authors also argue that currently, although the asset-based community development model is widely used, it is criticized for its lack of an evidence base, theoretical depth and consideration of macro-level causes of disempowerment. Social network concepts have been rarely used in a comprehensive manner in asset-based community development practice or research. This paper proposes to address these challenges through: 1. Exploring the strengths and limitations of ABCD, 2. Broadly overviewing social network theory analysis, and 3. Considering its potential to be integrated into ABCD practice and research. The paper concludes by arguing for the potential of social network analysis as a framework to study ABCD interventions and to understand how ABCD interventions impact the different elements of a community.

Folinsbee, S., & Jurmo, P. (1994). Collaborative needs assessment: A handbook for workplace development planners. ABC Canada . 

This handbook outlines a four-phase collaborative approach to assessing a work organization’s education needs and specifying a range of activities to meet the identified needs. Such phases are: 1. laying the groundwork for a workplace needs assessment (get all interested groups committed, organize a planning committee, plan and hold initial committee meetings, and design the workplace needs assessment); 2. Carrying out the needs assessment (prepare to gather information, collect information in personal interviews and focus groups, gather information from other sources, organize the information, and analyze selected workplace documents); 3. Interpreting and reporting (interpret the information, write the final report, and report the findings); and 4. Deciding what happens next (develop and get commitment for an action plan and evaluate the workplace needs assessment).

Garst, B., & McCawley, P. (2015). Solving problems, ensuring relevance, and facilitating change: The evolution of needs assessment within Cooperative Extension. Journal of Human Sciences and Extension, 3(2), 26-47 . 

The authors trace the history and evolution of needs assessments within Cooperative Extension. They first define the goal of needs assessments as twofold: 1. to understand stakeholders’ problems,  and/or concerns, and 2. to understand how to respond with program, products and services. The authors also present some reasons for conducting needs assessments (adapted from Etling & Maloney, 1995), which include: program planning, principle of democracy, motivation, accountability, support, anticipation of conflicts, needs change and complex society.

The authors also describe the historic evolution of needs assessments, where they highlight how needs assessments have been used over the decades in Extension. Before the 1960s, needs assessments were conducted to identify and prioritize programs for clientele. Local groups helped plan how to meet objectives rather than identifying priorities. Between the 60s and 70s, Extension services adopted more sophisticated protocols to evaluate if programs were meeting the needs of beneficiaries. During the 80s, there was a significant growth in the use of needs assessment practices, but given budget cuts, more cost-effective methods emerged. During the 90s, a more integrated approach was adopted for needs assessments, incorporating analysis of secondary data and conversations with key informants. Kaufman’s Organizational Elements Model (OEM)  was solidified, and asset mapping was introduced in this decade, which helped with capacity assessment. Finally, during the 2000s to the present, new technologies were introduced for needs assessments, such as new information technology platforms, Geographic Information Systems (GIS), real-time data collection, visual display and data storage in an interactive setting. Participatory research approaches to needs assessments were disseminated. Photovoice techniques also emerged.

Guion, L. (2010). A 10-step process for environmental scanning. Journal of Extension, 48(4), v48-4iw2 . 

This article describes a 10-step process for conducting environmental scanning in North Carolina Cooperative Extension (NCCE). The author defines environmental scanning as a study of emerging forces within an organization (as cited by Boone, 1992; Boone, Safrit, & Jones, 2002), and highlights it as an opportunity to explore diverse sources of information and viewpoints to accomplish Extension goals and find educational solutions. The 10 steps are: 1. The county team conduct situational analysis using secondary data, 2. List issues that are important, based on secondary data, 3. Conduct situational analysis using primary data from major stakeholder groups, 4. Map county to obtain primary data from a cross section of the population, 5. Collect primary data in each of the mapped areas, 6. List issues that consistently surfaced as important in Steps 2 and 3, 7. Conduct external asset assessments, 8. Prioritize issues, 9. Examine the complexity and interdisciplinary nature of priority issues, and 10. Each county enter priority issues, internal and external assets, and the integrated programming strategies to address the issues into the web-based NCCE county priority issues database. The article describes each of these 10 steps and provides a practical guide for conducting environmental guides at the county level.

Havercamp, M., Christiansen, E., & Mitchell, D. (2003). Assessing Extension internal organizational needs through an action research and learning process. Journal of Extension, 41(5), 5FEA2.  

This article describes how a participatory action research and learning process were used for a needs assessment of an Extension organization. The article describes the methods used, which included focus groups, questionnaires and employee feedback sessions. The goal was to identify the internal needs of University of Nevada Cooperative Extension (UNCE) over a five-year period for strategic planning. The authors argue that the results of this study have been used by UNCE, and recommend the use of participatory action research and learning process for conducting internal organizational needs assessments. The authors highlight the importance of engaging different personnel (Extension leaders, faculty and staff) when implementing the assessment.

Hillier, A. (2007). Why social work needs mapping. Journal of Science Work Education, 43(2), 205-222.  

The author presents several reasons why social work would benefit from the use of GIS. Among such reasons, the author argues that GIS is critical to identify community needs and assets. Mapping allows understanding of how the environment impacts individuals and provides evidence of disparity. The author provides examples of social work using GIS that has shown high levels of spatial inequality among recipients who tended to live in areas with poor service, providing evidence of a spatial mismatch. The author argues that mapping allows information about individuals and households to be integrated with information about their communities, so that funders, service providers and researchers can understand individuals in the context of their communities. The author makes the case that documenting needs is not enough, but that needs have to be spatially located. For the author, the integration of GIS in social work will improve delivery of social services and empower communities and traditionally disenfranchised groups.

Kaplan, M., Shih-Tsen, L., & Radhakrishna, R. (2003) Intergenerational programming in Extension: Needs assessment as planning tool. Journal of Extension, 41(4), 4FEA5.  

The authors present the findings of their needs assessment study conducted to plan and develop a statewide intergenerational program. The authors conducted a mail survey, directed to Extension educators in Pennsylvania. Respondents noted their preferences on program content and delivery format. The results were used to make decisions about curricular directions and program delivery strategies. These results and their incorporation in planning strategies showcase the value that needs assessments provide for setting program priorities and the importance of assessing the perceptions of staff delivering programs.  

Kenneth, L. C. (1993). Needs assessment for group work with people of color. Social Work with Groups, 15:2-3, 53-66 . 

The author claims that cultural sensitivity in needs assessment is necessary for effective group work practice with ethnically diverse populations. The author introduces a conceptual framework to assess the nature of psychological needs borne out of cultural differences. This method uses “sociocultural dissonance” as an orienting concept, which is based on three major categories of psychological needs: life-change events, role-status change, and social-structural adjustment. The author discusses how each of these dimensions is manifested at the individual, intragroup, intergroup and systems level. Finally, the paper considers implications for group practice.

Kerka, S. (2003). Community asset mapping. Educational Resources Information Center (ERIC). Trends and Issues Alert, 47 . 

The author describes asset mapping as a method for documenting the tangible and intangible resources of a community, where assets may be persons, physical structures, natural resources, institutions, businesses or informal organizations (as cited by Berkowitz & Wadud, 2003). The asset-mapping approach draws on appreciative inquiry, recognition of social capital, participatory approaches to development, collaborative economic development models and efforts to strengthen civil society (as cited by Mathie & Cunningham, 2002). In this note, the author lists and describes resources that can help community educators use asset-mapping approaches for program planning.

Kramer, S., Amos, T., Lazarus, S., & Seedat, M. (2012). The philosophical assumptions, utility and challenges of asset mapping approaches to community engagement. Journal of Psychology in Africa, 22:4, 537-544.  

This article presents a literature review and discussion of different asset-based mapping approaches, such as: Asset-Based Community Development (ABCD); Participatory Inquiry into Religious Health Assets, Networks and Agency (PIRHANA); Community Health Assets Mapping for Partnerships (CHAMP); the Sustainable Livelihoods Approach (SLA); Planning for Real®; and approaches using Geographic Information Systems (GIS). The review describes and examines these approaches to show ways in which asset-focused approaches as interventions could be used to promote community development through engagement. The authors conclude that these methods of asset-based mapping are valuable because of their key capacities for partnership building, consensus creation, and community agency and control. The authors suggest that when applied, these methods should ensure context-specificity, facilitate co-learning, encourage resource sharing and promote community empowerment.

Lightfoot, E., Simmelink, J., & Lum, T. (2014). Asset mapping as a research tool for community-based participatory research in social work. National Association of Social Workers.  

This research note describes the asset-mapping approach as a community-based participatory research (CBPR) method for social work. The article describes its origins, provides an overview of asset mapping and presents it as a research technique and as a method of asset mapping in CBPR and in social work research. The authors conclude that asset mapping is well suited for social work practice and as a research method for use in social work CBPR research partnerships that explore social issues. It can help tease out the strengths of communities, fits well with social work’s strengths-based approach to conducting research in low-resource communities, and is a fairly straightforward approach. In addition, the evidence base for Asset-based Community Development (ABCD) projects is robust.

Lien, A., Ruyle, G., & López-Hoffman L. (2018). Q methodology: A method for understanding complex viewpoints in communities served by Extension. Journal of Extension, 56(2), V56-2iw4 .

This article introduces Q methodology by explaining what it is and how it works, and providing an example of its use. Q methodology is an activity to understand individual viewpoints, and sort ideas. The method uses a card-sorting exercise for researchers to analyze individuals’ subjective viewpoints on different issues and groupings of different viewpoints within a community. The difference between Q methodology and focus groups, surveys or interviews, the authors claim, is that Q methodology focuses on the participant, not the participant’s answers. It provides an understanding of how respondents think about the questions themselves, rather than how respondents answer the questions about different aspects of an issue. The article explains the methodology and provides a didactive example of how the method works, as well as recommendations for further readings. This method provides an in-depth understanding of an issue and of the context that informs the subject’s thinking around the issue. It is of use for Extension, as it could help for conflict mediation or resource management.

North Carolina Cooperative Extension. 2017-2018 Needs assessment community statewide summary. NC State Extension.  

North Carolina Cooperative Extension provides several resources for county needs assessments, including: how to summarize county data, statewide report examples and methods for data collection, such as: secondary data, different instructions to conduct interviews, county commission surveys, stakeholder focus groups, employee surveys and citizen surveys. In the examples they provide they use multi-methods approaches to collect county data and stakeholder inputs. They also provide on their reports detailed examples for the data analysis and how to visualize most important community issues for relevant questions.

Phibbs, E., Relf, D., Hunnings, J. (2005). Implementing a needs assessment for long-term strategic planning in 4-H horticulture programming. Journal of Extension, 43(4), 4RIB7 .

This article describes a needs assessment implemented for 4-H horticulture programming to be used for strategic planning by Virginia Cooperative Extension (VCE). The needs assessment focused on the satisfaction of clientele with VCE 4-H horticulture publications, programs and available resources. The authors interviewed 4-H agents, agriculture and natural resource agents, Master Gardener coordinators, and 4-H camp directors. The results highlight areas for potential improvement, related to improved communication and resource sharing. The authors argue for the use of needs assessment as an example of strategic planning tool that might be useful for Extension programs.

Singletary, L., & Powell, P. (2003). Conducting a formal needs assessment: A five-step survey approach. University of Nevada Reno . 

This document presents a five-step approach to conducting a formal needs assessment through mail surveys. The five steps are: 1. Develop a broad set of questions and determine protocol, 2. Complete training (IRB) and seek certification to conduct research, 3. Seek IRB approval to conduct survey, 4. Implement needs assessment, record responses and analyze the data (Excel and SPSS and two software programs recommended for the analysis), and 5. Publish an Extension fact sheet, special publication or bulletin to share the results of your needs assessment.

Smith, C., & Freeman, R. (2002). Using continuous system level assessment to build school capacity. American Journal of Evaluation, 23(3), 307-319.  

In this paper, the authors introduce a conceptual framework for internal assessment called Continuous System Level Assessment (CSLA). This method has three phases: needs assessment and problem identification, designing interventions and building staff capacity, and implementing and evaluating interventions. The method is a holistic approach that allows schools to evaluate all programs implemented, and fosters local program and evaluation expertise. The authors argue that CSLA can contribute to more sophisticated professional development strategies for schools.

Wang, C., & Burris, M. A. (1997). Photovoice: concept, methodology, and use for participatory needs assessment. Health Education and Behavior, 24(3), 369-387.

The authors discuss the uses and implications of photovoice methods for needs assessments, based on their experience in Yunnan. First, photovoice techniques fuel critical consciousness and collective action. Second, photovoice provides a community-based diagnostic tool to strengthen inadequate theories in which programs are based. Third, they provide powerful means to advocate for increased funding and guide the distribution of money. Fourth, photovoice may enable grassroots constituents to participate in the policy-making process.

Wille, C., Garcia, Z., & Garcia-Pabón, J. (2019). Collaborating across state lines to leverage cultural competency expertise. Journal of Extension, 57(3), 3TOT6.  

The authors identified the need for a statewide Latino cultural competency training for Utah State University (USU) Extension personnel. This article explains a collaboration between USU Extension and Washington State University (WSU) Extension on adapting and customizing a WSU needs assessment tool for USU Extension faculty. The authors found that collaborating with professionals across the state produced many benefits, such as: streamlined resources and use of already developed material, capitalization of peer experience, customization of other state’s tools and resources, and mutual beneficial collaborations. They also found that administrative collaboration is key to successful cross-state collaboration work.

Worker, S., Schmitt-McQuitty, L., Ambrose, A., Brian, K., Schoenfelder, E., & Smith, M. (2017). Multiple methods needs assessment of California 4-H science education programming. Journal of Extension, 55(2), 2RIB4 . 

This article describes a needs assessment carried out to evaluate 4-H programs on program development and design, professional development, curricula, evaluation, partnerships, and fund development. The results identified areas for growth and needs for improved communication and resource sharing. Multiple qualitative data sources were used (an online open-ended survey, focus group interviews, participatory working groups, data analysis and data integration). The needs assessment revealed opportunities for more intentional and systematic 4-H science programming. It also revealed the need for national and state efforts that provide practical program models and examples of programs targeting scientific literacy, professional development for staff, and consistency in messaging and branding. The authors highlight that using more than one method to analyze and interpret data improved their understanding of the needs and gaps of the 4-H science programming.

Examples of Needs Assessments and Their Use

Duncan, S., & Marotz-Baden, R. (1999). Using focus groups to identify rural participant needs in balancing work and family education. Journal of Extension, 37(1), 1RIB1 . 

The authors illustrate how they used marketing techniques to understand the target audience for program development. Focus groups were carried out with the objective of learning the needs of rural residents in Montana. The authors claim that this study serves as an example of how Extension personnel can gain information about how a program should be produced, priced and promoted, as well as where it should be held to attract the largest number of participants and meet the needs of the target population.

Duttweiler, M. (2008). The value of evaluation in Cooperative Extension. In: Braveman, M. T., Engle, M., Arnold, M. E., & Rannekamp, R. A. (Eds). Program evaluation in a complex organizational system: Lessons from Cooperative Extension. New Directions for Evaluation . 

The author examines how evaluation practices have been of value in Cooperative Extension. The author examines more than 675 evaluations published between 1998 and 2007, through literature reviews, examinations of cases and correspondence with respective authors. The evaluations are characterized by their evaluation purpose and by Jacob’s Levels of Evaluation (Jacobs, 1988). Most evaluations analyzed were related to educational methods improvement, accountability studies or needs assessments. Almost 70% of studies addressed program improvement. The author also finds that most evaluations yielded substantial program modification.

Fuller, J., Bentley, M., & Shotton, D. (2001). Use of community health needs assessment for regional planning in country South Australia. The Australian Journal of Rural Health, 9, 12-17 .

This paper documents how community health needs assessments were used for regional and country health service planning in South Australia between 1995 and 1999. Both local and regional needs assessments were included. Data from needs assessments were translated into health promotion and early intervention program priorities through strategic planning. The authors derive two key lessons of using needs assessments for planning. First, local needs assessments involve local commitment to service change, but are usually slow processes. Second, needs assessments are more likely to be effective if focused rather than broad brushed. 

Hilton, J., Martin, S., & Evans, W. (2007). Meeting the needs of Nevada’s older adults: The role of University of Nevada Cooperative Extension. University of Nevada Cooperative Extension. Educational Bulletin, EB-07-02.  

Nevada’s rapid increase of its senior population is associated with different social processes, such as: increased longevity, higher education of baby boomers who tend to delay retirement, higher standards of living, geographic mobility, greater diversity in family structures, and ethnic composition of the population. A team of University of Nevada Cooperative Extension specialists used several strategies to assess the need for programs for older adults. The team reviewed data and theories, surveyed participants of conferences on aging, assessed services currently provided, and held community forums. These strategies were followed to: 1. Assess the present and future needs of older adults, 2. Investigate the resources available to meet these needs, and 3. Evaluate the gaps between identified needs and resources. This report provides detailed findings of this needs assessment and recommends specific activities related to outreach education, research and capacity building.

Kim, Y. (2012). Parenting needs for parents of young children in southern Nevada. University of Nevada Cooperative Extension. Special Publication, SP-12-10 . 

This study describes a needs assessment for parents of 5-year-old or younger children in southern Nevada. The needs assessment was carried out to identify parenting educational needs, given the relevance of children’s early years on their development and the limited resources available, especially for vulnerable families. The multi-method assessment included: a review of most critical areas in young children’s development, examination of well-being statistics, interviews with personnel working with young children and their families, and information collected from parents of young children about education needs. The study identified six needs to prioritize related to child learning, parents’ education, early literacy, self-discipline, healthy eating habits and community resources. The study also recommends that parenting information should be delivered through parents’ preferred mediums, and that more parenting education workshops and collaboration with other agencies in diverse geographical areas should occur.

Kratsch, H., & Skelly, J. (2012). Situational analysis: Horticultural needs and trends in Nevada. University of Nevada Cooperative Extension. Special Publication, SP-12-12.  

This report presents the results of needs assessments, studies, stakeholder interviews and surveys that were compiled to identify potential horticulture education targets and program efforts in Nevada. The report investigates trends in Nevada demographics, climate, horticulture, consumer horticulture, horticulture industry, Nevada green industry, and horticultural needs at the county level. Upon review of these topics, the report proposes a statewide emphasis on the following horticultural issues: home and small-scale food production, support of community – and school – garden program efforts, pest diagnosis and management, climate-appropriate gardening, and programs to support green-industry training.

Marshall, M., Bush, D., & Hayes, K. (2005). Extension programming for food entrepreneurs: An Indiana needs assessment. Journal of Extension, 43(5), 5RIB9 . 

This study describes a needs assessment for food entrepreneurs in Indiana. Purdue University Cooperative Extension specialists were designing a program to help food entrepreneurs develop value-added food products. This needs assessment was carried out to understand the needs of such food entrepreneurs and plan what services and information would be useful for Extension outreach. Extensionists from 86 counties were surveyed on topics of marketing, new business start-up, food regulations and food safety. The results of the study were used to develop a statewide workshop for food entrepreneurs.

Skelly, J., Singletary, L., Angle, J., Sepúlveda-Pulvirenti, E., & Moffitt, M. (2010). Addressing the needs of Nevada’s growing Latino population. University of Nevada Cooperative Extension. Special Publication, SP-10-08.  

This report documents that the Latino population in Nevada began growing in the 1960s, both in numbers and diversity. Nevada is now one of the top 10 states in the nation in the percentage of Latino population. Although Latinos are economically active, they are underrepresented in professional and technical positions. A large proportion of families did not have health insurance. This needs assessment is the first comprehensive effort to assess the Latino population in Nevada. Researchers reviewed extant literature, contacted numerous organizations interested in Latino issues, and developed a comprehensive list of issues that might interest Latinos. Results indicated that many of the issues participants identified as important to them were outside the purview of Extension, but may be addressed by other organizations. The results of this assessment support the need to develop Extension programs that use inclusive curriculum and trainings, and address issues identified within the Extension mission.

Smith, M., Meehan, C., & Dasher, H. S. (2009). Assessing volunteers' needs and interests to inform curriculum development in 4-H. Journal of Extension, 47(1), 1IAW3 . 

This paper describes a needs assessment of volunteers in 4-H animal and veterinary science. The needs assessment followed a mixed-methods design, which included focus groups and interviews. The results revealed content areas where volunteers needed the most resources and support. Volunteers also expressed their interest in educational activities to learn about the identified concepts. The results of the study helped UC Davis researchers develop two curricula on animal care and on biology, physiology and veterinary care to be used in youth development programs.

Walker, S. (2003). Building a state child care initiative: Applying principles of teamwork and collaboration. Journal of Extension, 41(3), 3FEA2 . 

This study is a description of a collaboration in Maryland to provide a coordinated childcare training and build a system of childcare service at the state level. The author describes the five-year coordination process, which consisted of statewide communication, identification of faculty needs, organization of coordinated conferences, developing a curriculum for childcare provider training and its implementation. Based on their experience, the author provides a list of recommendations for the effective development of a statewide team effort, which includes building on the good things that are present (capacities, skills and assets of people involved), empowering and rewarding individuals, ensuring trusted leadership, being responsive to the needs, and seeking resources.

• Altschuld, J. W., & Watkins, R. (2014). A primer on needs assessment: More than 40 years of research and practice. In J. W. Altschuld & R. Watkins (Eds.), Needs assessment: Trends and a view toward the future. New Directions for Evaluation, 144, 5–18.
• Angima, S., Etuk, L., & King, D. (2014). Using needs assessment as a tool to strengthen funding proposals. Journal of Extension, 52(6), TOT v52-6tt1. 
• Berkowitz, B., & Wadud, E. (2013). Identifying community assets and resources. In: The Community Tool Box, chapter 3, section 8. University of Kansas. 
• Caravella, J. (2006). A needs assessment method for extension educators. Journal of Extension, 44(1), 1TOT2. 
• Etling, A., & Thomas, M. (1995). Needs assessment for extension agents and other nonformal educators. Pennsylvania State Univ., University Park. Cooperative Extension Service. ED 388 774.
• Garst, B., & McCawley, P. (2015). Solving problems, ensuring relevance, and facilitating change: the evolution of needs assessment within Cooperative Extension. Journal of Human Sciences and Extension, 3(2), 26-47. 
• Ghimire, N. R. (2010). The relative importance of selected educational process professional competencies to extension educators in the North Central Region of USA. Doctoral Dissertation, Iowa State University, Ames.
• Jacobs, F. (1988). The five-tiered approach to evaluation: Context and implementation. In: H. B. Weiss & F. H. Jacobs (Eds), Evaluating family programs (pp 37-68). Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyter.Koundinya, V. (2010). An analysis of the food safety educational processes in the Cooperative Extension System of the North Central Region of the United States. Doctoral Dissertation, Iowa State University, Ames.
• Mathie, A., & Cunningham, G. (2003). From clients to citizens: Asset-based community development as a strategy for community-driven development. Development in Practice 13(5):474-486. 

Learn more about the author(s)

Also of Interest:

Batsche, C., Hernandez, M., & Montenegro, M. C. (1999). Community needs assessment with Hispanic, Spanish-monolingual residents. Evaluation and Program Planning, 22(1), 13-20 .

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Research Article

A guiding framework for needs assessment evaluations to embed digital platforms in partnership with Indigenous communities

Roles Conceptualization, Data curation, Formal analysis, Investigation, Methodology, Project administration, Supervision, Writing – original draft

Affiliation School of Occupational and Public Health, Toronto Metropolitan University, Toronto, ON, Canada

Roles Data curation, Formal analysis, Investigation, Software, Visualization, Writing – original draft

Affiliation School of Public Health Sciences, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON, Canada

Roles Conceptualization, Investigation, Project administration, Resources, Supervision, Writing – review & editing

Affiliation Île-à-la-Crosse School Division, The Northern Village of Île-à-la-Crosse, Île-à-la-Crosse, SK, Canada

Roles Conceptualization, Investigation, Resources, Supervision

Roles Conceptualization, Funding acquisition, Investigation, Methodology, Project administration, Resources, Supervision, Writing – review & editing

* E-mail: [email protected]

Affiliations DEPtH Lab, Faculty of Health Sciences, Western University, London, ON, Canada, Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Schulich School of Medicine and Dentistry, Western University, London, ON, Canada, Lawson Health Research Institute, London, Ontario, Canada

• Jasmin Bhawra, 
• M. Claire Buchan, 
• Brenda Green, 
• Kelly Skinner, 
• Tarun Reddy Katapally

• Published: December 22, 2022
• https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0279282
• Reader Comments

Introduction

In community-based research projects, needs assessments are one of the first steps to identify community priorities. Access-related issues often pose significant barriers to participation in research and evaluation for rural and remote communities, particularly Indigenous communities, which also have a complex relationship with academia due to a history of exploitation. To bridge this gap, work with Indigenous communities requires consistent and meaningful engagement. The prominence of digital devices (i.e., smartphones) offers an unparalleled opportunity for ethical and equitable engagement between researchers and communities across jurisdictions, particularly in remote communities.

This paper presents a framework to guide needs assessments which embed digital platforms in partnership with Indigenous communities. Guided by this framework, a qualitative needs assessment was conducted with a subarctic Métis community in Saskatchewan, Canada. This project is governed by an Advisory Council comprised of Knowledge Keepers, Elders, and youth in the community. An environmental scan of relevant programs, three key informant interviews, and two focus groups (n = 4 in each) were conducted to systematically identify community priorities.

Through discussions with the community, four priorities were identified: (1) the Coronavirus pandemic, (2) climate change impacts on the environment, (3) mental health and wellbeing, and (4) food security and sovereignty. Given the timing of the needs assessment, the community identified the Coronavirus pandemic as a key priority requiring digital initiatives.

Recommendations for community-based needs assessments to conceptualize and implement digital infrastructure are put forward, with an emphasis on self-governance and data sovereignty.

Citation: Bhawra J, Buchan MC, Green B, Skinner K, Katapally TR (2022) A guiding framework for needs assessment evaluations to embed digital platforms in partnership with Indigenous communities. PLoS ONE 17(12): e0279282. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0279282

Editor: Stephane Shepherd, Swinburne University of Technology, AUSTRALIA

Received: June 1, 2022; Accepted: December 2, 2022; Published: December 22, 2022

Copyright: © 2022 Bhawra et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Data Availability: Data are co-owned by the community and all data requests should be approved by the Citizen Scientist Advisory Council and the University of Regina Research Office. Citizen Scientist Advisory Council Contact: Mr. Duane Favel, Mayor of Ile-a-lacrosse, email: [email protected] ; [email protected] University of Regina Research Office contact: Ara Steininger, Research Compliance Officer; E-mail: [email protected] . Those interested can access the data in the same manner as the authors.

Funding: TRK received funding from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) and the Canada Research Chairs Program to conduct this research. The funding organization had no role to play in any part of the study implementation of manuscript generation.

Competing interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Community engagement has been the cornerstone of participatory action research in a range of disciplines. Every community has a unique culture and identity, hence community members are the experts regarding their diverse histories, priorities, and growth [ 1 – 3 ]. As a result, the successful uptake, implementation, and longevity of community-based research initiatives largely depends on meaningful community engagement [ 4 – 9 ]. There is a considerable body of evidence establishing the need for ethical community-research partnerships which empower citizens and ensure relevant and sustainable solutions [ 1 – 3 , 10 ]. For groups that have been marginalized or disadvantaged, community-engaged research that prioritizes citizens’ control in the research process can provide a platform to amplify citizens’ voices and ensure necessary representation in decision-making [ 11 ]. Such initiatives must be developed in alignment with a community’s cultural framework, expectations, and vision [ 12 ] to support continuous and meaningful engagement throughout the project. In particular, when partnering with Indigenous communities, a Two-Eyed Seeing approach can provide valuable perspective to combine the strengths of Indigenous and Western Knowledges, including culturally relevant methods, technologies, and tools [ 13 – 15 ].

Many communities have a complicated relationship with research as a result of colonialism, and the trauma of exploitation and discrimination has continued to limit the participation of some communities in academic partnerships [ 16 ]. Indigenous Peoples in Canada experience a disproportionate number of health, economic, and social inequalities compared to non-Indigenous Canadians [ 17 ]. Many of these health (e.g., elevated risk of chronic and communicable diseases) [ 18 – 21 ]), socioeconomic (e.g., elevated levels of unemployment and poverty) [ 19 , 22 – 24 ], and social (e.g., racism and discrimination) [ 19 , 22 – 24 ]) inequities can be traced back to the long-term impacts of assimilation, colonization, residential schools, and a lack of access to healthcare [ 19 , 20 , 22 – 24 ]. To bridge this gap, and more importantly, to work towards Truth and Reconciliation [ 25 ], work with Indigenous Peoples must be community-driven, and community-academia relationship building is essential before exploring co-conceptualization of initiatives [ 26 ].

One of the first steps in building a relationship is to learn more about community priorities by conducting a needs assessment [ 27 , 28 ]. A needs assessment is a research and evaluation method for identifying areas for improvement or gaps in current policies, programs, and services [ 29 ]. When conducted in partnership with a specific community, needs assessments can identify priorities and be used to develop innovative solutions, while leveraging the existing knowledge and systems that communities have in place [ 30 ]. Needs assessments pave the path for understanding the value and applicability of research for community members, incorporating key perspectives, and building authentic partnerships with communities to support effective translation of research into practice.

For rural, remote, and northern communities within Canada, issues related to access (e.g., geographic location, transportation, methods of communication, etc.) pose significant barriers to participation in research and related initiatives [ 31 ]. Digital devices, and in particular, the extensive usage of smartphones [ 32 ] offers a new opportunity to ethically and equitably engage citizens [ 33 ]. Digital platforms (also referred to as digital tools) are applications and software programs accessible through digital devices. Digital platforms can be used for a variety of purposes, ranging from project management, to healthcare delivery or mass communication [ 34 ]. Digital infrastructure–the larger systems which support access and use of these digital platforms, including internet, satellites, cellular networks, and data storage centres [ 34 ]. The Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has catalyzed the expansion of digital technology, infrastructure and the use of digital devices in delivering essential services (e.g., healthcare) and programs to communities [ 35 , 36 ].

While digital platforms have been used in Indigenous communities for numerous initiatives, including environmental mapping initiatives (e.g., research and monitoring, land use planning, and wildlife and harvest studies) [ 37 , 38 ] and telehealth [ 39 ], there has largely been isolated app development without a corresponding investment in digital infrastructure. This approach limits the sustainability of digital initiatives, and importantly does not acknowledge an Indigenous world view of holistic solutions [ 39 ].

Thus given the increasing prominence of digital devices [ 39 , 40 ], it is critical to evaluate the conceptualization, implementation, and knowledge dissemination of digital platforms. To date, there is little guidance on how to evaluate digital platforms, particularly in partnership with rural and remote communities [ 41 ]. A review of recent literature on community-based needs assessments uncovered numerous resources for conducting evaluations of digital platforms, however, a key gap is the lack of practical guidance for conducting needs assessments in close collaboration with communities in ways that acknowledge existing needs, resources, supports and infrastructure that also incorporates the potential role of digital platforms in addressing community priorities.

This paper aims to provide researchers and evaluators with a framework (step-by-step guide) to conduct needs assessments for digital platforms in collaboration with Indigenous communities. To achieve this goal, a novel needs assessment framework was developed using a Two-Eyed Seeing approach [ 13 – 15 ] to enable the identification of community priorities, barriers and supports, as well as existing digital infrastructure to successfully implement digital solutions. To demonstrate the application of this framework, a community-engaged needs assessment conducted with a subarctic Indigenous community in Canada is described and discussed in detail.

Framework design and development

This project commenced with the design and development of a new framework to guide community-based needs assessments in the digital age.

Needs assessments

Needs assessments are a type of formative evaluation and are often considered a form of strategic or program planning, even more than they are considered a type of evaluation. Needs assessments can occur both before and during an evaluation or program implementation; however, needs assessments are most effective when they are conducted before a new initiative begins or before a decision is made about what to do (e.g., how to make program changes) [ 29 ]. Typically, a needs assessment includes: 1) collecting information about a community; 2) determining what needs are already being met; and 3) determining what needs are not being met and what resources are available to meet those needs [ 42 ].

Framework development

Based on existing literature, community consultation, and drawing expertise from our team of evaluation experts who have over a decade of experience working with Indigenous communities on a range of research and evaluation projects, a novel framework was developed to guide community-based needs assessments focused on the application of digital platforms.

This framework (see Fig 1 ) is driven by core questions necessary to identify community priorities that can be addressed by developing and implementing digital platforms. Through team discussion and community consultation, five key topic areas for the assessment of community needs were identified: i) current supports; ii) desired supports; iii) barriers; iv) community engagement; and v) digital access and connectivity. A series of general questions across the five needs assessment topic areas were developed. Thereafter, a set of sub-questions were embedded in each key topic area.

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https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0279282.g001

The Guiding Framework outlines an approach for conducting community needs assessments which can be adapted across communities and jurisdictions. This framework offers a flexible template that can be used iteratively and applied to various community-engaged needs assessments in a range of areas, including but not limited to community health and wellness projects. The questions assigned to each topic area can be used to guide needs assessments of any priority identified by community stakeholders as suitable for addressing with digital platforms.

Needs assessment methods

The Guiding Framework was implemented in collaboration with a subarctic Indigenous community in Canada, and was used to identify key community priorities, barriers, supports, and existing digital infrastructure which could inform the design and implementation of tailored digital platforms.

Using an environmental scan of relevant documents and qualitative focus groups and interviews, a needs assessment was conducted with the Northern Village of Île-à-la-Crosse, Saskatchewan, Canada between February and May 2020.

This project is governed by a Citizen Scientist Advisory Council which included researchers, Knowledge Keepers, Elders, and youth from Île-à-la-Crosse. The study PI (TRK) and Co-Investigator (JB) developed a relationship with key decision-makers in Île-à-la-Crosse in 2020. Through their guidance and several community visits, the decision-makers introduced the research team to Elders, youth, and other community members to gain a better understanding of current priorities and needs in Île-à-la-Crosse. The research team developed relationships with these community members and invited them to join the Council to formally capture feedback and plan ongoing projects to promote health and wellbeing in the community. The Council represents the needs and interests of the community, and guides the project development, implementation, and evaluation. Council members were provided with Can $150 (US $119.30) as honoraria for each meeting to respect their time, knowledge, and contributions.

Written consent was obtained from all focus group participants and verbal consent was obtained from all key informants participating in interviews. This study received ethics clearance from the research ethics boards of the University of Regina and the University of Saskatchewan through a synchronized review protocol (REB# 2017–29).

Established in 1776, Île-à-la-Crosse is a northern subarctic community with road access in northwest Saskatchewan. Sakitawak, the Cree name for Île-à-la-Crosse, means “where the rivers meet,” hence the community was an historically important meeting point for the fur trade in the 1800s [ 43 , 44 ] The community lies on a peninsula on the Churchill River, near the intersections with the Beaver River and Canoe River systems. Île-à-la-Crosse has a rich history dating back to the fur trade. Due to its strategic location, Montreal-based fur traders established the first trading point in Île-à-la-Crosse in 1776, making the community Saskatchewan’s oldest continually inhabited community next to Cumberland House [ 45 ]. In 1821, Île-à-la-Crosse became the headquarters for the Hudson’s Bay Company’s operations in the territory. In 1860, the first convent was established bringing Western culture, medical services, and education to the community.

Île-à-la-Crosse has a population of roughly 1,300 people [ 19 ]. Consistent with Indigenous populations across Canada, the average age of the community is 32.7 years, roughly 10 years younger than the Canadian non-Indigenous average [ 19 ]. Census data report that just under half (44%) of the community’s population is under the age of 25, 46.3% are aged 25–64, and 9.3% aged 65 and over [ 19 ]. Members of the community predominantly identify as Métis (77%), with some identifying as First Nations (18%), multiple Indigenous responses (1.2%), and non-Indigenous (2.7%) [ 19 ]. Many community members are employed in a traditional manner utilizing resources of the land (e.g., hunting, fishing, trapping), others in a less traditional manner (e.g., lumbering, tourism, wild rice harvesting), and some are employed through the hospital and schools. The community currently has one elementary school with approximately 200 students from preschool to Grade 6, and one high school serving Grades 7–12 with adult educational programming. Île-à-la-Crosse has a regional hospital with Emergency Services, which includes a health services centre with a total of 29 beds. Other infrastructure of the community includes a Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) station, a village office, volunteer fire brigade, and a catholic church [ 46 ].

Needs assessment approach

Île-à-la-Crosse shared their vision of integrating digital technology and infrastructure as part of its growth, thus the needs assessment was identified as an appropriate method to provide the formative information necessary to understand what the needs are, including who (i.e., players, partners), and what (i.e., information sources) would need to be involved, what opportunities exist to address the needs, and setting priorities for action with key community stakeholders [ 47 ]. As a starting point and rationale for this needs assessment, the community of Île-à-la-Crosse values the potential of technology for improving health communication, information reach, access to resources, and care, and was interested in identifying priorities to begin building digital infrastructure. Given the timing of the COVID-19 pandemic, being responsive to community health needs were key priorities that they wanted to start addressing using a digital platform. This needs assessment facilitated and enabled new conversations around key priorities and next steps.

The evaluation approach was culturally-responsive and included empowerment principles [ 48 – 50 ]. Empowerment evaluation intends to foster self-determination. The empowerment approach [ 50 ] involved community members–represented through the Citizen Scientist Advisory Council–engaging in co-production of the evaluation design and implementation by establishing key objectives for the evaluation, informing evaluation questions, building relevant and culturally responsive indicators, developing focus group guides, leading recruitment and data collection, and interpreting results [ 51 ]. In this way, the approach incorporated local community and Indigenous Knowledges as well as Western knowledge, in a similar approach to Two-Eyed Seeing [ 13 – 15 ]. Using these needs assessment evaluation results, the community will identify emerging needs and potential application issues, and work with the researchers to continue shaping project development and implementation.

Two-Eyed Seeing to embed digital platforms

Two-Eyed Seeing as described by Elder Albert Marshall [ 13 , 14 ], refers to learning to see with the strengths of Indigenous and Western Knowledges. Our engagement and overall approach to working with the community of Île-à-la-Crosse takes a Two-Eyed Seeing lens, from co-conceptualization of solutions, which starts with understanding the needs of the community. All needs are a result of direct Indigenous Knowledge that was provided by the Advisory Council. Indigenous Knowledge is not limited to the knowledge of Elders and Traditional Knowledge Keepers; however, they play a critical role in guiding that knowledge through by providing historical, geographic, and cultural context. Moreover, the Knowledge Keepers can be key decision-makers in the community, and in our case, they were key informants who participated in this needs assessment. Every aspect of needs assessment was dependent on the Advisory Council and Key informants providing the Indigenous Knowledge that the research team needed to tailor digital solutions. As a result, Two-Eyed Seeing approach informed all aspects of the research process.

As we are working to develop, and bring digital platforms and technologies (i.e., Western methods) to address key community priorities, Indigenous Knowledge is central to the overall project. Indigenous Elders, decision-makers, and Advisory Council members are bringing both their historical and lived experience to inform project goals, key priority areas, target groups, and methods. Île-à-la-Crosse is a predominantly Metis community, which differs in culture from other Indigenous communities in Canada—First Nations and Inuit communities. Ceremony is not a key part of community functioning; thus, specific cultural ceremonies were not conducted upon advice of the Advisory Council. Instead, the knowledge of historical issues, challenges, and success stories in the community is considered Indigenous Knowledge for this needs assessment, and more importantly, this Indigenous Knowledge informed the focus areas and next steps for this project. Overall, the spirit of collaboration and co-creation which combined Western research methods/technology with Indigenous Knowledge and expertise is considered Two-Eyed Seeing in this project. This lens was taken at all phases, from the engagement stage to Advisory Council meetings, to planning and executing the needs assessment and next steps.

Data collection

In order to obtain an in-depth understanding of the key priorities and supports within the community of Île-à-la-Crosse, this needs assessment used a qualitative approach. An environmental scan was conducted in February 2020 of current school and community policies and programs. Published reports, meeting memos, community social media accounts, and the Île-à-la-Crosse website were reviewed for existing policies and programs. The Citizen Scientist Advisory Council identified appropriate data sources for the document review and corroborated which programs and initiatives were currently active in the community.

Qualitative data were collected from key decision-makers and other members within the community. A purposeful convenience sampling approach was employed to identify members of the community who could serve on the Council and participate in focus group discussions. Key decision makers and existing Council members recommended other community members who could join the focus group discussions to provide detailed and relevant information on community priorities, digital infrastructure, supports, and challenges. Two focus groups were conducted by members of the research team in Île-à-la-Crosse with the Council in May 2020. Focus group participants were asked to describe community priorities, supports, and barriers, as well as experience and comfort with digital platforms. Each focus group had four participants, were two-hours in length, and followed an unstructured approach. Three key informant interviews were conducted in Île-à-la-Crosse between February and April 2020. One-hour interviews were conducted one-on-one and followed a semi-structured interview format. The focus groups and key informant interviews were led by the study PI, TRK, and Co-Investigator, JB, who have extensive training and experience with qualitative research methods, particularly in partnership with Indigenous communities. Focus groups and key informant interviews were conducted virtually using Zoom [ 52 ]. The key informant interviews and focus groups were audio-recorded and transcribed. All data were aggregated, anonymized, and securely stored in a cloud server. Data are owned by the community. Both the Council and the research team have equal access to the data.

Data analysis

All documents identified through the environmental scan were reviewed for key themes. A list of existing school and community programs was compiled and organized by theme (i.e., education-focused, nutrition-focused, health-focused, etc.). Follow-up conversations with key informants verified the continued planning and provision of these programs.

Following the 6-step method by Braun and Clarke (2006), a thematic analysis was conducted to systematically identify key topic areas and patterns across discussions [ 53 ]. A shortlist of themes was created for the key informant interviews and focus groups, respectively. A manual open coding process was conducted by two reviewers who reached consensus on the final coding manual and themes. Separate analyses were conducted for key informant interviews and focus group discussions; however, findings were synthesized to identify key themes and sub-themes in key priorities for the community, community supports and barriers, as well as digital connectivity and infrastructure needs.

Needs assessment findings

The needs assessment guiding framework informed specific discussions of key issues in the community of Île-à-la-Crosse. Key informant interviews and focus group discussions commenced by asking about priorities–“what are the key areas of focus for the community?” In all conversations–including a document review of initiatives in Île-à-la-Crosse–health was highlighted as a current priority; hence, questions in the guiding framework were tailored to fit a needs assessment focused on community health. The following five overarching evaluation questions were used to guide the evaluation: i) What are the prominent health issues facing residents of Île-à-la-Crosse?; ii) What supports are currently available to help residents address prominent health issues in the community?; iii) What types of barriers do community members face to accessing services to manage their health?; iv) How is health-related information currently shared in the community?; and v) To what extent are health services and information currently managed digitally/electronically? The evaluation questions were kept broad to capture a range of perspectives. An evaluation matrix linking the proposed evaluation questions to their respective sub-questions, indicators, and data collection tools is outlined in Table 1 .

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0279282.t001

Feedback on each needs assessment topic area is summarized in the sections below. Sample quotes supporting each of the key topic areas is provided in Table 2 .

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0279282.t002

Key priorities

Four priorities were identified through the focus groups, key informant interviews, and document review ( Fig 2 ). Given the timing of the discussion, the primary issue of concern was the COVID-19 pandemic. Many community members were worried about contracting the virus, and the risk it posed to Elders in the community. Of greater concern, however, was how COVID-19 exacerbated many existing health concerns including diabetes and hypertension in the community. For example, routine procedures were postponed and community members with other health conditions were not receiving routine healthcare during the height of the pandemic. The St. Joseph’s Hospital and Health Centre services Île-à-la-Crosse and bordering communities, hence maintaining capacity for COVID-19 patients was a priority. COVID-19 exposed existing barriers in the healthcare system which are described in greater detail in the barriers to community health section.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0279282.g002

Another priority discussed by many community members was climate change and the environment. Community members noted that changes in wildlife patterns, land use, and early winter ice road thaw were areas of concern, particularly due to the impact these factors have on traditional food acquisition practices (i.e., hunting) and food access. For instance, the geographic location of Île-à-la-Crosse is surrounded by a lake, and the main highway which connects the community to the land has experienced increased flooding in the past few years.

In addition to posing immediate danger to community members, food security and sovereignty are also closely linked to road access. While the community produces some of its own food through the local fishery and greenhouses, Île-à-la-Crosse is still dependent on a food supply from the south (i.e., Saskatoon). During COVID-19, food access was further restricted due to limited transport and delivery of food products, which increased the risk of food insecurity for community members. Food insecurity was believed to be of bigger concern for Elders in the community compared to younger members. Younger community members expressed having the ability to source their own food in a variety of capacities (e.g., fishing in the lake), whereas Elders rely more heavily on community resources and support (e.g., grocery stores, friends, and family).

Community members also discussed issues surrounding mental health and wellbeing. This topic was of particular concern for youth and Elders in the community. Community members discussed the importance of identifying covert racism (vs. discrimination) that exists within health services that exacerbated mental health issues and care, as well as developing coping strategies, resilience, and supports to prevent mental health crises. Key informants emphasized the need to minimize the stigma around mental health and focus on holistic wellbeing as they work to develop strategies to improve community wellness.

Community health supports

Île-à-la-Crosse has been working on developing supports to improve community health through various initiatives. A document review identified a community-specific wellness model which has informed program development and planning over the past few years. The key components of the Île-à-la-Crosse wellness model are: i) healthy parenting; ii) healthy youth; iii) healthy communities; iv) Elders; v) healing towards wellness; and vi) food sovereignty. The Elders Lodge in the community provides support for holistic wellbeing by promoting intergenerational knowledge transmission, guidance to youth and community members, as well as land-based activities which improve bonding, cultural awareness, and mental and spiritual well-being among community members. The Elders Lodge hosts both drop-in and organized events.

Several initiatives have been developed to support food sovereignty in the community, including a greenhouse program where fruits and vegetables are grown and shared locally. This program is run in partnership with the school to increase food knowledge and skills among youth. In addition, after-school programs including traditional food education (i.e., cooking classes) and land-based activities (i.e., berry picking) led by Elders support the goals of the wellness model. The community is currently working on developing additional programs dedicated to improving mental wellness among adults, youth, and Elders.

Barriers to community health

When key informants were asked to identify barriers to community health, they described delays in access to timely health information. For example, daily COVID-19 tests conducted at the regional health centre in Île-à-la-Crosse were relayed to the provincial health authority; however, information about the total number of COVID-19 cases could take up to one week to be sent back to the community. This time lag restricted community decision-makers’ ability to enact timely policy (i.e., contact tracing) and rapidly respond to managing cases.

A second barrier that was raised by community members was a delay in access to timely healthcare. The Île-à-la-Crosse hospital is a regional health service centre serving the community as well as surrounding areas. Community members noted that the load often exceeded the capacity of the single hospital, and some patients and procedures were relocated to hospitals and clinics in the larger city of Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. This was reported to be challenging for many community members as it was associated with longer wait times, long commutes, and sometimes required time off work. Many of these challenges were exacerbated during the COVID-19 pandemic. As a result of the pandemic, many medical centres and hospitals postponed routine and elective medical procedures in an attempt to accommodate the overwhelming influx of patients who contracted COVID-19. In addition, community members were advised to avoid spending time in health centres to limit risk of exposure to the virus. These COVID-related changes further delayed access to timely healthcare for many community members of Île-à-la-Crosse.

Several community members reported experiencing institutional racism in healthcare and social service settings outside of Île-à-la-Crosse. This was particularly exacerbated during the COVID-19 movement restrictions, where community members faced significant difficulties in accessing services and care in larger urban centres, and experienced further discrimination due to the stigma of COVID-19-related rumours about communities in the north.

Lastly, community members discussed a lack of awareness about some health topics, including where and how to access reliable health information. Some community members attributed this lack of awareness to a general distrust in government health information due to a history of colonialism and exploitation in Canada, which likely contributed to increased misinformation about COVID-19 risk and spread.

Health communication

The primary modes of communication within Île-à-la-Crosse are radio and social media. These platforms were used throughout the pandemic to communicate health information about COVID-19 case counts and trends. Community members also reported obtaining health information from healthcare practitioners (i.e., for those already visiting a healthcare provider), Elders, and the internet. Key informants indicated an interest in improving digital infrastructure to enable sharing of timely and accurate health information with community members and minimize misinformation. Key informants also reported room for improvement in the community’s digital health infrastructure, particularly in improving timely communication with community members, and to inform decision-making in crisis situations.

Digital infrastructure and connectivity

Île-à-la-Crosse has its own cell tower which offers reliable access to cellular data. The community also has access to internet via the provincial internet provider–SaskTel, as well as a local internet provider—Île-à-la-Crosse Communications Society Inc. Key informants and community members confirmed that most individuals above 13 years of age have access to smartphones, and that these mobile devices are the primary mode of internet access. However, it was unclear whether everyone who owns smartphones also has consistent data plans or home internet connections. Key informants described the great potential of digital devices like smartphones to increase the speed and accuracy of information sharing. Discussions with both key informants and community members suggested the need for a community-specific app or platform which could provide timely health information that was tailored to the community’s needs.

Community members noted that expanding digital infrastructure had to be paired with efforts to improve digital literacy–particularly as it relates to data security, privacy, and online misinformation. A separate initiative was discussed which could work to improve digital literacy among youth and Elders, as this would improve both the uptake of digital health platforms, as well as their usefulness and application. Key informants discussed the importance of building digital infrastructure that would enable data sovereignty, self-governance, and determination. The key informants, who are also primary decision-makers in the community, described opportunities for ethical development of digital platforms that would ensure that data is owned by the community.

Needs assessments are commonly the first step in understanding specific community needs, [ 27 , 28 ]; however, few evaluation frameworks provide practical guidance on how to engage communities in needs assessments [ 41 ]. This paper provides a step-by-step guide for conducting needs assessments in collaboration with communities in the digital age. Using the series of questions outlined in the Guiding Framework, researchers and evaluators can gain an in-depth understanding of a community’s priorities, needs, existing capacity, and relevant solutions.

The Guiding Framework was critical to establishing a partnership with the community of Île-à-la-Crosse, as it enabled the research team to obtain detailed insight into their priorities–in this case, community health–as well as community capacity. Taking a Two-Eyed Seeing approach [ 15 ], conversations with the community highlighted strengths of Western digital technology and the diversity of Indigenous Knowledges for addressing priorities [ 13 ]. This approach was also important to establishing trust and respect for the variety of perspectives that could be used to address community priorities. The resulting partnership also enabled the conceptualization of tangible action items that were aligned with current and future priorities–a key factor in the sustainability and feasibility of community-based initiatives [ 4 – 8 , 54 ].

Challenges and opportunities for using digital platforms for priorities identified by needs assessment

Many rural and remote communities face similar challenges and share common priorities with Île-à-la-Crosse. For example, resource and service access, including food and other essential supplies, healthcare, and internet connectivity are issues faced by many rural and remote communities across Canada [ 55 – 60 ]. Key informants and community members from our partner community corroborated these access issues, particularly in relation to public health. Given the potential for digital technology to bridge access gaps, it has become pertinent to invest in digital infrastructure and platform development.

Research has shown that in many rural and remote communities, smartphone ownership is not the limiting factor–it is internet inequity, which is defined as differential internet access based on wealth, location (urban, rural, or remote), gender, age, or ethnicity [ 61 ]. The United Nations has declared internet access a human right [ 10 ], which makes it imperative to develop digital infrastructure such as internet connectivity to improve digital accessibility. Île-à-la-Crosse has its own cell tower which offers reliable access to cellular data. The community of Île-à-la-Crosse also has access to consistent and dedicated internet service through a provincial internet provider and local internet provider. The needs assessment showed that the universality of smartphone ownership combined with good internet connectivity lays the foundation for the development of tailored, culturally appropriate digital health platforms in communities like Île-à-la-Crosse.

In particular, the needs assessment revealed that smartphone apps, which most citizens are well-versed with, can be used to provide local services and access to resources. For example, a locally developed app can connect the Mayor’s office with community members in real-time to provide updates on COVID-19 outbreaks. Apps also have the potential to connect communities to resources within and outside of the community [ 35 , 57 ]. For example, advanced artificial intelligence algorithms can be used to anticipate community needs prior to urgent crises like COVID-19, environmental disasters, or food crises [ 35 , 62 – 65 ]. To date, the issue has not been the lack of technology or ability to bridge this gap for rural and remote communities. Instead, larger systemic inequities have limited our ability to co-create local solutions for global problems by decentralizing technology that is widely available [ 35 , 66 ], which highlights upstream inequities in developing digital platforms.

Recommendations for inclusive digital needs assessments

Given the widespread adoption of digital technology, digital platforms can provide rich data to identify and address community crises [ 2 , 3 , 35 ]. Importantly, co-created digital platforms can be used to share knowledge in real-time with community members and other stakeholders to enable remote engagement, which is especially important during crisis situations such as a pandemic [ 2 , 3 , 35 ]. As we implement creative digital platforms in varied programs or research projects, we must also integrate this digital perspective into the evaluation process. Research and evaluation literature has well established approaches to needs assessment evaluations [ 29 , 42 , 67 ]; however, in the 21st century, we need to account for the use and application of digital platforms in community-focused initiatives. To identify how and where digital platforms can play a role in addressing community priorities, we propose several recommendations for inclusive community-based needs assessments.

First, at the crux of all community-based needs assessments is relationships. A relationship built on respect, reciprocity, mutual understanding, and prioritizing the needs and vision of communities is essential for sustainable impact. The First Nations OCAP® principles [ 68 ] informed conversations between the research team and community about data ownership and control. These principles include ownership of knowledge and data, control over all aspects of research, access to information about one’s own community, and possession or control of data [ 68 ]. The OCAP® principles ensure First Nations and other Indigenous Peoples the right to their own information, and also reflect commitments to use and share information in a way that maximizes the benefit to a community, while minimizing harm. Some communities may choose to lead a project, or work closely in collaboration with experts for specific projects. Irrespective of the project dynamics, needs assessments rely on detailed information and context about a community for a project to succeed.

Second, it is important for researchers and evaluators to gain an understanding of the current digital infrastructure and connectivity in the community. The needs assessment framework ( Fig 1 ) includes relevant questions for identifying data and WIFI access in a community, penetration of digital devices, and existing digital infrastructure. Even for community-based initiatives that are not focused on a digital platforms, digital technologies will inevitably be a part of the solution, a barrier, or both. Hence the digital landscape has become part of the context that we must capture and understand in a needs assessment to better design and develop programming, policies, and other initiatives.

Third, it is important to ask the question of where and how a digital tool or platform could help. Are there gaps that digital platforms can help address or fill? In rural and remote communities, in particular, digital platforms can provide access to real-time information and services not otherwise available. For example, Telehealth [ 69 , 70 ] in the Canadian north offers citizens access to essential healthcare services, including video appointments with medical specialists. Prior to Telehealth, many residents would need to fly into bigger cities in the nearest province to access health care [ 55 ].

Lastly, an understanding of the broader context which affects a community’s ability to adopt digital platforms is critical to the success of digital initiatives. This includes, but is not limited to, capturing data on socioeconomic status and the accessibility of internet-connected digital devices. Digital platforms should help to bridge the divide in resource, service, and information access–not widen the gap. For some communities, this may require working on building digital infrastructure and obtaining dedicated funds to expand access prior to implementing digital initiatives. In addition, digital literacy cannot be taken for granted. Digital literacy refers to individuals’ ability to not only use digital devices, but according to Eshet-Alkalai [ 71 ], “includes a large variety of complex cognitive, motor, sociological, and emotional skills, which users need in order to function effectively in digital environments.” In its simplest form, digital literacy may include the ability to navigate digital platforms, download apps, and communicate electronically. Other more specific skills include ability to read and understand instructions, terms and services, as well as data privacy and security statements [ 72 – 74 ] As part of a needs assessment, identifying digital literacy within a community is an important step to safe, ethical, and relevant digital tool development.

Considering the challenges, immense potential, and learnings from applying the Guiding Framework, a tailored digital platform was conceptualized called Sakitawak Health.

Development of Sakitawak Health

Sakitawak Health is a culturally-responsive digital epidemiological platform to monitor, mitigate, and manage COVID-19 outbreaks. The needs assessment concluded that digital platforms can be used for emerging or other existing population health crises within Île-à-la-Crosse and potentially other Indigenous communities. Moreover, to co-create digital platforms, the Île-à-la-Crosse Citizen Scientist Advisory Council identified key features to embed in CO-Away, including free virtual care for citizens via a smartphone app at the frontend, and access to anonymized community data on the backend for decision-makers.

The app will provide three key precision medicine services that are specific to each citizen: 1) continuous risk assessment of COVID-19 infection; 2) evidence-based public health communication; and 3) citizen reporting of food availability, access to public services, and COVID-19 symptoms and test results. These culturally-responsive features have been co-created with Métis decision-makers in Île-à-la-Crosse based on imminent community needs and preferences. CO-Away will enable real-time data collection through continuous citizen engagement to inform municipal jurisdictional policies.

There are three guiding principles for developing Sakitawak Health: I) Citizen empowerment and data ownership: Active engagement is enabled through app features such as visualizing community risk. More importantly, the community owns the data to ensure data sovereignty; II) Privacy: Utilizing a cutting-edge methodology called federated machine learning, we will develop artificial intelligence algorithms that stores sensitive data such as participant location on mobile devices itself (i.e., sensitive data are not stored in external servers); III) Security and scalability: The backend server will be located in Cloud in Canada, which allows for horizontal and vertical scalability (i.e., the potential for developing multiple frontend apps and decision-making dashboards).

Recognizing the importance of data sovereignty and Indigenous self-governance

Data sovereignty and social justice are important aspects of community-based work, particularly for communities that have experienced discrimination or systemic inequities [ 2 , 75 ]. Data sovereignty refers to meaningful control and ownership of one’s data [ 76 ]. For Indigenous communities in Canada, self-determination and self-governance are of paramount importance given the colonial history of oppression, trauma, and disenfranchisement [ 77 ], and data sovereignty and ownership of digital platforms can promote that independence. In conducting digital community-based needs assessments, the application of a Two-Eyed Seeing lens enables us to leverage strengths of both Indigenous and Western Ways of Knowing to help focus on key priorities and develop solutions.

The engagement and overall approach to working with the community of Île-à-la-Crosse applied a Two-Eyed Seeing lens. In the needs assessment with Île-à-la-Crosse, Two-Eyed Seeing involved incorporation of Métis Knowledge during team engagements, which ensured that any digital platforms developed would incorporate Indigenous Knowledge to promote data sovereignty. All priorities identified within this manuscript are a result of direct Indigenous Knowledge that was provided by the Council. Indigenous Knowledge is not limited to the knowledge of Elders and Traditional Knowledge Keepers; however, they play a critical role in guiding that knowledge through by providing historical, geographic, and cultural context. Discussions with Île-à-la-Crosse about data sovereignty centered around citizen ownership of data, community access, and ensuring data privacy and security. The ultimate goal of this approach to data sovereignty is to facilitate decreased dependence on external systems and use digital solutions for Indigenous self-determination and self-governance.

The needs assessment represents the first phase of a larger evaluation strategy to develop and implement culturally appropriate digital platforms for community health. Phase 1 involved identifying core health priorities and desired supports in the community of Île-à-la-Crosse. Based on the needs assessment findings, Phase 2 of this project will involve the development of tailored digital health platforms and programming to support digital literacy. As part of Phase 2, digital literacy programs and tailored digital health platforms will be pilot tested and adapted prior to their implementation. In Phase 3, a process evaluation will be conducted to assess the reach, uptake, and use of digital health platforms and digital literacy programming. Integrated knowledge translation will be conducted during all phases to ensure continuous feedback, communication, and knowledge sharing with all relevant stakeholder groups.

Conclusions

Needs assessments can facilitate important conversations in community-based research and evaluation to learn about key priorities, challenges, and opportunities for growth. The Guiding Framework for Community-Based Needs Assessments to Embed Digital Platforms details a step-by-step approach to begin a conversation with communities to better understand their needs, and to tailor research and evaluation projects focused on embedding digital platforms. In Île-à-la-Crosse, the needs assessment framework has propelled the launch of a timely, community-engaged digital initiative to address key priorities, starting with COVID-19. Overall, tailored platforms can help bridge existing gaps in resource, program, and service access in Indigenous communities, irrespective of their location across the world.

Supporting information

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0279282.s001

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to acknowledge the contributions of community members of Île-à-la-Crosse. The Elders, youth, and key decision-makers who are part of the Île-à-la-Crosse Citizen Scientist Advisory Council have been invaluable in providing support, guidance, and cultural training to the research team. The authors also acknowledge the support of the Canadian Internet Registration Authority in advancing the uptake of digital health applications.

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• What is a needs assessment? 3 types and ...

What is a needs assessment? 3 types and examples

A needs assessment is a process for determining the needs, otherwise known as "gaps," between current and desired outcomes. When used properly, this assessment provides valuable insight into your team’s processes and highlights areas for efficiency improvements.

When you’re balancing multiple growth initiatives and new projects, it’s hard to know which team improvements to prioritize. Where do you even begin?

When in doubt, try a needs assessment. A needs assessment helps you determine the most important process gaps so you can achieve your desired outcome in the shortest amount of time. Not only will assessing your current processes give you insight into how your team works, but it can also help identify areas of potential efficiency improvements.

What is a needs assessment?

A needs assessment is a process for determining the needs, or "gaps," between a current and desired outcome. It’s a part of strategic planning—essentially, a needs assessment helps you pinpoint how you’ll accomplish your strategic goals. 

A need is an opportunity for improvement within a particular process or system. When you identify—and resolve—needs, you can act on potential new opportunities, like making processes more efficient, streamlining resource allocation , and identifying resource gaps in your current workflow .  

For example, say your team is working on a process to organize customer data. A needs assessment would be a great way to understand where gaps exist in the data collection process—such as missing or inaccurate information—and where internal resources could be better utilized.

What is the purpose of a needs assessment?

A needs assessment identifies areas within your organization that need improvement. Use a needs assessment on existing processes to analyze data and inform internal changes.

Examples of processes you might use a needs assessment to accomplish include:

A process to automate duplicative manual work

A customer journey process that is underperforming

It can be challenging to pinpoint exactly where enhancements are needed. When you’re faced with multiple areas of opportunity, a needs analysis can help you identify the best areas of improvement. 

Example of a needs assessment

A needs assessment is a great way to improve processes, but it’s not always easy to get started. Start by taking a look at some example questions to get a better understanding of the data you’re looking for.

Success rate questions

What activities must be done to accomplish our objectives? 

What is the probability our solution is a success? 

What tasks are required to successfully solve our needs?

Performance questions

Which KPIs are we using to measure performance?

What does excellent performance look like?

What does current performance look like?

Operational questions

Which stakeholders are involved?

Where does the need occur within the process?

How frequently do we observe the need?

Identifying needs requires team communication, problem solving skills, and out-of-the-box ideas. Use these questions as a jumping off point to get the ball rolling. Once you know which questions to ask, you can begin to gather data. 

How to conduct a needs assessment

A needs assessment is a great way to analyze and interpret relevant data. To do this, you need to understand your team’s baseline needs, as well as the process’s overall desired outcome. 

Success rate questions:

Performance questions:

Operational questions:

Identifying needs requires team communication, problem-solving skills, and out-of-the-box ideas. Use these questions as a jumping-off point to get the ball rolling. Once you know which questions to ask, you can begin to gather data.

6 steps for conducting a needs assessment

A needs assessment is a great way to analyze and interpret relevant data that will influence your decision-making. To do this, you need to understand your team’s baseline needs, as well as the process’s overall desired outcome. 

Enlist the help of key stakeholders, funders, and decision makers and collect feedback through meetings or brainstorming sessions. However you choose to start, here are the four steps to follow when conducting a needs assessment. 

1. Identify your team’s needs

To determine the gaps between existing and ideal processes, you first need to understand what the ideal process looks like. Clear objectives are the best way to ensure you’re creating a measurable, actionable, and results-oriented needs assessment. 

Before you can start collecting and analyzing information for your needs assessment, take some time to consider your desired outcomes. Set objectives and gather data on areas of opportunity to plan deadlines and understand the intended outcome. 

Your team members are probably closer to the process than you are, and they have valuable insight into potential process improvements. Gather feedback from your project team, or host a general brainstorming session to identify your team’s biggest gaps. 

Work with your team to answer the following questions: 

What needs are you trying to solve? 

How is this process currently implemented? 

Where are the biggest opportunity gaps? 

What are your desired outcomes? 

Are you looking to solve a specific problem or a more general process? 

Do you have clear, measurable data sources? 

How will you measure success?

2. Measure and allocate your resources

Before you start your assessment, decide exactly how much bandwidth your team has and how much you’re willing to spend on the project. Also, determine how much time you’re giving yourself to meet your goals. Do you want to fill the gaps in six months? A year? Knowing exactly how much bandwidth you have will allow you to take a systematic approach to your report. 

Your team’s availability and organizational resources will impact the comprehensiveness of your needs assessment. If you allot more time to your needs assessment, you’ll be able to spend more time on data collection. 

3. Collect internal information

Next, gather information and collect data on how to best solve the identified gaps. Remember that the goal of a needs assessment is to understand how to get from your current process to the desired outcome. 

Gather data from various departments and stakeholders who are closest to the process. At this point, you’ve already brainstormed with your close project team members, but it’s also critical to understand what your cross-functional partners need from this process improvement as well. 

In order to create a good needs assessment, you need detailed information, so encourage stakeholders to share in depth data about their specific needs. The more information you have, the more likely your needs assessment is to succeed.

Some questions to consider when gathering information include: 

Where are improvements needed?

Why are current methods underperforming?

Do we have enough resources to execute a more successful process?

These questions will help you gather the necessary details to move on to step four.

4. Gather external information

Once you’ve gathered information from your project team and from cross-functional stakeholders, all that’s left is to gather information from external sources. Getting information from external sources, in addition to your internal collaborators, gives you a bird’s-eye view of the process from start to finish. 

There are multiple ways to gather external information on your target group, including:

Customer questionnaires: Used to gather quick, high-level customer data from multiple geographical locations

Focus groups: Used to gather in-depth information from a specific geographical location

It’s also a good idea to enlist a fresh pair of eyes to follow the process from start to finish to catch additional inefficiencies. While the type of needs assessment technique you use will depend on your situation, you should opt for the one that gives you the best chance of correcting inefficiencies.

5. Get feedback

A needs assessment is all about corporate and community needs. Test your findings with diverse groups of people who might have varying perspectives (and biases ) on your data. Share it with stakeholders and community members alike to gauge how both your higher-ups and target audience are going to react to any process changes. 

A few people who may want to see your assessment include: 

Project partners

Community members

Stakeholders

With the feedback you receive, you can make any necessary adjustments to the report before you start making large-scale changes to your identified needs. 

6. Use your data

At this point, you’ve collected all of the information you can. The only thing left to do is to use your needs assessment results and insights to make a final report and an action plan.

Use the information you gathered in steps one through five to transform your needs assessment data into a cumulative report. In addition to the notes, details, and observations you’ve made during your brainstorming sessions, add a summary documenting the next steps—in particular, the phases, technical assistance, training programs, and other components that will help you implement the process changes. 

Implementing the results of your needs assessment will take time. Make sure your team has an effective process in place to guide the improvement, like:

Project management tools : Help to organize information and communicate with team members

Change management : Assists with documenting need and gap changes

Business process management (BPA) : Helps to analyze and improve processes

Process implementation planning : Outlines the steps needed to reach a shared goal

Needs assessment examples

There are many different data collection methods—from quantitative techniques like surveys to qualitative techniques such as focus groups. Your target demographic may influence your methodology, so take into account whose perspective you’re looking for before you decide. 

Needs assessments provide crucial data on existing processes and help teams create more effective systems. 

Here are three of the most popular methods of collecting needs assessment data:

Questionnaires

Questionnaires and interviews are the most popular methods for collecting data. A questionnaire is a surface-level form with general yes or no questions. This is a great way to get quick information from respondents.

Use for things like: Evaluating the effectiveness of your brand identity

Many teams use surveys to collect external information around customer experience. Surveys often include open-ended questions, so they provide more in-depth information than questionnaires. This is a great way to find accurate but quick information.

Use for things like: Evaluating the success of your post-purchase experience from the customer’s perspective

Focus groups

A focus group is an interview involving a small number of participants who share common traits or experiences. While they require considerably more time than the other two methods, focus groups provide extensive information around needs and customer experience. This is a great way to gather in-depth information.

Use for things like: Evaluating how your customers experience your brand and what they think could be improved

Identify your team’s needs with an analysis

Performing a needs assessment is a great way to understand how current processes are being handled and how you can streamline tasks and communication. Knowing which needs are most important isn’t always obvious. With a needs analysis, you can gather the data you need to make your team more efficient. 

If you’re looking to improve efficiency and productivity as a team, keep information and tasks streamlined with productivity software. From empowering collaboration to creating and sharing templates, Asana can help.

Related resources

Unmanaged business goals don’t work. Here’s what does.

How Asana uses work management to drive product development

How Asana uses work management to streamline project intake processes

How Asana uses work management for smoother creative production

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Qualitative Research: Needs Assessment

• Needs Assessment
• Focus Groups
• Oral Histories
• Evaluating Qualitative Research
• Qualitative Data Analysis Tools

What is needs assessment?

Definitions of needs assessment may vary by purpose.

Curriculum and Training Development

A needs assessment is the process of collecting information about an expressed or implied organizational need that could be met by conducting training. ( Source )

Program Planning

Needs assessment has been defined as the process of measuring the extent and nature of the needs of a particular target population so that services can respond to them. ( Source )

An analysis of requirements. It determines what people, functions or systems are currently lacking in order to achieve the goals of an organization. A needs assessment also prioritizes the requirements so that the most glaring deficiency can be fulfilled first. ( Source )

Conducting Needs Assessments

• Assessing Community Needs & Resources
• Community Health Assessment and Group Evaluation (CHANGE) Created by the CDC
• Needs Assessment Guide Developed by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
• Other Resources for Community Health Assessment Resource list provided by the CDC

Needs Assessment Techniques

• Using Community Meetings
• Gaining Consensus among Stakeholders through the Nominal Group Technique
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• Last Updated: Mar 21, 2024 3:14 PM
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3 Selecting a Needs Assessment Design

• Published: April 2009
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This chapter presents a range of needs assessment data collection methods organized by intensity and scientific rigor based on a needs assessment team's time, resources, and expertise. The chapter illustrates that choosing the right design is important because it guides the overall approach and structures the questions to be addressed, the data to be collected, the data analysis, and the conclusions and interpretations can be drawn from the data in the final report. Examples of needs assessment designs are discussed including the review of existing and secondary data sources (such as agency records or the US census), impressionistic approaches like focus groups and community forums, and prospective data like surveys and interviews. The chapter explains these methods and provides guidance concerning the strengths and weaknesses of the various needs assessment approaches.

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• Research article
• Open access
• Published: 07 March 2012

Community based needs assessment in an urban area; A participatory action research project

• Saeid Sadeghieh Ahari 1 ,
• Shahram Habibzadeh 2 ,
• Moharram Yousefi 3 ,
• Firouz Amani 1 &
• Reza Abdi 4  

BMC Public Health volume  12 , Article number:  161 ( 2012 ) Cite this article

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Community assessment is a core function of public health. In such assessments, a commitment to community participation and empowerment is at the heart of the WHO European Healthy Cities Network, reflecting its origins in health for all and the Ottawa Charter for Health Promotion. This study employs a participation and empowerment plan in order to conduct community assessment.

The method of participatory action research (PAR) was used. The study was carried out in an area of high socio-economic deprivation in Ardabil, a city in the northwest of Iran, which is currently served by a branch of the Social Development Center (SDC). The steering committee of the project was formed by some university faculty members, health officials and delegates form Farhikhteh non-governmental organization and representatives from twelve blocks or districts of the community. Then, the representatives were trained and then conducted focus groups in their block. The focus group findings informed the development of the questionnaire. About six hundred households were surveyed and study questionnaires were completed either during face-to-face interviews by the research team (in case of illiteracy) or via self-completion. The primary question for the residents was: 'what is the most important health problem in your community? Each health problem identified by the community was weighted based on the frequency it was selected on the survey, and steering committee perception of the problem's seriousness, urgency, solvability, and financial load.

The main problems of the area appeared to be the asphalt problem , lack of easy access to medical centers , addiction among relatives and unemployment of youth . High participation rates of community members in the steering committee and survey suggest that the PAR approach was greatly appreciated by the community and that problems identified through this research truly reflect community opinion.

Conclusions

Participatory action research is an effective method for community assessments. However, researchers must rigorously embrace principles of mutual cooperation, respect for public ideas, and a robust belief in community empowerment in order to pave the way for responsible and active citizen participation in the various stages of research.

Peer Review reports

Community-based participatory research (CBPR) has been identified as a key strategy for effectively reducing health disparities in underserved communities [ 1 ]. Assessing the health of a community through CBPR was identified as one of the core functions of public health in the Institute of Medicine's The Future of Public Health [ 2 ]. The Future of Public Health (1988) recommended that local public health agencies should "regularly and systematically collect, assemble, analyze, and make available information on the health of the community, including statistics on health status, community health needs, and epidemiologic and other studies of health problems [ 3 ]. However, even when assessments were completed, policy development and assurance mostly did not follow [ 4 , 5 ].

Strong historical roots of assessment can be found in England. John Graunt (1620-1674), an Englishman, is credited to be among the first demographers. His Natural and Political Observations upon the Bills of Mortality written in 1662 demonstrated that there was regularity in mortality and survivorship figures. Yet, William Farr, appointed the first "Compiler of Abstracts" at the General Register Office in July 1839, is generally said to be the first to make use of the standardized mortality rate to adjust for differences in age distribution in different subgroups [ 3 ].

Community health assessment defined

Community health assessment should not be confused with clinical needs assessments, which are routinely performed during an initial visit to a medical care provider. Community health needs assessment produces information that is relevant to groups and is not focused on the medical needs of individuals so that treatment plans can be developed accordingly. Furthermore, community health needs assessment should not be confused with assessment of disease prevention services. Since health is not seen merely as the absence of disease, community health assessment, therefore, focuses on general well-being. Of course, in many cases, disease prevention and promotion of general health overlap [ 6 ].

Definitions of community health assessment (CHA) widely vary. While some definitions focus on data collection and analysis, others highlight the use of assessment data to develop objectives and action plans for health improvement [ 3 ]. A straightforward definition for CHA is "collecting and analyzing, and using data to educate and mobilize communications, develop priorities, garner resources, and plan actions to improve public health [ 7 ]. In this article, we use the term Community Health Assessment (CHA) to describe both the process and the product of assessment, in that population health data are essential to both CHA's process and products. We identify the major components of CHA as community engagement, data access, data analysis, and interpretation.

Community participation and empowerment

Participation by local households would require optimal community engagement [ 8 ]. Assessment partnerships are encouraged in Healthy People 2010 and in state-level public health improvement plans such as Healthiest Wisconsin 2010: A Partnership Plan to Improve the Health of the Public [ 9 ]. A commitment to community participation and empowerment is at the heart of the WHO European Healthy Cities Network (WHOEHCN), reflecting its origins in health for all and the Ottawa Charter for Health Promotion [ 10 ]. Health promotion works through concrete and effective community action in setting priorities, making decisions, planning strategies and implementing them to achieve better health. At the heart of this process is the empowerment of communities, their ownership and control of their own endeavors and destinies [ 11 ]. The subsequent Jakarta Declaration (WHO, 1997) reinforces this focus, giving priority to increasing community capacity and empowering individuals. It emphasizes the necessity of participation, with actions being carried out by and with people, not on or to people [ 12 ].

Although rigorous evidence of the effectiveness of community participation in relation to health is limited, community participation is widely accepted to have many important benefits [ 13 ]. Key benefits include increasing democracy, mobilizing resources and energy, developing more holistic and integrated approaches, achieving better decisions and more effective services, ensuring the ownership and sustainability of programs, and empowering communities [ 14 ].

Participatory action research

Participatory action research (PAR) is a research process that focuses on improving the quality of service by means of a self-reflecting process of exploring and solving problems [ 15 , 16 ]. The basic structure of PAR is an ever increasing spiral process of planning, acting, observing, reflecting, developing theory and re-planning [ 15 ]. Participation, collaboration and mutuality of all participants in all levels of research is effective in identifying and defining the problem, planning the research, collecting and interpreting the data, planning and evaluating the intervention and re-evaluating the problem in light of the new information generated from the implemented activities, and, finally, disseminating the information [ 17 , 18 ]. PAR works with a community, which is defined as a group of people who share a common interest and not necessarily a common geographical location. Empowerment and social change are important goals of PAR. Equality in sharing control and power are basic values of PAR. Through participation in the research process, disempowered participants are expected to lose their fear, and shame, gain self-confidence, self-esteem and control, and develop an understanding of their own value. PAR is highly relevant for work with oppressed and disempowered communities with self-help groups and for health education [ 16 , 19 , 20 ]. The researchers become essentially facilitators or catalysts, and participants become co-learners in PAR; nobody is considered the expert [ 20 ]. Insiders and outsiders work together as equals to solve problems. PAR is subjective and therefore not always neutral [ 17 ]. PAR involves commitment from all participants and requires mutual respect, trust, humility, adaptability and a holistic approach to problem solving. Listening, dialogue and negotiating consensus are strategies to achieve mutuality and empowerment. As stated previously, the PAR process is an open process that requires constant revisiting of previous levels with newly generated knowledge from actions taken, which then help to reshape the problem and resolve it at a deeper level [ 20 ].

This paper describes a local PAR project to conduct a community health assessment in an urban region of Ardabil, a city in the northwest of Iran. The primary goals of this study were to: 1) demonstrate how health related needs could be assessed through a PAR approach to community participation in an urban community inside a developing country; and 2) encourage community groups and non-state organizations to collaborate to conduct health-related research. The broadness of the issue and diversity of community groups, made both goals challenging from the start.

Study design and community selection

A community PAR was conducted drawing on theories of community mobilization, participation, and empowerment. The steps included 1) establishing the Steering Committee 2) deciding on methods 3) identifying trusted and interested people to form Executive Committees 4) transferring knowledge 5) collecting and weighting data and 6) interpreting data and prioritizing needs.

A local requirement that stipulates that any community based program should be based on a formal demand by the community made us choose a potentially demanding area, based on the criteria of 'low socio-economic status', 'an abundance of various health problems', and a persistent demand on the part of the residents for improvement. The existence of a non-state health center and a high probability of participation were other criteria for choosing this location. At a meeting with delegates from Health Department of Ardabil Medical University, Mayoralty, and Welfare Organization, an area of about 20000 inhabitants was selected for the study site.

Our research project followed a set of prior activities that were undertaken by some members of the current project with the aim of establishing relationships with the local people and winning their trust. The earlier activities included identifying the trusted individuals, those with philanthropic interests, and those who were interested in local development and trust-building projects. Earlier projects involved repairing small open sewer canals, lighting pathways, holding leisure time classes, building sport teams, allocating library space inside the non-state health center of the region, and providing consultation services. All of the above services were made possible through cooperation between the community representatives and non-state organization agents, who managed to involve and attract the attention of the highest authority of the province in the process.

These successful experiences paved the way for this study. The research committee examined the profiles of the trusted and interested people in voluntary philanthropic activities and outlined the study procedures. Twelve Executive Committees were formed by representatives from 12 Blocks that were selected after considering physical texture and pathways following the blocking system of local community development center.

The most important challenge of this study was to encourage academic researchers and officials of health system to believe in the fact that people can participate in health domain research and be empowered to help conduct health research more effectively.

Involving the community development center and selecting executives

In order to encourage the Community Development Center (CDC) of Ardabil to participate in this study, the general outline was discussed with CDC officials, agents from Farhikhteh non-state organization, and local people, during three 2-hour face to face meetings. Finally, the Executive Team of research project was decided mostly from among the local people and a few number of university colleagues. An attempt was made to select the majority of Executive Team members of the study from among the non-state organizations and local people. The ratio of the university colleagues to other members was 1 to 7. The members of the instruction, documentation, supervision, coordination, interview, and enquiry teams were selected from among the community members of CDC and the Farhikhteh institute. Rigorous care was taken to limit the role of the academic members to instruction and other technical aspects and much of the research task were delegated to the community groups in spite of numerous difficulties.

Knowledge transfer and empowerment

The different methods of community assessment were presented through lectures to all members of the Steering Committee. The group preferred the 'focus group' technique to the other presented methods. The members of the project Executive Team and the representatives of the twelve blocks, who were selected from among interested people based on the documents of the Social Research Center , attended focus group workshops for two months. In addition, a questionnaire designing workshop and the data entering methods were hold for the community members of the project. The instruction prepared members for full participation; in practice, much of the job was delegated to ordinary members of the Executive Committees.

Method of data collection

The trained community agents of the Executive Committees held group discussions in the twelve blocks with an average attendance of 8 to 14 neighborhood residents with the retention rate of about 70%. On the whole, three group discussions were held in every block by agents who were fluent in both Turkish and Persian. 1 The invited people included local retailers, state employees, housewives, pensioners, trustees, and active youth from the local blocks. The people attending the discussions were also supposed to act as facilitators of the research and prepare the community for full participation.

A note-taker recorded the details of every discussion. The workshops took place in April through May, 2006. The venues for the workshops were decided based on the convenience of each individual group and included the neighbor's homes, local mosques or CDC rooms. During the workshops, the purpose and process of the research was thoroughly explained.

The research process was started with the following statement: " what is the most important problem in your community's health?" . The agents were asked to tell people that "As a member of our community, we want to understand the problems better. It is necessary to know the answer to this question according to your priorities, so that we can suggest an appropriate intervention to health and other officials, and then implement the intervention, and assess the results of our efforts."

From the beginning, it was made clear to the community that health system officials and relevant domains were expected to allocate considerable amounts of time and money on an annual basis to improve health condition. However, the main challenge was to decide on the priorities from the perspectives of the locals.

Each block team was given the mission to discover the most important problems in their community.

After finishing the workshops, the results were reported to the Steering Committee by the representatives of the groups. The final procedure was agreed to by the Steering Committee with the cooperation of agents of Farhikhteh Institute and representatives of twelve local areas.

Subsequently, in order to assess the needs from the perspectives of the households of the blocks, the Steering Committee planned more workshops to empower the community groups to design the questionnaire and conduct interviews. Three 1-day workshops were planned and implemented in July through August, 2006.

The Steering Committee, representatives of twelve blocks and Farhikhteh institute agreed on a questionnaire which included 60 yes-no items. The items were related to the general problems of local people such as health, security, economy, employment, and education. Subsequently, a final orientation session was held for all the local interviewers to practice completing the questionnaire.

The community interviewers of 12 local areas and their supervisors, from among the members of the Executive Committees interviewed 30 households from the 12 blocks and repeated it after a 14-day interval in order to check the reliability of the instrument, which was found to be 0.76.

Six hundred households were interviewed in September 2006. The target households were selected through cluster random sampling using the CDC database. Considering the population (20,000) and the average number of family members (4.3) in Iran [ 20 ], 600 households equaled about 15% of the households. It should be noted that the demographic information of the participants was not systematically gathered. The supervisors examined the daily delivered questionnaires and randomly checked some households for quality assurance purposes.

Method of data analysis

During the Steering Committee's meetings, the necessity of including diverse groups of people was discussed. The best method of implementing community assessment was also discussed. Finally, the Steering Committee decided to apply a mixed model containing surveys and focused group discussion in the local areas.

The first set of data was produced following analysis of the priorities offered by 12 local groups which represented each block. Then, face-to-face interviews were carried out with [almost all] 600 households of the selected area, to create a second dataset. With consistent supervision and training, the community groups entered the data into the computer as planned. They cooperated with a statistician to analyze the data. Finally, the output of the data which comprised five main problems from the perspective of 600 households was produced.

Ethical considerations

This study was approved in the research committee of Ardabil University of Medical sciences, which considers and verifies the research proposals both academically and ethically. It should also be noted that participation in this project has been voluntary for all the community representatives and the agents of Farhikhteh institute of Ardabil. In the first meeting, their option to leave or continue the study was explained to them formally at the beginning and during the study. The researcher after acknowledging their participation in the project ensured the privacy of the data. Additionally, an attempt was made to employ both female and male colleagues to observe the religious and cultural norms and values.

In the first stage of analysis, the needs of 12 local areas were identified. The number of identified needs for the neighborhoods varied from 8 to 24. As it can be seen in Table 1 , the five prioritized problems for each neighborhood are related but not limited to the health domain.

In Table 2 , the results of the analysis of frequency of the problems, from the point of view of 600 households, are displayed.

In the next stage of research, the Steering Committee decided on some more criteria to produce more practical results. The four criteria that were agreed on were: seriousness, urgency, solvability, and financial burden of the problems, which received weights (quotients) of 8.6, 7.5, 5.5, and 4.8, respectively. The frequency criterion received a weight of 6.8. To arrive at these weights, all 30 members of the Steering Committee assigned a weight score of 1-10 to the above five criteria and then the results were averaged out.

When the five criteria and relevant weights were decided, the Committee met again and all 30 members provided a value number of 1-100 to each problem (e.g. lack of adequate pathway lighting) in terms of its seriousness, urgency, solvability, and financial burden. Then, the five values were multiplied by the relevant weight to yield the final score for each problem which appears in Table 3 .

This participatory action research demonstrated that the availability of trusted and philanthropic people could be very helpful at the beginning of the project. This study also revealed that when assessment of the health problems of a community is carried out, other social problems may be observed that influence the community's general health. As confirmed by the data in Table 3 , health is influenced by an array of social factors [ 21 , 22 ].

Working "with people and for people" during the project indicated that efforts for establishing relationships, empowerment, trusting key roles to people, and involving them in health research can pave the way for high community participation. However, convincing people to trust and join the project was a real challenge at the beginning, which was resolved by the perseverance and negotiation of the certain members of the Steering Committee with the trusted group.

The results of study clarified that in working with the community, researchers should ignore their presuppositions, and let participants discover their own problems and needs, which is a crucial step in empowerment.

Participatory researchers in developing countries such as Iran allocate most of their energy to coping with local rules, getting the approval of participatory research projects, and facing objections from traditional researchers.

This study demonstrated that active community participation can be achieved if the following conditions are met:

1. Acknowledging the key role of people in designing and actually conducting studies;

2. Providing adequate training in research methods;

3. Building trust and empowerment;

4. Seriously taking the community's viewpoint into account;

5. Crating a sense of responsibility in the community;

6. Involving a non-state organization in the research as a bridge between the community and the state; and

7. Communicating research results with participants in public forums and newspaper articles.

However, this study could have been more useful if the following limitations were not present. In the first place, we could not secure a full participation of authorities from non-health departments. Secondly, the demographic details was not gathered which could have enriched the interpretation of the data. Thirdly, we could not attract a proportionate participation of women due to cultural constraints. Finally, our project was the first in type in the region both for the members of the steering committee and also the general participants, which frequently resulted in slowing the procedure.

PAR is very applicable for community assessment. However, researchers must rigorously take into account the caveats of mutual cooperation, respect for public ideas, and a robust belief in community empowerment in order to pave the way for people to feel responsible and actively take part in the various stages of research.

The native language of people in Ardabil Province is Turkish, while the official language is Persian. During late decades, the local people have used Turkish for oral conversation and Persian for written communication. Only a quite small number of people are able to read and write in Turkish. However, in accordance with the current traditions and convenience of region, the group discussions were performed in Turkish, but recorded in Persian.

Abbreviations

Social Development Center

Community-Based Participatory Research

Community Health Assessment

Institute of Medicine

WHO European Healthy Cities Network

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Acknowledgements

We express our gratitude to all residents of the region under study who even sometimes received us in their homes. Moreover, we should thank the community agents of the Steering and the Executive Committees of the project which aided us generously and taught us a lot. Finally, we appreciate Research Department of Ardabil University of Medical Sciences that financially supported this project.

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Department of Community Medicine, Ardabil University of Medical Sciences, University street, 5615746765, Ardabil, Iran

Saeid Sadeghieh Ahari & Firouz Amani

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Shahram Habibzadeh

Empowerment Institute, Bakeri street, 5624849658, Ardabil, Iran

Moharram Yousefi

Department of ELT, Faculty of Humanities, University of Mohaghegh Ardabili, University Street, 5619911367, Ardabil, Iran

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Ahari, S.S., Habibzadeh, S., Yousefi, M. et al. Community based needs assessment in an urban area; A participatory action research project. BMC Public Health 12 , 161 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1186/1471-2458-12-161

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Tools and instruments for needs assessment, monitoring and evaluation of health research capacity development activities at the individual and organizational level: a systematic review

• Johanna Huber 1 ,
• Sushil Nepal 1 ,
• Daniel Bauer 1 ,
• Insa Wessels 2 ,
• Martin R Fischer 1 &
• Claudia Kiessling 1 , 3  

Health Research Policy and Systems volume  13 , Article number:  80 ( 2015 ) Cite this article

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In the past decades, various frameworks, methods, indicators, and tools have been developed to assess the needs as well as to monitor and evaluate (needs assessment, monitoring and evaluation; “NaME”) health research capacity development (HRCD) activities. This systematic review gives an overview on NaME activities at the individual and organizational level in the past 10 years with a specific focus on methods, tools and instruments. Insight from this review might support researchers and stakeholders in systemizing future efforts in the HRCD field.

A systematic literature search was conducted in PubMed and Google Scholar. Additionally, the personal bibliographies of the authors were scanned. Two researchers independently reviewed the identified abstracts for inclusion according to previously defined eligibility criteria. The included articles were analysed with a focus on both different HRCD activities as well as NaME efforts.

Initially, the search revealed 700 records in PubMed, two additional records in Google Scholar, and 10 abstracts from the personal bibliographies of the authors. Finally, 42 studies were included and analysed in depth. Findings show that the NaME efforts in the field of HRCD are as complex and manifold as the concept of HRCD itself. NaME is predominately focused on outcome evaluation and mainly refers to the individual and team levels.

A substantial need for a coherent and transparent taxonomy of HRCD activities to maximize the benefits of future studies in the field was identified. A coherent overview of the tools used to monitor and evaluate HRCD activities is provided to inform further research in the field.

Peer Review reports

The capacity to cope with new and ill-structured situations is a crucial ability in today’s world. Developing this ability, by shaping empowered citizens, challenges individuals as well as organisations and societies. This process of empowerment is usually referred to as capacity development (CD) [ 1 ]. While this term has been commonly used for years in the field of foreign aid, other societal and political domains (e.g. social work, education and health systems) are increasingly adopting the concept of CD when developing new or existing competencies, structures, and strategies for building resilient individuals and organizations [ 2 ]. Also in the field of health research, an increasing number of activities to strengthen health research competencies and to support organizations can be observed – as demanded by the three United Nations Millennium Development Goals addressing health related issues [ 3 – 6 ]. Several frameworks are already in use that support a structured approach to health research capacity development (HRCD) and address competencies that are specific to health research [ 7 – 9 ]. These frameworks usually incorporate the individual or team, organization or institution, and society levels [ 8 , 10 , 11 ]. One conclusion that can be drawn from the available evidence is that, in such a structured approach to HRCD efforts, meaningful data collection is crucial. First, data collection incorporates the HRCD needs assessment and second, the monitoring and evaluation (NaME) of activities and programs once implemented. Therefore, HRCD activities should address the needs as assessed. Monitoring and evaluation of these activities should reflect the desired outcomes as defined beforehand [ 12 – 15 ]. Bates et al. [ 16 ] indicate how data collection tools and instruments are usually developed for a certain purpose in a certain context. The context specificity of tools and instruments has to be considered and the appropriateness of these must be determined when selecting instruments for any needs assessment for a new project. This article offers a systematic review of tools and instruments for the NaME of HRCD activities at the individual or team and the organizational levels to aid HRCD initiatives in selecting appropriate tools and instruments for data collection within their respective context. For this purpose, a range of studies published between January 1, 2003, and June 30, 2013, were chosen and analysed based on different context parameters such as the level of the CD and the nature of the HRCD activities.

We followed the PRISMA checklist for reporting systematic reviews and meta-analyses [ 17 ]. Inclusion and analysis criteria were defined in advance and documented in a protocol (Tables  1 and 2 ).

Information sources and search strategy

We conducted the systematic literature search in July 2013. The search was done in both the literature database PubMed and the search engine Google Scholar. We applied the three search terms “capacity building” AND “research ” , “capacity development” AND “research”, and “capacity strengthening” AND “research”. We checked the first 200 hits in Google Scholar for each search term. “Health” and “evaluation” were not included in the search terms as a pre-test search had revealed this would exclude relevant literature. Articles from personal bibliographies of the authors were also included.

Inclusion categories and criteria

The inclusion process was structured along the five inclusion categories ‘capacity development’, ‘research’, ‘health profession fields’, ‘monitoring and evaluation’, and ‘level of NaME’. Table  1 gives a detailed overview of all descriptions and operationalisations used.

The category ‘capacity development’ [ 18 ] represents an exemplary definition which serves as a guideline for inclusion but should not to be applied word by word. ‘Research’ was operationalized according to the categories of the ‘research spider’ [ 19 ]. Some process-related research skills as well as communicational and interpersonal skills were added to our operationalisation [ 20 ]. Main health professions were identified and grouped within different fields. NaME was operationalized according to a self-constructed NaME framework of HRCD activities (Fig.  1 ), which summarizes 13 HRCD/NaME frameworks [ 2 , 5 , 8 , 10 – 13 , 15 , 21 – 25 ] and reflects the level of HRCD, common indicators, and the order (from needs assessment to impact evaluation) commonly used in the original frameworks.

Framework for needs assessment, monitoring and evaluation (NaME) of health research capacity development (HRCD) [ 2 , 5 , 8 , 10 – 13 , 15 , 21 – 25 ].

For the categories ‘research’, ‘health profession fields’ and ‘monitoring and evaluation’, at least one of the operationalisations of each category had to be addressed by the study. The category ‘level of NaME’ was operationalized referring to the ESSENCE framework ‘Planning, monitoring and evaluation framework for capacity strengthening in health research’ which describes three CD levels: individual and/or team, organizational, and system levels [ 10 ]. Only publications focussing on NaME on the individual/team and organizational levels were considered for this review.

Additionally, the following eligibility criteria were set: English or German language, publication period from January 1, 2003, to June 30, 2013, intervention, non-intervention and multiple design studies (Fig.  2 ). We excluded grey literature, editorials, comments, congress abstracts, letters, and similar. Articles focussing on institutional networks with external partners were excluded as well.

Categorization of the study designs. The study designs are restricted to the included studies.

Study selection

Two researchers, JH and SN, independently scanned the abstracts identified for inclusion. In case of disagreement, JH and SN discussed the abstracts in question. If consensus could still not be reached, a third reviewer, CK, was consulted. After consensus on inclusion was reached, the full-texts of all included studies were rechecked for inclusion by JH and SN.

Study analysis procedure

We analysed the included articles according to nine aspects defined in Table  2 .

The search in PubMed revealed 700 suitable records (Fig.  3 ). We removed 27 duplicates, resulting in 673 records for inclusion screening. The first 200 hits for each of the three search terms in Google Scholar were considered, resulting in two additional records after removing duplicates. Furthermore, we included articles from the personal bibliographies of the authors, adding 10 more abstracts after checking for duplicates. Of the 685 records identified, 24 did not contain an abstract, but were preliminarily included for the full-text screening. JH and SN scanned the remaining 661 abstracts in terms of the inclusion criteria, thus excluding 616 records; 45 abstracts and the 24 records without abstracts were considered for full-text screening. After the full-text screening, 42 articles were finally included for further analysis; 37 articles originated from PubMed, one from Google Scholar, and four from the personal bibliographies of the authors.

Flowchart of the inclusion process.

These 42 articles were subsequently analysed along nine aspects (Table  2 ). The results are summarized in Table  3 .

Around half of the NaME studies on HRCD activities were conducted in high-income countries (n = 24) [ 26 ]. Six studies took place in lower-middle-income and two in upper-middle-income economies. Participants of one study were from a low-income country [ 27 ]. Two studies were performed in partnerships between a high-income and several low-, lower-middle and upper-middle-income economies. Mayhew et al. [ 28 ] described a partnership study between two upper-middle income countries and Bates et al. [ 29 ] analysed case studies from two lower-middle-income and two low-income economies. Five authors did not specify the country or region of their studies.

The evaluation focus of the studies was predominately on outcome evaluation (n = 23). Besides that, six studies surveyed the current state, three studies assessed requirements, and two studies investigated needs of HRCD activities. The remaining eight studies combined two evaluation aspects: definition of needs and outcome evaluation (n = 4), analysis of current state and outcome evaluation (n = 1), outcome evaluation and impact evaluation (n = 1), and analysis of current state and definition of needs (n = 1). Jamerson et al. [ 30 ] did not define their focus of evaluation.

Nearly half of the studies investigated HRCD on the individual/team level (n = 20); 16 studies were conducted at both the individual/team and organizational levels. The authors of six studies focused on organizational aspects of HRCD.

Almost all studies (n = 38) described and evaluated HRCD activities; 19 of these HRCD activities were training programmes of predefined duration, lasting between some hours or days up to 2 years. Another nine HRCD activities were perpetual or their duration not specified and 10 studies defined and pre-assessed the setting in preparation of an HRCD activity. The authors of four studies did not specify an HRCD activity, focussing on the development or validation of tools, instruments, and frameworks.

The participants of HRCD activities represent a wide range of health professions (e.g. laboratory scientists, physiotherapists, dentists, pharmacists); 10 studies investigated staff with management tasks in health, e.g. hospital managers, clinical research managers. Nurses participated in eight studies with another eight studies looking into ‘research staff’ and ‘scientists’ with no further description. Medical practitioners were studied in five papers. Besides all these, the background of participants was often not specified beyond general terms like ‘health professionals’, ‘ethic committee members’, ‘scholars’, ‘university faculty members’, or ‘allied health professionals’. In a different approach, Suter et al. [ 31 ] analysed reports and Bates et al. [ 29 ] investigated case studies (without specifying the material scrutinized).

A wide variety of study designs was employed by the studies included in the review. We identified 35 single-study and six multi-study approaches. Of the 35 single-study approaches, 10 were designed as intervention (three with control groups) and 25 as non-intervention studies. Four multi-study approaches combined an intervention study with a non-intervention study. Two multi-study approaches combined different non-intervention studies. Jamerson et al. [ 30 ] did not specify their study design.

Many different tools and instruments for NaME were identified and applied in quantitative, qualitative and mixed mode of analysis. No preferred approach was observed. One third of the studies (n = 16) used a combination of tools for quantitative as well as qualitative analysis. In 13 studies, tools like questionnaires and assessment sheets were applied to evaluate and monitor HRCD activities quantitatively. Evaluation tools, such as interviews, focus group discussions, document analyses, or mapping of cases against evaluation frameworks, were identified in 12 studies and commonly analysed in a qualitative approach. In one study, tools for evaluation were not described at all.

Summary of evidence

The aim of our systematic review was to give an overview on tools and instruments for NaME of HRCD activities on the individual and organizational level; 42 included articles demonstrated a large variety of tools and instruments in specific settings. Questionnaires, assessment sheets and interviews (in qualitative settings) were most commonly applied and in part disseminated for further use, development and validation.

Overall, 36 studies were either conducted on the individual/team or on both individual/team and organizational level. Within these studies, a well-balanced mixture of quantitative, qualitative and mixed tools and modes of analysis were applied. Judging from the depth of these studies, it seems as if NaME of HRCD on the individual level is quite well developed. Only six studies focused exclusively on organizational aspects, almost all with qualitative approaches, indicating that HRCD studies at this level are still mainly exploratory. The organizational level is possibly a more complex construct to measure. The fact that 13 out of 19 studies that broach organizational aspects were conducted in high-income countries might reflect the wider possibilities of these research institutions and indicates a need for more attention to NaME on the organizational level in lower-income settings. Results from these exploratory studies on the organizational level should feed into the development of standardized quantitative indicators more regularly. Qualitative approaches could be pursued for complex and specific constructs not easily covered quantitatively.

By not limiting the primary selection of articles for this review to a specific health profession, it was revealed that staff with management tasks in health research, as well as nurses, were the cohorts most frequently targeted by NaME studies. Further research should concentrate on other health professionals to determine communalities and differences of health-research related skill acquisition and development between health professions. These studies could determine whether and which parts of HRCD and NaME can be considered generic across health professions. Further, we will at some point have to ask, who is being left out and who is not getting access to HRCD programs, and why.

The focus of NaME throughout the studies included in this review was on outcome measurement, regardless of whether these were conducted in high-income, upper-middle, lower-middle, or low-income countries. However, there were only few reports of needs assessment from middle- and low-income economies, while high-income countries regularly give account of current states. While this should not be over-interpreted, it still raises the question of whether the needs assessment in the middle- and low-income countries is being done as thoroughly as warranted, but not reported in the articles, or if these countries’ needs might not always be at the very centre of the HRCD’s attention. While the evaluation of HRCD outcomes is, of course, of importance, more attention should be paid to the sustainability of programs and impact evaluation, e.g. parameters of patient care or societal aspects. Only one study, that of Hyder et al. [ 32 ], made use of one such indicator and assessed the impact of a HRCD training by considering “teaching activities after returning to Pakistan”. The development of valid impact indicators of course constitutes a methodological challenge. Some studies reporting impact evaluation on a system level might of course have been missed due to the search parameters applied.

When undertaking the review, three main methodological weaknesses of this research area became apparent. First, there is a need for common definitions and terminologies to better communicate and compare the HRCD efforts. The analysis of the studies showed that there is an inconsistent use of terms, for example, for CD activities (e.g. training, course, or workshop). Similar problems were already identified in the context of educational capacity building by Steinert et al. [ 33 ], who suggest definitions for different training settings which may also be suitable for a more precise description of CD activities. A common taxonomy for the description of health professionals (i.e. the study participants) would be just as desirable. The use of coherent terms would not only enable the accurate replication of studies but also help in determining whether tools and instruments from one setting can be easily transferred to another. A clear and coherent description of study setting and participants is thus an integral step towards scientific transparency. The incoherent categorisation of study types is probably not a new problem. It is, however, amplified by authors who choose very complex approaches to collect data at different NaME levels with deviating terms to describe these approaches [ 28 , 34 – 36 ].

The second weakness of the research area is the varying adherence to reporting standards. While there are standards available for reporting qualitative or quantitative research (e.g. Rossi et al. [ 12 ], Downing [ 37 ], Mays & Pope [ 38 ]), it seems these or similar recommendations were not frequently considered when reporting or reviewing NaME studies. This was particularly the case in studies with a mixed-method mode of analysis, where the need for more standardised reporting became apparent. Frambach et al.’s [ 39 ] “Quality Criteria in Qualitative and Quantitative Research” could provide guidance, especially for studies with mixed-method approaches. Another important aspect of transparent reporting would be the publication of the tools and instruments used in NaME studies. Of the 42 articles scrutinized during this review, only 15 either disclosed the tools and instruments within the article itself in an appendix or volunteered to have them sent to any audience interested. Of all the tools and instruments disclosed, only two were used in two or more studies. Making the tools and instruments available to the HRCD community would not only allow for their adaptation whenever necessary but, more importantly, support their validation and enhancement.

The last point concerns the study designs implemented. The majority of articles are mainly descriptive, non-intervention studies that only allow for low evidence according to Cochrane standards [ 40 ]. While most HRCD studies conducted in high-income economies were of non-interventional nature, those from low- and middle-income countries were a mix of non-intervention, intervention and multi-study approaches, yielding higher levels of evidence. Of all interventional studies, most employed a quasi-experimental design with only one randomized controlled trial [ 23 ]. The studies reporting HRCD on the institutional level were also primarily on a descriptive level. Cook et al. [ 41 ], however, demand going beyond describing what one did (descriptive studies) or whether an intervention worked or not (justification studies). Instead, they call for analysing how and why a program worked or failed (clarification studies). An in-depth analysis of the effectiveness of different HRCD activities is, however, still lacking.

Limitations of the systematic review

This systematic review displays some methodological limitations itself. The issue of deviating terminologies has been raised earlier. In most cases, we adopted the terms used in the studies themselves, e.g. when reporting the authors’ denoted study designs. In very few cases, we changed or completed terms to make the studies more comparable to others. One example is changing the wording from Green et al.’s [ 35 ] “case study approach” into a “multi-study approach” to match Flyvberg’s taxonomy [ 42 ]. Other limitations typical for reviews may also apply. Relevant sources might not have been detected due to the selected search terms, the range of the data sources, the exclusion of grey literature, and the restriction to English and German sources.

A systematic review on studies from the field of HRCD activities was conducted, with 42 studies being fully analysed. The analysis revealed that a variety of terms and definitions used to describe NaME efforts impedes the comparability and transferability of results. Nevertheless, insight from this review can help to inform researchers and other stakeholders in the HRCD community. A coherent overview on tools and instruments for NaME of HRCD was developed and is provided (Table  3 ).

Furthermore, it is time to set standards for NaME in the HRCD community. Researchers and stakeholders should develop a common research agenda to push, systematise and improve the research efforts in the field of NaME of HRCD activities. To do so, a common language and terminology is required. The conceptualizations used for the purpose of these review can inform this development. On the other hand, we have to critically analyse research gaps in terms of generalizable versus context-specific theories, methods, tools, and instruments. To maximize the benefits and to incorporate different research traditions, these undertakings should be done internationally and multi-professionally within the HRCD community.

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JH and SN designed and conducted the systematic review. JH wrote the draft of the systematic review and revised it according to the commentaries of SN, DB, IW, MF, and CK. JH provided the final version of the manuscript. SN additionally critically reviewed the manuscript and substantially contributed to the final version of the manuscript. DB critically reviewed both the design of the systematic review as well as the manuscript. He was involved in the development of meaningful inclusion criteria. DB contributed substantially to the final version of the manuscript. IW critically reviewed the design of the study and made important suggestions for improvement. She also critically reviewed the manuscript and contributed substantially to the final version of the manuscript. MF critically reviewed the design of the study and the manuscript. He suggested important improvements for the design of the study and substantially contributed to the final version of the manuscript. CK made substantial contributions to the design, conduction and review of the study, and was the third reviewer during the inclusion process of the identified studies. She critically reviewed the manuscript and delivered important improvements for the final version of the manuscript.

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Huber, J., Nepal, S., Bauer, D. et al. Tools and instruments for needs assessment, monitoring and evaluation of health research capacity development activities at the individual and organizational level: a systematic review. Health Res Policy Sys 13 , 80 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12961-015-0070-3

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Community Needs Assessment Guide with Examples

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So what if you could leave an even bigger impact, just by doing a bit of research in advance?

A community needs assessment is a systematic review of the existing programs in the community to determine if there are any gaps.

The results of the assessment can identify where needs are not being met and may help you design a new program, or shift focus slightly so you and your volunteer team can better serve the community.

A community needs assessment is not a quick process, but it is well worth the time and effort. 

So let’s take a look at why community needs assessments are so important, how to conduct an assessment and analyze your findings, plus look over an example action plan to help you get started. 

What is a community needs assessment?

Community Needs Assessments seek to gather accurate information representative of the needs of a community. Assessments are performed prior to taking action and are used to determine current situations and identify issues for action. Needs assessments establish the essential foundation for vital planning,” according to learningtogive.org .

A finalized community needs assessment will:

• Identify the essential resources that are already available within the community.
• Identify the essential resources missing.
• Determine how best to use, develop, or obtain those resources.

What are the 3 main categories of community needs assessment?

A final outcome will usually determine that changes need to be either:

1. Policy, law or guideline changes to help change behavior.

This may mean campaigning to change laws that mean all drivers under the age of 23 must have a blood alcohol level of 0.0 at all times, in response to an increase in youth car accidents.

2. System changes that may affect social norms, institutions or standard practice

This may mean bringing in more alcohol-free drink options, increasing advertising targeting young drivers around the dangers of drink driving.

3. Environmental changes that include social, economic or physical changes designed to influence behaviors.

This may see taxi fares reduced for youths, or non profits organizing free courtesy buses home from local drinking establishments.

Why are community needs assessments important to volunteer organizations?

The usual mission of non profit volunteer organizations is to better serve the community, however communities are not a set construct. They are continually changing, from the average age of the population, the ethnic composition, unemployment rate, as well as general social, cultural, and economic changes which alter the character of a community. 

So by performing a community needs assessment, non profit organizations can effectively determine the current community needs and work towards solving them.

While in the past, non profits may not have had the experience or resources to undertake strategic planning, many are now recognizing that a little bit of planning goes a long way.

So a community needs assessment has become a key tool, alongside volunteer management software and volunteer management plans , to help non profits maximize their impact. Strategic planning can also help them stay competitive, attract more volunteers and donors, and plan effectively for the future. 

What are community needs?

Firstly, we want to explain what is ‘community needs’?

When we talk about a ‘community’ it’s easy to think of a geographical area. And while this may be the typical community that non profits operate in, there are other ways to define a community, and thus assess its specific needs: 

• Demographics, such as age, gender, race, income level, disabilities
• Places such as community center users, religious associations, schools
• Views and beliefs such as environmentalists, vegans or dog owners.

We can categorize community needs into four major categories:

• Perceived needs: Things that members of the public think they need, and may vary greatly from person to person.
• Expressed needs: These are the things that have been voiced, whether it be to a public official, on a Facebook group or at a community meeting. While they may not be universal, they are real needs.
• Absolute needs: The basics such as clean running water, power, food, safety. If any of these are lacking, they should be an absolute priority.
• Relative needs: These are the things that contribute to a more equitable society. It might be providing laptops for families without one, breakfast at schools for children who don’t eat at home, or visiting dog walkers for elderly residents.

What are examples of community needs?

Community needs and their importance vary greatly between different groups. For example, young mothers probably won’t be worried about the development of a new senior citizens center, however they would find a new playground redevelopment important.

When we’re talking specifically about the needs of a residential community, they can fit into any of the four categories above. According to the National Community Survey (The NCS) in the US, below are the top 10 needs that matter most to residents. They are ranked in order of priority.

Nearly all residents rank safety as top priority in their community. Safety doesn’t necessarily tie in with high crime rates, as things such as graffiti, messy streets, dark alleyways and news articles can all influence perceived safety.

2. Economic health

Good jobs, shops, services and restaurants all rate highly as factors relating to economic independence. However, the more of these services that are available, the higher the cost of living, so this needs to be balanced.

3. Education

No doubt one of the biggest community needs is access to quality education, for both children, adolescents, and older adults. 

4. Natural environment

As people search out clean air, water, open space and nature, communities with easy access to these natural environments are highly rated. And as remote work becomes a growing trend, we’re seeing more and more people move away from cities in search of green space - which creates new needs. 

5. Image/ reputation

People judge the quality of a community by how others view it. Therefore, residents want to see municipalities spend resources on marketing, events, streetscapes, historical attractions, and other community building programs.

6. Appearance

The presence of things such as rubbish, weeds, graffiti, construction, bad roads and other eyesores negatively affect community ratings.

7. Sense of community

Creating opportunities for locals to gather, whether it be at formal events and clubs, parks or cafes, are all big needs in the community. It’s never too late to create these places where people can connect in person.

8. Health and wellness

Across all age groups, residents want to live in places where they can live healthy lives. This includes access to good quality, healthy food, medical services, fitness centers, walking trails and other wellness centers such as swimming pools, spas and allied health services. 

9. Mobility

While mobility – walking paths, cleverly designed streets, lack of congestion and public transport – is important, it is something most people are willing to compromise on in return for safety, economic prospects and good facilities.

10. Built environment

The built environment, housing, town planning and green spaces define the quality of the community. Residents like to feel the area they live in was designed to maximize their quality of life. 

How to conduct a community needs assessment

Conducting a community needs assessment is all about getting out there and speaking to your clients, stakeholders, community partners and members.

There are many ways to consult your community, so you can choose the best processes that match your resources, time and financial situation. But first, you need to define your scope of research.

Define your scope

One of the hardest parts of a community needs assessment is narrowing your focus. If your assessment uncovers many issues in your community, you may be tempted to try to address all of them at once.

However, you will only end up spreading yourself too thin, and wearing out your team and volunteers . So it’s important to define your scope before you start a community needs assessment. This will help you focus your audience and research.

Really think about your organization's skills, mission, volunteer resources and connections  already at your disposal. For example, if your organization addresses food relief in your local area, then taking on a new project rescuing animals will not be the best use of time and resources. However, if your assessment determines that residents also struggle with loneliness, you may be able to combine food relief with social visits and coffee chats by utilizing your existing network and program. After all, many community needs are interconnected, so there may be opportunities to address other gaps without losing focus of your mission. 

Now, let’s take a look at some different research methods to find out exactly what your community needs.

Research and interviews

You can start gathering quantitative information by reading through existing government records, census data, newspaper stories, other agencies and researching on the internet. You may find some research has already been done in this area.

Also, speak to ​influential people in the area such as government officials, school records, community leaders and other non profit organizations and ask them about the important issues in the community and what they think is needed.

• Not too resource intensive
• Can be done over time
• Good background information to guide your next steps
• More problem than solution focused
• Not specific to your area

Questionnaires and surveys

Questionnaires and surveys are two data collection methods that provide a great way to collect information about your area if there isn’t any existing research available. If you have an existing database, you could email the survey to your clients and supporters, or if you are operating in a geographical area, you could deliver a letter with a link to the online survey, or hand it out at shops or markets.

It is likely that a majority of people will not respond, so hand out as many as you can to anyone who shows interest. Once you have numerous responses, you can start seeing trends in the data and you’ll get an idea about key issues. 

Designing the survey is important, and it will differ depending on your goals. If you just want to gauge general community needs, your questions will differ from a survey to gauge information about your organization.

Here are a few sample questions you might like to use:

Demographic info:

• Family status
• Income level
• What do you know about our organization?
• How would you like to see (region/organization/program) change in the next five years?
• Are there needs or gaps in our programs and services that are not being met at the moment?
• Are there any changes taking place in the community that concern you? What are they? What might be done about those changes?
• What programs do you know of that people are trying in other places that we should try in this community?
• What factors are most important to you in a community?
• Any additional comments?
• A cost-effective way to get a lot of information
• Can collect a diverse range of responses
• May not get many responses
• No opportunity to create dialogue
• May be biased results based on survey design

Focus groups

Focus groups really allow you to deep dive into the community’s needs and discuss them. The trick is to gather a wide selection of people - clients, diverse volunteers , community members, other stakeholders, so you can take them through your ideas and get valuable feedback before you make any major plans. Gaining their insight will allow you to adjust your program or operations based on feedback, as well as identifying any potential issues or gaps. 

Make sure to have a facilitator who is able to ensure the session runs smoothly, and they can move the discussion along when needed. Also bring a list of questions, topics or plans to get direct feedback on.

Focus groups do take a bit of organization, and traditionally attendees are given some sort of financial compensation for their time. You may also want to record them to go back over any great insights.

• You can invite a wide variety of people
• You can ask open-ended questions
• Get feedback before implementing changes
• Hard to organize and get people to attend
• You’ll get a lot of opinions, not facts
• Resource intensive

Hosting a community or public forum is a great way to ensure they feel part of the process, and that they have been consulted and heard. Community forums can be extremely valuable and encourage positive steps towards finding solutions that meet a need. The experience, advice, and local knowledge that you gain can be extremely effective, and hard to gain in other avenues.

It’s important to gather as many people from various backgrounds as possible, including other non profit or volunteer charity organizations who may want to address similar topics.

Have a community leader or someone from your organization lead the discussion, with roving microphones to allow the crowd to be heard.

• Great community buy-in
• You can think things through productively as a community
• A lot of work to organize
• Hard to get individual opinions
• Group-speak
• Can go off-topic

Observation

A great way to get unbiased, direct from the source qualitative data is by observing people. You may want to visit places such as aged care facilities, hospitals, schools or community centers, observing and speaking with the visitors. 

This sort of data collection will help you identify gaps or needs that even the community themselves may not even be aware of.

Make sure you ask lots of questions and participate in services and programs.

• Qualitative data
• Very useful findings
• Very individual
• Time-consuming

Analyze your findings

After you’ve collected a large amount of data, it’s time to bring together all your interviews, research, observations and survey responses and analyze it.

Start by sorting your data into groups so you can begin to identify trends and patterns in responses. You may want to use a SWOT template to help you sort out the responses. It also helps to conduct the session as a group with other team members or stakeholders. 

After brainstorming, create a final prioritized list of points in our SWOT analysis template. List the factors in each category from highest to lowest priority.

Identify any areas that appear as strengths of your community. This might be other non profit organizations who are operating in the area, services, community projects such as parks or events, school results or health outcomes. Make note of any strengths that continually pop up in the data or any that are particularly related to your cause.

Identify any gaps in the community services that are currently available. Perhaps residents are continually mentioning that there are not enough places to walk safely, or children have nowhere to play outside. Or maybe the data findings outline the lack of jobs for teenagers, or lack of maternity services for mothers. These weaknesses will help you identify gaps and guide your next steps.

Opportunities

Identify opportunities that already exist within your community that you can take advantage of as you make plans. Opportunities might include partnering with other organizations, taking learnings from similar non profits operating in other geographical areas, extending existing services, or funding schemes you can apply for.

Note down any threats or challenges that appear in the data. These are the things that could derail your plans or make it challenging to operate. This could include changes to funding, distrust in the community, lack of available volunteers, a changing population, or other external factors threatening the safety of the community.

Make a plan

The final step in the community needs assessment is to make a plan of attack.

Based on the survey results and the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats identified, you should be able to identify the major community gaps and needs. 

The community needs assessment should conclude with recommendations as to what gaps your non profit organization will address. Consider how you will address them, why is your organization the best to do that, and how will you communicate with stakeholders?

It’s also important to consider how you can use your existing volunteer network to run the program, or how you will recruit more volunteers . 

A complete volunteer management plan and volunteer management software such as Rosterfy will be essential towards ensuring the new program will be effective and sustainable.

Don’t forget to communicate your new program with as many people as possible to ensure it has a successful launch. Recruit volunteers, ask existing volunteers to share with their networks, issue a press release, emails, social media announcements and at community events. The more engagement you can generate, the more reach and impact you’ll make. 

Community needs assessment example

Creating an action plan is the document that will guide your internal actions, so everyone knows exactly what needs to be done, by when, who is responsible, and what are the indicators of success.

We’ve created a community needs assessment example action plan below for a fictional non profit organization.

From their community needs assessment, they identified that the community is recording poor health outcomes in the 18-30’s age group. They found that these people, both male and female, are lacking sufficient health and fitness activities and the obesity level is rising within this group.

So the fictional non profit organization Fit4Life is launching a new service aimed at engaging this group in fun, free and accessible exercise activities.

Conducting a community needs assessment is an important tool that non profit organizations can use to identify gaps and plan services accordingly.

And while it does take a lot of time and effort to conduct a community needs assessment, you don’t need to start completely from scratch.

There are plenty of great resources out there that can help guide your research and give you the basic structure to follow. Check out these resources to help you get started:

• Australian Institute of Family Studies : This resource is for practitioners and policy makers who want to learn more about the needs assessment process or how to conduct a needs assessment.
• Community Needs assessment workbook by American CDC : This workbook effectively guides you through planning for a community needs assessment including the questions to ask, how to review and rate data, develop and prioritize strategies for improvement, and creating an action plan. It’s helpful for any non profit organization.
• Community Toolbox from Kansas University : Another great tool that will guide you through a community needs assessment as a group. Simply download and follow.
• Rural Health Information Hub : Rural communities have limited resources to address many health-related needs, so this evidence based toolkit helps frame rural health programs.

We’ve also got plenty more great resources on the Rosterfy blog . 

Keep reading more about volunteer management :

• Non profit event management: The ultimate guide for success
• How to write a volunteer job description
• 10 ways to promote volunteer diversity and inclusion

About Rosterfy

Rosterfy exists to connect communities to events and causes they are passionate about through volunteer and paid workforce management technology. Our proven end to end technology allows charities, events and organizations to recruit , register , screen , train , manage and report with ease, replacing manual processes with automations to better engage and retain your volunteers.

If you’d like to learn more about how Rosterfy can help you recruit and manage a diverse team of volunteers, why not book a demo of our product today?

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Tools and instruments for needs assessment, monitoring and evaluation of health research capacity development activities at the individual and organizational level: a systematic review

Johanna huber.

Institut für Didaktik und Ausbildungsforschung in der Medizin, Klinikum der Universität München, Ziemssenstraße 1, 80336 Munich, Germany

Sushil Nepal

Daniel bauer, insa wessels.

bologna.lab, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, Hausvogteiplatz 5-7, 10117 Berlin, Germany

Martin R Fischer

Claudia kiessling.

Medizinische Hochschule Brandenburg Theodor Fontane, Fehrbelliner Straße 38, 16816 Neuruppin, Germany

In the past decades, various frameworks, methods, indicators, and tools have been developed to assess the needs as well as to monitor and evaluate (needs assessment, monitoring and evaluation; “NaME”) health research capacity development (HRCD) activities. This systematic review gives an overview on NaME activities at the individual and organizational level in the past 10 years with a specific focus on methods, tools and instruments. Insight from this review might support researchers and stakeholders in systemizing future efforts in the HRCD field.

A systematic literature search was conducted in PubMed and Google Scholar. Additionally, the personal bibliographies of the authors were scanned. Two researchers independently reviewed the identified abstracts for inclusion according to previously defined eligibility criteria. The included articles were analysed with a focus on both different HRCD activities as well as NaME efforts.

Initially, the search revealed 700 records in PubMed, two additional records in Google Scholar, and 10 abstracts from the personal bibliographies of the authors. Finally, 42 studies were included and analysed in depth. Findings show that the NaME efforts in the field of HRCD are as complex and manifold as the concept of HRCD itself. NaME is predominately focused on outcome evaluation and mainly refers to the individual and team levels.

A substantial need for a coherent and transparent taxonomy of HRCD activities to maximize the benefits of future studies in the field was identified. A coherent overview of the tools used to monitor and evaluate HRCD activities is provided to inform further research in the field.

The capacity to cope with new and ill-structured situations is a crucial ability in today’s world. Developing this ability, by shaping empowered citizens, challenges individuals as well as organisations and societies. This process of empowerment is usually referred to as capacity development (CD) [ 1 ]. While this term has been commonly used for years in the field of foreign aid, other societal and political domains (e.g. social work, education and health systems) are increasingly adopting the concept of CD when developing new or existing competencies, structures, and strategies for building resilient individuals and organizations [ 2 ]. Also in the field of health research, an increasing number of activities to strengthen health research competencies and to support organizations can be observed – as demanded by the three United Nations Millennium Development Goals addressing health related issues [ 3 – 6 ]. Several frameworks are already in use that support a structured approach to health research capacity development (HRCD) and address competencies that are specific to health research [ 7 – 9 ]. These frameworks usually incorporate the individual or team, organization or institution, and society levels [ 8 , 10 , 11 ]. One conclusion that can be drawn from the available evidence is that, in such a structured approach to HRCD efforts, meaningful data collection is crucial. First, data collection incorporates the HRCD needs assessment and second, the monitoring and evaluation (NaME) of activities and programs once implemented. Therefore, HRCD activities should address the needs as assessed. Monitoring and evaluation of these activities should reflect the desired outcomes as defined beforehand [ 12 – 15 ]. Bates et al. [ 16 ] indicate how data collection tools and instruments are usually developed for a certain purpose in a certain context. The context specificity of tools and instruments has to be considered and the appropriateness of these must be determined when selecting instruments for any needs assessment for a new project. This article offers a systematic review of tools and instruments for the NaME of HRCD activities at the individual or team and the organizational levels to aid HRCD initiatives in selecting appropriate tools and instruments for data collection within their respective context. For this purpose, a range of studies published between January 1, 2003, and June 30, 2013, were chosen and analysed based on different context parameters such as the level of the CD and the nature of the HRCD activities.

We followed the PRISMA checklist for reporting systematic reviews and meta-analyses [ 17 ]. Inclusion and analysis criteria were defined in advance and documented in a protocol (Tables  1 and ​ and2 2 ).

Description and operationalization of the five inclusion categories

Nine aspects for further analysis of the included studies

Information sources and search strategy

We conducted the systematic literature search in July 2013. The search was done in both the literature database PubMed and the search engine Google Scholar. We applied the three search terms “capacity building” AND “research ” , “capacity development” AND “research”, and “capacity strengthening” AND “research”. We checked the first 200 hits in Google Scholar for each search term. “Health” and “evaluation” were not included in the search terms as a pre-test search had revealed this would exclude relevant literature. Articles from personal bibliographies of the authors were also included.

Inclusion categories and criteria

The inclusion process was structured along the five inclusion categories ‘capacity development’, ‘research’, ‘health profession fields’, ‘monitoring and evaluation’, and ‘level of NaME’. Table  1 gives a detailed overview of all descriptions and operationalisations used.

The category ‘capacity development’ [ 18 ] represents an exemplary definition which serves as a guideline for inclusion but should not to be applied word by word. ‘Research’ was operationalized according to the categories of the ‘research spider’ [ 19 ]. Some process-related research skills as well as communicational and interpersonal skills were added to our operationalisation [ 20 ]. Main health professions were identified and grouped within different fields. NaME was operationalized according to a self-constructed NaME framework of HRCD activities (Fig.  1 ), which summarizes 13 HRCD/NaME frameworks [ 2 , 5 , 8 , 10 – 13 , 15 , 21 – 25 ] and reflects the level of HRCD, common indicators, and the order (from needs assessment to impact evaluation) commonly used in the original frameworks.

Framework for needs assessment, monitoring and evaluation (NaME) of health research capacity development (HRCD) [ 2 , 5 , 8 , 10 – 13 , 15 , 21 – 25 ].

For the categories ‘research’, ‘health profession fields’ and ‘monitoring and evaluation’, at least one of the operationalisations of each category had to be addressed by the study. The category ‘level of NaME’ was operationalized referring to the ESSENCE framework ‘Planning, monitoring and evaluation framework for capacity strengthening in health research’ which describes three CD levels: individual and/or team, organizational, and system levels [ 10 ]. Only publications focussing on NaME on the individual/team and organizational levels were considered for this review.

Additionally, the following eligibility criteria were set: English or German language, publication period from January 1, 2003, to June 30, 2013, intervention, non-intervention and multiple design studies (Fig.  2 ). We excluded grey literature, editorials, comments, congress abstracts, letters, and similar. Articles focussing on institutional networks with external partners were excluded as well.

Categorization of the study designs. The study designs are restricted to the included studies.

Study selection

Two researchers, JH and SN, independently scanned the abstracts identified for inclusion. In case of disagreement, JH and SN discussed the abstracts in question. If consensus could still not be reached, a third reviewer, CK, was consulted. After consensus on inclusion was reached, the full-texts of all included studies were rechecked for inclusion by JH and SN.

Study analysis procedure

We analysed the included articles according to nine aspects defined in Table  2 .

The search in PubMed revealed 700 suitable records (Fig.  3 ). We removed 27 duplicates, resulting in 673 records for inclusion screening. The first 200 hits for each of the three search terms in Google Scholar were considered, resulting in two additional records after removing duplicates. Furthermore, we included articles from the personal bibliographies of the authors, adding 10 more abstracts after checking for duplicates. Of the 685 records identified, 24 did not contain an abstract, but were preliminarily included for the full-text screening. JH and SN scanned the remaining 661 abstracts in terms of the inclusion criteria, thus excluding 616 records; 45 abstracts and the 24 records without abstracts were considered for full-text screening. After the full-text screening, 42 articles were finally included for further analysis; 37 articles originated from PubMed, one from Google Scholar, and four from the personal bibliographies of the authors.

Flowchart of the inclusion process.

These 42 articles were subsequently analysed along nine aspects (Table  2 ). The results are summarized in Table  3 .

Included studies on needs assessment, monitoring and evaluation (NaME) of health research capacity development (HRCD) at the individual and organizational level

a Country group by income according to the World Bank: HIC, High-income country; UMIC, Upper-middle-income country; LMIC, Lower-middle-income country; LIC, Low-income country.

b Sample size.

c See also Figure  2 .

d Sample size not specified.

e Not specified in the article.

Around half of the NaME studies on HRCD activities were conducted in high-income countries (n = 24) [ 26 ]. Six studies took place in lower-middle-income and two in upper-middle-income economies. Participants of one study were from a low-income country [ 27 ]. Two studies were performed in partnerships between a high-income and several low-, lower-middle and upper-middle-income economies. Mayhew et al. [ 28 ] described a partnership study between two upper-middle income countries and Bates et al. [ 29 ] analysed case studies from two lower-middle-income and two low-income economies. Five authors did not specify the country or region of their studies.

The evaluation focus of the studies was predominately on outcome evaluation (n = 23). Besides that, six studies surveyed the current state, three studies assessed requirements, and two studies investigated needs of HRCD activities. The remaining eight studies combined two evaluation aspects: definition of needs and outcome evaluation (n = 4), analysis of current state and outcome evaluation (n = 1), outcome evaluation and impact evaluation (n = 1), and analysis of current state and definition of needs (n = 1). Jamerson et al. [ 30 ] did not define their focus of evaluation.

Nearly half of the studies investigated HRCD on the individual/team level (n = 20); 16 studies were conducted at both the individual/team and organizational levels. The authors of six studies focused on organizational aspects of HRCD.

Almost all studies (n = 38) described and evaluated HRCD activities; 19 of these HRCD activities were training programmes of predefined duration, lasting between some hours or days up to 2 years. Another nine HRCD activities were perpetual or their duration not specified and 10 studies defined and pre-assessed the setting in preparation of an HRCD activity. The authors of four studies did not specify an HRCD activity, focussing on the development or validation of tools, instruments, and frameworks.

The participants of HRCD activities represent a wide range of health professions (e.g. laboratory scientists, physiotherapists, dentists, pharmacists); 10 studies investigated staff with management tasks in health, e.g. hospital managers, clinical research managers. Nurses participated in eight studies with another eight studies looking into ‘research staff’ and ‘scientists’ with no further description. Medical practitioners were studied in five papers. Besides all these, the background of participants was often not specified beyond general terms like ‘health professionals’, ‘ethic committee members’, ‘scholars’, ‘university faculty members’, or ‘allied health professionals’. In a different approach, Suter et al. [ 31 ] analysed reports and Bates et al. [ 29 ] investigated case studies (without specifying the material scrutinized).

A wide variety of study designs was employed by the studies included in the review. We identified 35 single-study and six multi-study approaches. Of the 35 single-study approaches, 10 were designed as intervention (three with control groups) and 25 as non-intervention studies. Four multi-study approaches combined an intervention study with a non-intervention study. Two multi-study approaches combined different non-intervention studies. Jamerson et al. [ 30 ] did not specify their study design.

Many different tools and instruments for NaME were identified and applied in quantitative, qualitative and mixed mode of analysis. No preferred approach was observed. One third of the studies (n = 16) used a combination of tools for quantitative as well as qualitative analysis. In 13 studies, tools like questionnaires and assessment sheets were applied to evaluate and monitor HRCD activities quantitatively. Evaluation tools, such as interviews, focus group discussions, document analyses, or mapping of cases against evaluation frameworks, were identified in 12 studies and commonly analysed in a qualitative approach. In one study, tools for evaluation were not described at all.

Summary of evidence

The aim of our systematic review was to give an overview on tools and instruments for NaME of HRCD activities on the individual and organizational level; 42 included articles demonstrated a large variety of tools and instruments in specific settings. Questionnaires, assessment sheets and interviews (in qualitative settings) were most commonly applied and in part disseminated for further use, development and validation.

Overall, 36 studies were either conducted on the individual/team or on both individual/team and organizational level. Within these studies, a well-balanced mixture of quantitative, qualitative and mixed tools and modes of analysis were applied. Judging from the depth of these studies, it seems as if NaME of HRCD on the individual level is quite well developed. Only six studies focused exclusively on organizational aspects, almost all with qualitative approaches, indicating that HRCD studies at this level are still mainly exploratory. The organizational level is possibly a more complex construct to measure. The fact that 13 out of 19 studies that broach organizational aspects were conducted in high-income countries might reflect the wider possibilities of these research institutions and indicates a need for more attention to NaME on the organizational level in lower-income settings. Results from these exploratory studies on the organizational level should feed into the development of standardized quantitative indicators more regularly. Qualitative approaches could be pursued for complex and specific constructs not easily covered quantitatively.

By not limiting the primary selection of articles for this review to a specific health profession, it was revealed that staff with management tasks in health research, as well as nurses, were the cohorts most frequently targeted by NaME studies. Further research should concentrate on other health professionals to determine communalities and differences of health-research related skill acquisition and development between health professions. These studies could determine whether and which parts of HRCD and NaME can be considered generic across health professions. Further, we will at some point have to ask, who is being left out and who is not getting access to HRCD programs, and why.

The focus of NaME throughout the studies included in this review was on outcome measurement, regardless of whether these were conducted in high-income, upper-middle, lower-middle, or low-income countries. However, there were only few reports of needs assessment from middle- and low-income economies, while high-income countries regularly give account of current states. While this should not be over-interpreted, it still raises the question of whether the needs assessment in the middle- and low-income countries is being done as thoroughly as warranted, but not reported in the articles, or if these countries’ needs might not always be at the very centre of the HRCD’s attention. While the evaluation of HRCD outcomes is, of course, of importance, more attention should be paid to the sustainability of programs and impact evaluation, e.g. parameters of patient care or societal aspects. Only one study, that of Hyder et al. [ 32 ], made use of one such indicator and assessed the impact of a HRCD training by considering “teaching activities after returning to Pakistan”. The development of valid impact indicators of course constitutes a methodological challenge. Some studies reporting impact evaluation on a system level might of course have been missed due to the search parameters applied.

When undertaking the review, three main methodological weaknesses of this research area became apparent. First, there is a need for common definitions and terminologies to better communicate and compare the HRCD efforts. The analysis of the studies showed that there is an inconsistent use of terms, for example, for CD activities (e.g. training, course, or workshop). Similar problems were already identified in the context of educational capacity building by Steinert et al. [ 33 ], who suggest definitions for different training settings which may also be suitable for a more precise description of CD activities. A common taxonomy for the description of health professionals (i.e. the study participants) would be just as desirable. The use of coherent terms would not only enable the accurate replication of studies but also help in determining whether tools and instruments from one setting can be easily transferred to another. A clear and coherent description of study setting and participants is thus an integral step towards scientific transparency. The incoherent categorisation of study types is probably not a new problem. It is, however, amplified by authors who choose very complex approaches to collect data at different NaME levels with deviating terms to describe these approaches [ 28 , 34 – 36 ].

The second weakness of the research area is the varying adherence to reporting standards. While there are standards available for reporting qualitative or quantitative research (e.g. Rossi et al. [ 12 ], Downing [ 37 ], Mays & Pope [ 38 ]), it seems these or similar recommendations were not frequently considered when reporting or reviewing NaME studies. This was particularly the case in studies with a mixed-method mode of analysis, where the need for more standardised reporting became apparent. Frambach et al.’s [ 39 ] “Quality Criteria in Qualitative and Quantitative Research” could provide guidance, especially for studies with mixed-method approaches. Another important aspect of transparent reporting would be the publication of the tools and instruments used in NaME studies. Of the 42 articles scrutinized during this review, only 15 either disclosed the tools and instruments within the article itself in an appendix or volunteered to have them sent to any audience interested. Of all the tools and instruments disclosed, only two were used in two or more studies. Making the tools and instruments available to the HRCD community would not only allow for their adaptation whenever necessary but, more importantly, support their validation and enhancement.

The last point concerns the study designs implemented. The majority of articles are mainly descriptive, non-intervention studies that only allow for low evidence according to Cochrane standards [ 40 ]. While most HRCD studies conducted in high-income economies were of non-interventional nature, those from low- and middle-income countries were a mix of non-intervention, intervention and multi-study approaches, yielding higher levels of evidence. Of all interventional studies, most employed a quasi-experimental design with only one randomized controlled trial [ 23 ]. The studies reporting HRCD on the institutional level were also primarily on a descriptive level. Cook et al. [ 41 ], however, demand going beyond describing what one did (descriptive studies) or whether an intervention worked or not (justification studies). Instead, they call for analysing how and why a program worked or failed (clarification studies). An in-depth analysis of the effectiveness of different HRCD activities is, however, still lacking.

Limitations of the systematic review

This systematic review displays some methodological limitations itself. The issue of deviating terminologies has been raised earlier. In most cases, we adopted the terms used in the studies themselves, e.g. when reporting the authors’ denoted study designs. In very few cases, we changed or completed terms to make the studies more comparable to others. One example is changing the wording from Green et al.’s [ 35 ] “case study approach” into a “multi-study approach” to match Flyvberg’s taxonomy [ 42 ]. Other limitations typical for reviews may also apply. Relevant sources might not have been detected due to the selected search terms, the range of the data sources, the exclusion of grey literature, and the restriction to English and German sources.

A systematic review on studies from the field of HRCD activities was conducted, with 42 studies being fully analysed. The analysis revealed that a variety of terms and definitions used to describe NaME efforts impedes the comparability and transferability of results. Nevertheless, insight from this review can help to inform researchers and other stakeholders in the HRCD community. A coherent overview on tools and instruments for NaME of HRCD was developed and is provided (Table  3 ).

Furthermore, it is time to set standards for NaME in the HRCD community. Researchers and stakeholders should develop a common research agenda to push, systematise and improve the research efforts in the field of NaME of HRCD activities. To do so, a common language and terminology is required. The conceptualizations used for the purpose of these review can inform this development. On the other hand, we have to critically analyse research gaps in terms of generalizable versus context-specific theories, methods, tools, and instruments. To maximize the benefits and to incorporate different research traditions, these undertakings should be done internationally and multi-professionally within the HRCD community.

Competing interests

The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Authors’ contributions

JH and SN designed and conducted the systematic review. JH wrote the draft of the systematic review and revised it according to the commentaries of SN, DB, IW, MF, and CK. JH provided the final version of the manuscript. SN additionally critically reviewed the manuscript and substantially contributed to the final version of the manuscript. DB critically reviewed both the design of the systematic review as well as the manuscript. He was involved in the development of meaningful inclusion criteria. DB contributed substantially to the final version of the manuscript. IW critically reviewed the design of the study and made important suggestions for improvement. She also critically reviewed the manuscript and contributed substantially to the final version of the manuscript. MF critically reviewed the design of the study and the manuscript. He suggested important improvements for the design of the study and substantially contributed to the final version of the manuscript. CK made substantial contributions to the design, conduction and review of the study, and was the third reviewer during the inclusion process of the identified studies. She critically reviewed the manuscript and delivered important improvements for the final version of the manuscript.

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The Process of Needs Assessment Research Paper

Organization and the audience, needs assessment tool, communication skill, delivery plan, learning outcomes.

The audience that will be engaged in the training is the Saudi Students Organization members. This organization was chosen as a result of a complex needs assessment which aimed at finding and understanding the aspects for improvement. After the estimation, it was identified that the organization is currently facing a problem in the sphere of planning. It is hard for the group to organize the necessary events, follow the plan, and implement its ideas in reality. Therefore, the training and development program will be completed in this organization.

For the process of needs assessment, it was primarily crucial to observe the communication in the group and identify the areas which seemed to lack expertise and professionalism from the organization members. Thus, an overview of the conditions that needed immediate improvement was created. Afterwards, the trainer held the central part of the needs analysis during which the Saudi Students Organization members attended an interview. The dialogue was initiated with the use of open-ended questions. As indicated by Weller et al. (2018), these kinds of inquiries are used “alone or with other techniques to explore topics in depth, to understand processes, and to identify potential causes of observed correlations” (p. 2). For this reason, it can be stated that the use of open-ended questions was appropriate and effective.

Question types used:

• In your opinion, what are the areas that need improvement in your organization?
• How effective is the process of planning and organizing in the workplace?
• What are the main obstacles to the achievement of the organization’s plans and ideas?

Description

Since the needs assessment concluded that the audience encounters a lack of organization and planning, the communication skill that will be trained is planning. As noted by Haythem (2015), “strategic planning is the basis of every common-interest community” (p. 2). Preparation is the process which describes objectives, strategies, directions, and decisions for pursuing the identified goals (Haytem, 2015). The study concluded that planning is the skill that is positively associated with the overall performance of any organization (Haythem, 2015). Moreover, organizing is essential for the procedure of establishing trust and responsibility between individuals (Fox et al., 2017). Hence, without planning and coordinating the work properly, it is hard to achieve desirable results and establish trustful professional relationships within the community.

Training Methods

In order to engage and motivate the participants, the training session will start with an icebreaker game. One of the prime examples of active icebreakers is changing names according to personal preferences and using them throughout the training session. The training itself will be conducted on a practical assignment. After the presentation about planning as an essential communication skill, the participants will be acquainted with a task to plan an event. The engaging and challenging assignment will help individuals to go through a detailed process of organizing, identifying resources and environment and determine the perspectives of the group (Haythem, 2015). Consequently, the training session will be both exciting and challenging for the team members.

Training Objectives

The main objective of the following training and development session is to highlight the importance of planning as a fundamental necessity for a successful working outcome of the organization. Furthermore, another goal is to teach the participants how to use and implement the skill of planning in everyday situations and environments. Finally, the third goal will be to benefit future opportunities for acquiring new skills, knowledge, and competence of the organization members (Mozael, 2015). The achievement of the mentioned training objectives will be ensured by the establishment of positive physical and psychological surroundings and professional preparation and delivery of the session.

Composing a clear delivery plan is vital for the positive outcome of the training session. As mentioned by Mozael (2015), the training plan needs to be made according to the needs and preferences of participants. An entirely developed delivery program encourages an increase in the output and overall performance of the group (Mozael, 2015). The created training session is planned for 5 hours during a weekday and should be held after lunch. The conference consists of various parts, such as a 30-minute presentation, a 2-hour practical assignment, a 1-hour break, a 1-hour task presentation, and 30 minutes for debriefing and questions. The training needs to happen at least once a month. This consistency will ensure a continual practice of the planning skill that will be developed during the session. Some of the verbal and nonverbal skills that are necessary for the trainer are understanding, support, responsiveness, positivity, adaptability, and conflict resolution.

Even though organizations usually invest a lot of time and money in training and development, only a small amount of the knowledge delivered during the sessions is attributed to the everyday environment. For this reason, it is crucial to identify the expected outcomes and evaluate the job of the trainer. As suggested by Kodwani (2017), the awareness of the coach, overall physical and psychological climate, and participant involvement are significantly correlated with the positive outcomes of the training process. Therefore, since the following session is developed with careful consideration, it is expected that the skill of planning will be considerably enhanced. Through the use of icebreaking games, the trainer will ensure the establishment of the needed environment, which will motivate the participants to engage and take advantage of the conference.

In order to objectively evaluate the effectiveness of the program, it is essential to conduct follow-up research regarding the situation in the workplace. The analysis can be done through the completion of a short survey by the participants. The questionnaire will include questions about the current situation in the organization concerning the issue of planning. As concluded by Rehmat et al. (2015), such surveys can help to identify the reaction of people towards the training and understand its performance at a deeper level. Consequently, after the research, it will be easier to indicate the points for improvement and work on them. For now, one thing that can be improved in future training is the length of the session. A 5-hour conference may become boring for the participants at some point, which will lead to the loss of motivation and desire to work. Thus, one of the solutions is to break the session for two days. During the first day, individuals will listen to the presentation and complete the task and, on the second, deliver their results and ask questions.

• Fox, M., Long, D., & Magazzeni, D. (2017). Explainable planning [PDF document]. Web.
• Haythem, A. (2015). The role of strategic planning in performance management. Express, an International Journal of Multi Disciplinary Research , 2 (3), 1-14. Web.
• Kodwani, A. D. (2017). Decoding training effectiveness: The role of organisational factors . Journal of Workplace Learning , 29 (3), 200-216. Web.
• Mozael, B. M. (2015). Impact of training and development programs on employee performance . International Journal of Scientific and Research Publications , 5 (11), 37-42. Web.
• Rehmat, W., Aaltio, I., Agha, M. H., & Khan, H. R. (2015). Is training effective? Evaluating training effectiveness in call centers . EJBO: Electronic Journal of Business Ethics and Organization Studies , 20 (1), 4-13. Web.
• Weller, S. C., Vickers, B., Bernard, H. R., Blackburn, A. M., Borgatti, S., Gravlee, C. C., & Johnson, J. C. (2018). Open-ended interview questions and saturation. PloS One , 13 (6), 1-18.
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Needs Assessment

A needs assessment is executed within an organization (or any other community) to collect information necessary to identify an occurring need, which can be provided through training, needs analysis , and other specific developmental procedures. A particular training needs assessment is implemented depending on the condition or situation of the group where the process is incorporated or applied.

There are different kinds of needs assessments. From environmental assessment documents up to organizational needs assessment, we can provide you with templates and samples which can help you to create the definite needs assessment you would like to have. You may also see health questionnaire examples.

Needs Assessment Template

• Apple Pages

Size: 37 KB

Free School Needs Assessment Template

Size: 47 KB

Training Needs Assessment

Professional training needs.

Size: 191 KB

Community Needs Assessment

Community health needs sample.

Size: 710 KB

Hospital Community Assessment

Size: 911 KB

Health Needs Assessment

Health care needs example.

Size: 531 KB

What Is Needs Assessment?

A needs assessment can be defined as the following:

1. Needs assessment is a way of identifying and addressing the needs of a particular community. As an example, it can be in a form of nursing assessment examples which assesses the areas of improvement that a nursing station or department needs to develop.

2. It is a process that systematically determines the call to actions that can be done to achieve a desired condition from the actual or current condition of a group or an individual. self-assessment examples, for one, showcases the items that an individual needs to focus into to assure that he/she will reach his/her wants through continuous performance development.

3. It is a process that allows organizations to correct deficiency and strengthen weaknesses by improving the quality of programs, policies and implementation procedures.

Strategic Needs Assessment

Joint strategic needs example.

Strategic Planning

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How to Conduct a Needs Assessment

1. Surveys can be used to collect the data that you need which specifically asks for questions that are essential for the assessment or evaluation.

2. Community meetings can be a way for you to gather information as well. It is essential to know your target community so you can get more details from a larger group of participants. You may also see evaluation questionnaire examples & samples.

3. You can use the focus group method by conducting an interview with the representatives of a community which are predetermined or selected.

4. You can also have a key informant interview where you may ask an individual about his / her experiences in relation to the processes of the group where he/she belongs. The key informant that you will select must pass all the selection criteria that you will curate before the interview to assure the efficiency and effectiveness of the process. You may also like questionnaire templates & examples.

Learning Needs Assessment

Nursing education service learning needs sample.

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Individual Learning Assessment

Size: 491 KB

Early Learning Needs Example

Size: 133 KB

Comprehensive Needs Assessment

School comprehensive assessment system.

Size: 70 KB

Research Needs Assessment

Market research needs example.

Size: 376 KB

Leadership Needs Assessment

Leadership training needs example.

Relationship Needs Assessment

Free relationship needs.

Size: 775 KB

Importance of Needs Assessment

1. One of the main importance of needs assessment is that it can improve the current condition of a group or a community. It allows an in-depth knowledge about the things that are needed to be changed, removed or replaced on the operations or processes that a particular entity follows and/or executes. You might be interested in  career assessments .

2. Needs assessment does not only improve the quality of the operations of the community but it also allows individual performance development as well. With this, it assures a group that each of its workforce are parts of the desired accomplishment that the organization would like to have through the usage of performance assessment examples.

3. Needs assessment allows the analysis of the business operations through the use of feasibility studies and needs versus wants analysis approach. This will make the development processes that the business will implement more effective.

4. The process of needs assessment can help the entity identify the methods that can fix the deficiency of the performance of the entire group. Just like any assessment examples in PDF, Word or Excel; a needs assessment should identify the root of the problem first before creating call to actions to improve the condition of a community. A behavior chart may be used to further identify the specific characteristic of a community which affects its operations.

Technology Needs Assessment

School technology needs assessment.

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Educational Technology Assessment

Information Technology Needs

Size: 144 KB

Business Needs Assessment

Small business needs example.

Size: 72 KB

Business Plan Assessment

Size: 715 KB

Business Development Needs

Housing Needs Assessment

Affordable housing needs sample.

Size: 113 KB

Regional Housing Assessment

Physical Needs Assessment

Physical health needs example.

Size: 34 KB

Service Needs Assessment

Social service needs sample.

Size: 248 KB

Human Service Assessment

Student Needs Assessment

High school student needs.

Size: 91 KB

Assessment of College Student

Size: 466 KB

What Does a Needs Assessment Include?

• The description of the community where the needs assessment will be conducted
• The current condition of the community
• The specific needs of a community
• The data gathering method that will be used for the assessment
• The participants of the data gathering
• The changes that are expected to be seen after the assessment

You may also see what Is a questionnaire?

Purposes of Needs Assessment

1. To know the specific needs of a community and to identify whether these needs are essential for the growth of the community in a particular area. It can include a health assessment if the community needs improvement in its medical processes, health and safety precautions and nutrition guidance.

2. To record and document the needs of a group and assure that these needs will be supplied for the development of the people present within a community through the help of a process flowchart as a guide.

3. To be aware of the needs of the community which may not be discussed for a long period of time. Assessment examples in Doc   or in any other software used in this manner  are essential as there are needs that can sometimes be deemed as not important depending on the culture and tradition present within a location. You may also like what is a survey questionnaire?

4. To know an individual’s needs for growth. An example of this are career assessment examples that are used by people to identify how they are developing within their professional undertakings.

5. To have information about the thoughts, beliefs, and perceptions of a bigger scope of the community or have an observation assessment based on a representative’s general statements .

Personal Needs Assessment

Personal and development needs.

Size: 103 KB

Personal Health Needs Assessment Example

Volunteer Needs Assessment

Volunteer program needs sample.

Teacher Needs Assessment

New teacher assessment.

Teacher Training Needs Example

Size: 740 KB

Patient Needs Assessment

Patient education needs.

Size: 154 KB

Parent Needs Assessment

Parent carer’s needs assessment.

Size: 382 KB

Parent Education Needs

Size: 60 KB

Learning Need Assessment

Community learning needs.

Financial Needs Assessment

Family financial needs assessment.

Size: 446 KB

Employment Needs Assessment

Employment land needs example.

Size: 989 KB

Guidelines for Needs Assessment

1. You may compare the needs assessment document that you have created to other free assessment examples   so you can have an idea on how to format the content, structure and layout of the specific needs assessment that you plan to have.

2. Make sure that you already have a list of questions to be answered for your formal analysis  of the community. This will help you to get the information that is essential for the assessment that you would like to make.

3. Select the appropriate method to use in terms of data gathering. This will depend on the kind of change that you want to have and the means and ways that you will implement to achieve your desired results.

4. You also should be able to determine the people that you would like to use as your samples for your simple analysis . You need to assure that you are aware of the number of people that you want to ask and how their characteristics and/or qualifications are relevant to the needs assessment.

5. Just like when creating   risk assessment examples, always be aware of the internal and external factors that can affect the results of the needs assessment which includes your target community’s approach to the assessment, the dependent variables of your assessment, and the inconsistencies that may change the results of the needs assessment.

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Needs Assessment Strategies, Research Paper Example

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This paper contrasts and compares strategies, tactics and instruments or tools that are required in order to perform a ‘Needs Assessment’ in order to improve business performance. The paper is structured into four distinct parts: (1) Introduction (2) Examination of different strategies and methods (3) Tactics and Approaches (4) Concluding remarks. The paper addresses the question of why ‘Needs Assessments’ of this nature are an important part of managerial practice in business today.

Introduction

The concept of Needs Assessments is the provision of a “systematic process in the determination of the size and gap between that of current knowledge, skills, attitudes, performances and situations” (Davis, 2010). When performing or carrying out a Needs assessment you will need to develop a framework that will answer the following basic questions. Essentially the Who, What, When, Where and How approach.  For example:

Types of need assessment strategies:  There are numerous types of need assessment strategies and these might include such examples as follows:

• Standard Assessment Exercises
• Knowledge questions
• Focus groups
• Questionnaires
• Observations,
• Reflective studies
• Government surveys

Examination of different strategies and methods

There are a number of different strategies and approaches in order to conduct or carry out a Needs Assessment.  The following approaches are reviewed:

Existing data approach:  This is where a large volume of existing data is already available.  An example being that of a community data that is collected by Government agencies for surveys and analysis.  The US Census Bureau is an excellent example of this source of data.  The table below describes the Advantages, Disadvantages and Usefulness of this kind of strategic approach:

Attitude survey approach: This survey approach tests the attitudes from a broad range of participants. This is accomplished by the means of a questionnaire that can be very difficult to construct. A considerable amount of technical skill is required in the formulation of the questionnaire in order to obtain the right degree of balance and perspective.

Key informant approach :  The gathering of key information from different subject matter experts allows the use of situational analysis. This approach can be used in conjunction with other needs assessment strategies. “The approach requires the identification of a select group of formal and informal leaders, influential leaders and experts” (Doll-yogherst, 2010).

Community forum approach:   The gathering of information from local community forums enables a wide range of data and opinions to be gathered from local groups on specific subject matter. This method is both easy to set up and administer but it may have only limited benefits from it’s’ use.

Focus group approach:  Essentially a group of people brought together in order to obtain information about a specific subject matter. A typical focus group size may consist of between 6-10 people and composed of different people who may represent the population of the segment under review. These are normally short intensive sessions lasting around 1-1.5 hours with a focus group facilitator moderating the sessions and asking open ended questions to stimulate the discussion.

Internal audit assessments :  These provide the ability to conduct assessments on important review subjects.  For example: review of employee pension schemes, equity in salary and remuneration schemes, employee benefit schemes etc.  Audits often have a set of benchmarks upon which measurement criteria is made.  Assessment being to levels of compliance in performance and quality.  Processes may also be examined from an efficiencies perspective to determine whether there are any redundancies or further streamlining would prove useful.

A look at techniques

Use of questionnaires:  “There is no single “one size fits all” questionnaire that can serve this purpose” (Teramis, 2009). The Needs Assessment questionnaire should be designed in order to provide the stakeholders with the initial scope and objectives from the business point of view. These instruments are also useful to obtain buy-in from the management team “If you are conducting a public seminar within a company, sending a needs assessment questionnaire to managers ahead of the training will make you look like a polished professional” (Ecker, 2010).

Interviews: Interviews are a good means for carrying out data collection. The first step is to draw up a list of those persons being interviewed. The reasons and objectives of the interview. Consideration of any sensitivity that may be involved. Next put forward a planning schedule of time, place and appointment of the interview. Decide upon whether the interview should be formal or informal. Senior Management interviews are almost always formal. Ensure that an agenda is produced and issued prior to the commencement of the interview, showing timings of start, events, and completion. Ensure that interviews are conducted in private and there are no distractions. Before commencement ensure that the interviewee is properly oriented and made to feel relaxed. “The more candid about the purpose, then the better information you will collect” (Lawson, 2010)

Three types of organization needs assessments

• Examining those needs considered  external to the organization
• Alignment of societal goals with organizational objectives
• Tactical Needs Assessment
• Focus on organizational performance and contributions
• Aligns organization objectives with its’ projects
• Operational Needs Assessment
• Looks at individual or team performance
• Brings projects in alignment with individual performance
• Helps in the development of  learning plans

Tools available:  The following list is an example of the tools available for facilitating Needs Assessment Strategies:

• Focus Groups – DACUM
• Focus Groups – Delphi
• Focus Groups – Nominal
• Focus Groups – Straw Votes
• Interviewing
• Task Analysis
• Cognitive Task Analysis
• Tabletop analysis
• SWOT + Causal Utility
• Dual-response surveys
• Johari Window
• Concept mapping
• Fault Tree Diagrams
• Fishbone Diagrams
• Multi-attribute Utility Analysis
• Force Field Analysis
• Risk and Resilience Analysis
• Systematic Document Review
• Performance Observation
• Guided Expert Review

Tools examples

The Johari window

A very useful matrix diagram. Shows human interaction and personal awareness divided into four distinct types.  Open, Hidden, Blind and Unknown.

“The “open” quadrant represents things that both I know about myself, and that you know about me” (Yen, 1999).  Whereas the blind quadrant is things that you know about me that I am unaware of. The hidden quadrant is items I know about myself that you do not know and finally the Unknown is things that I do not know about you or me.

Swot analysis

A simple quadrant diagram that sorts information out into four distinct types. Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats, hence the term SWOT.  It is similar in design and construction to that of a PEST Analysis that examines Political, Economic, Social and Technology into a quadrant analysis.  It is a useful strategic diagram to examine the positive and negative influences and information gathered.

Fishbone diagrams

The Fish Bone diagram is used in order to examine cause and effect information.  It addresses a core problem. It’s really a team brainstorming tool that may be used in focus groups in order to examine the causes of a problem.  It is one of the tools used for the concept of root cause analysis.  In this example the fishbone show four causes relative to the problem under review and the effects relating to each of these.

Forcefield analysis

The object of Forcefield analysis is to show the driving forces (+) and the constraining forces (-) that are the dynamics of a particular problem.  For example: Quitting Smoking.  A driving force to quit might be the high risk of getting lung cancer or other serious health problems. A negative constraining force might be a habitual bond to the practice and enjoyment of smoking.  You can also identify what is known as polarizing forces where a change in one force creates and equal and opposite effect in the change of another. This analysis is extremely useful in the examination of the dynamics of a problem.  The diagram to the right illustrates how this might be used in the determination of a change condition.

Concept diagrams

A concept diagram is essentially a simple chart that enables you to convey or conceptualise a specific problem. The object being to convey to the reader a central theme or idea.  That’s it really!

The simple example to the right illustrates the concept of honey bees and the relationship and types within that community.

Fault tree diagrams

These are techniques that are often used for the analysis of large and complex systems. They are particularly useful to obtain analysis where there are significant redundancies and therefore facilitate streamlining. The events are easily modelled and are often used in change management and business transformation projects. The example diagram here illustrates that of dealing with the consequences of an explosion.

Multi attribute utility analysis

Essentially used as part of the decision making toolbox. It is a powerful tool that can be used for material selection and as such is widely used in the Engineering industry. It assists in the decision making analysis with the ability to make effective choices.

Scenario and mind maps

These diagrams enable you to structure your thoughts into a logical representation and order. They take a core theme like in the ample above. Why change a Business Strategy?  This then expands out to four concepts that addresses or answers this problem. You can then subsequently add further thoughts by attaching groupings of ideas to that particular analysis box.  This is often useful for mapping out a specific process and has a variety of applications including Needs Assessments.

Why are needs assessment an important part of managerial practice today?

Needs Assessments serve a variety of applications but can be particularly useful in running effective workshops. By carefully asking the right questions you can construct an effective needs assessment plan.  The concept of participant observation has been widely adopted in the Health and Medical profession. Patient observation “enables one to view the unique interaction of given members directly, rather than serving as an outside observer” (Campbell, 2005).

Preservation surveys are another important part of the needs assessment practice. With particular emphasis on the use of surveys “A preservation needs assessment identifies problems. More important, it results in recommendations for strategies and actions that address the problems. This assessment should be part of a larger planning process” (Call preservation, 2010).

Learning Needs assessments have become paramount in the Education and Training sector “Learning needs assessment is a crucial stage in the educational process that leads to changes in practice, and has become part of government policy for continuing professional development” (Grant, 2002)

Works Cited

Call preservation. (2010). Preservation Needs Assessment . Retrieved 9 11, 2010, from Call preservation: http://www.calpreservation.org/management/needs-assessment.html

Campbell, G. G. (2005). Needs and capacity assessment strategies for health education and health . In G. G. Campbell, Needs and capacity assessment strategies for health education and health (pp. 1-127). London: Jones & Bartlett.

Davis, D. (2010, 1 1). Needs Assessment . Retrieved 9 11, 2010, from KT Knowledge Base: http://ktclearinghouse.ca/knowledgebase/knowledgetoaction/action/interventions/strategies/needsassessment

Doll-yogherst, D. (2010, 1 1). Key Informat Approach . Retrieved 9 11, 2010, from Program Planning: http://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&q=cache:74N86kUenbUJ:www.uwex.edu/ces/pdande/progdev/pdf/keyinform.pdf+KEY+INFORMANT+APPROACH&hl=en&gl=ca&pid=bl&srcid=ADGEESh4oHQe3lhQT1JeM5Cn6XNwRNM3Z6XFIE0c4vNmmYfrkm2x35kmusHT9z5RhPrEMd1PmZdKerY14nECcnoUmHgTMz2ZixP4OO

Ecker, J. (2010). Why Needs Assessment Questionnaires Are Important . Retrieved 9 11, 2010, from Ezine: http://ezinearticles.com/?Why-Needs-Assessment-Questionnaires-Are-Important&id=4920982

Grant, J. (2002, 1 19). Learning needs assessment: assessing the need . Retrieved 9 11, 2010, from BMJ: http://www.bmj.com/content/324/7330/156.full

Lawson, K. (2010). Success in Needs Assessment Interviews. Lansdale PA: Winning Trainer.

Teramis. (2009, 3 10). Sample Questionnaires for Training Needs Analyses . Retrieved 9 11, 2010, from Directory Journal: http://www.dirjournal.com/guides/sample-questionnaires-for-training-needs-analyses/

Yen, D. H. (1999, 4 26). Johari Window . Retrieved 9 11, 2010, from NooGenesis: http://www.noogenesis.com/game_theory/johari/johari_window.html

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