In planning community and social services, perceptions of need come from many sources - from the local news to political interest groups - but the first step in conducting efficient and effective community interventions is to look beyond perceptions and identify the actual needs based on available evidence. Creating a comprehensive needs assessment is essential for securing funding and designing programs in governmental agencies and nonprofit organizations. This workbook helps community groups, social service organizations, and government agencies collect, analyze, prioritize, and present local data in a way that will ensure that a community's needs are understood and met. Employing a learn-by-doing approach, the book walks readers through the actual steps of creating a comprehensive needs assessment. The workbook offers thorough background information and provides step-by-step activities to address the entire process beginning with the planning stage, followed by data collection and analysis, and concluding with preparing your report and implementing findings.Whether in a classroom setting or in the workplace, this is the book that practitioners will use throughout their entire careers. Features: text is formatted as a workbook designed around tasks, worksheets, and tools to guide the reader through the process of creating an actual needs assessment the website www.rodneywambeam.com accompanies the book and has downloadable copies of all the worksheets included so that readers can print and use them for future projects demonstrations provide real-world examples of communities and organizations at every step of the process covers important topics frequently left out of needs assessment texts including survey research, and using completed assessment reports for making decisions, and writing grant proposals

This volume is for students and practitioners interested in improving their understanding and skills in the area of needs assessment. The text follows the typical sequence of an actual needs assessment process. Case studies are used to illustrate conceptualization of the task through the application of needs-based data to effective public health solutions. Examples are drawn from myriad public health efforts, recognizing that not all public health sector agencies bear direct responsibility for all activities that could be considered part of public health.

A Practical Guide to Needs Assessment, Third Edition For fifteen years, A Practical Guide to Needs Assessment has been the go-to text for those who are seeking useful, systematic approaches to needs assessment. Needs assessment is the first step in training, performance improvement, and community development projects. This thoroughly revised and updated edition contains a treasury of resources including a toolkit of ready-to-use templates and job aids that you can customize for your own use. Illustrative case studies and tips show how to assess needs for individuals, teams, organizations, government agencies, and communities. This book combines a how-to text and reference tool for trainers, performance improvement professionals, and students. Managers and community leaders use it to get to the root of their learning and performance problems, make effective decisions, and obtain support for their most pressing issues. Updates to the third edition include: Links to online resources, including a needs assessment book that you can download for free, ethical guidelines, and vendors who assess individual, group and organizational needs. A new chapter on the complex needs assessment approach with new toolkit forms. A summary of the recent advances in our knowledge about learning, training, and performance that you can use to quickly prepare for client meetings. Guidelines on workforce surveys, such as employee engagement surveys. An Instructor’s Guide that contains discussion questions, assessments materials, and new exercises for each chapter. You can use this book to quickly access up-to-date information on the fundamentals of needs assessment including current models, theories, and resources. You can also learn how to manage and report a needs assessment project and access professional ethical guidelines. Learn five approaches to needs assessment: knowledge and skills analysis, job and task analysis, competency-based needs assessment, strategic needs assessment, and complex needs assessment.

This manual was created in an attempt to unravel some of the questions pertinent to conducting a needs assessment on HIV in a community: What is a needs assessment? Why should we do a needs assessment? and How do we use the results of the needs assessment?

This thoroughly revised edition of the best-selling book Conducting Needs Assessment offers a brief, how-to guide that demystifies the process of planning a community intervention by helping both students and practitioners understand how to plan and conduct a needs assessment. Coverage includes planning the needs assessment, including the variety of methods used, survey methods and sample sizes, data collection and analysis, and reporting the findings. To aid students' understanding, Soriano engages the students in the process of planning a community intervention by using clear, real-world examples and basic terms that have been updated to reflect current issues and HIPPA regulations.