Home | Performance Measures and 
Evaluative Tools (Summary)
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United Kingdom
Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA)
On this site the UK public library statistics can be accessed and downloaded but only by subscribers. Questionnaires and commentaries are freely available.
http://www.ipf.co.uk/sis/leisure/publiclibraryactuals/default.asp

Department for Culture, Media and Sport standards for public libraries in England
Most input standards will be measured using the statistics supplied annually to CIPFA. There are also output standards of user satisfaction which will be measured via regular surveys and unobtrusive testing.
http://www.culture.gov.uk/PDF/libraries_pls_assess.pdf

IPF Public Library Benchmarking Club 
Benchmarking [metric and process]
http://www.ipf.co.uk/benchmarking

The Library & Information Statistics Unit
LISU publishes compilations of statistical information about libraries and for librarians. The 2001 version of the annual statistical sampler, the Library and Information Statistics Tables (L.I.S.T.), is available on-line. This covers public, academic, special, national and school libraries. The 2000, 1999, 1998 and 1997 editions are also available.
http://www.lboro.ac.uk/departments/dils/lisu/lisuhp.html

MIEL: Management Information for the Electronic Library 
Reviewed current trends in library development and the related literature and proposed performance indicators for the electronic, networked library. One chapter usefully summarises previous texts and manuals. Largely academic library-based.
http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/dlis/models/studies/

Performance measures
These matrices are the results of a comparative review of a number of key documents on performance indicators for libraries. The review was commissioned by the DECIDE project and carried out by John Sumsion.
http://www.staff.dmu.ac.uk/~camile/matrices/intro.htm#top

The People’s Network 
This project will connect all 4300 UK public libraries to the Internet, where practicable, by the end of 2002. The £170 million project is managed as a partnership between the New Opportunities Fund (NOF) and Resource: The Council for Museums, Archives and Libraries. The website will be used to publicise outcomes by the use of case studies. 
People’s Network: training success stories 
Now that nearly all authorities have embarked upon their NOF ICT Training, this page features feedback, progress and interesting anecdotes relating to the programme. 
http://www.peoplesnetwork.gov.uk/

Standardised questionnaires
PLUS [Public Library User Survey] 
http://www.ipf.co.uk/plus/

Learning Impact Research Project (LIRP)
Research commissioned by Resource: The Council for Museums, Archives and Libraries to develop a scheme for finding evidence of the outcomes and impact of learning in museums, archives.
http://www.resource.gov.uk/documents/lirpanalysis.pdf

VITAL: The Value and Impact of IT Access in Libraries 
Addressed the question ‘What is the value and impact of the provision of end-user access to IT-based services in public libraries?’ The main focus of the Project was not just on gathering data on what the answers might be now, but on developing transferable methodologies which libraries can use to assess the value and impact of their own services. The Project Final Report and Workbook are available from the website.
http://www.mmu.ac.uk/h-ss/cerlim/projects/vital.htm

USA
There are a number of exemplary US sites covering public libraries and other sectors. 
http://nces.ed.gov/surveys/libraries/

ARL Statistics site 
is an interactive site, where you can select variables, rank libraries, produce ratios and indicators, and also present data graphically. Raw data can be downloaded in ASCII format. 
http://fisher.lib.virginia.edu/newarl/ 
Described in the article Interactive Peer Group Comparisons through the Web http://www.arl.org/newsltr/197/peergroup.html

International Coalition of Library Consortia (ICOLC) 
Guidelines for Statistical Measures of Usage of Web-Based Indexed, Abstracted, and Full Text Resources (November 1998)
http://www.library.yale.edu/consortia/webstats.html

Library Statistics program 
http://www.nclis.gov/libraries/lsp/statist.html 

NCLIS Statistics and Surveys Web site
http://www.nclis.gov/statsurv/statsurv.html 

Key Publications

Moore, N. Measuring the Performance of Public Libraries: a Draft Manual. Paris, General Information Programme and UNISIST, UNESCO, January 1989. 
This is a commendably comprehensive work; its language is straightforward and clear

Ward, Suzanne; Sumsion, John; Fuegi, David; Bloor, Ian. Library Performance Indicators and Library Management Tools. Luxembourg, European Commission DG-XIII-E3, 1995
Final report of the PROLIB Project, otherwise known as "The Toolbox Study". A "ground clearing" study aimed (1) to survey the state of library performance measurement across Europe, (2) to recommend priorities for further development and (3) to produce a toolbox of performance measures and indicators applicable and important for all types of library in Europe. 

Bertot, J.C., McClure, C.R., and Ryan, J., Statistics and Performance Measures for Public Library Networked Services. Chicago, IL: American Library Association, 2001 
Introduces the issues related to new electronic service performance measurement.

Van House, Nancy A; Lynch, Mary Jo; McClure, Charles R; Zweizig, Douglas L; Rodger, Eleanor Jo. Output Measures for Public Libraries: A Manual of Standardized Procedures. Second edition. Chicago, America Library Association, 1987. 
A classic and formative text which has served to introduce sampling measurements of output to library managers worldwide. 

Van House, Nancy A; Weil, Beth T; McClure, Charles R. Measuring Academic Library Performance: A Practical Approach. Chicago, American Library Association, 1990.
Following the manual for public libraries one year later, this is also a classic and formative text which has served to introduce sampling measurements of output to library managers worldwide.

Home | Performance Measures and 
Evaluative Tools (Summary)
Full Text: Page 1 | Page 2 | Page 3 | Page 4