Using the results

At the beginning of the evaluation process, you had a reason for conducting an evaluation. Now that you’ve completed that effort, it’s time to use what you’ve discovered. Your evaluation report will likely include some recommendations based on the findings and your original questions and purpose for the evaluation. The utility of your work doesn’t have to stop there, however—there are probably lessons learned that will be useful in other ways.

Recommendations

At least some of your recommendations should address your evaluation questions. But you may also have uncovered unexpected results that lead to recommendations as well. These should also be included.

State the recommendations clearly, and link them to the evidence you reported earlier in the evaluation report. Some of your recommendations might involve:

• Offering the same program to a new audience

• Putting more resources into the program (staff, money, tools, research)

• Changing communication or marketing strategies

• Addressing problems in the program (with or without specific strategies to do so, depending on the information on hand)

Moving forward

Don’t let the hard work you’ve done evaluating and assessing your initiative gather dust after the final report is finished.

• Did you learn anything that can be put to use in another initiative?

• Did you learn anything that indicates a larger or more systemic change needs to happen in the library?

• If the initiative is ongoing, how will you continue assessing or evaluating it moving forward?