The Library's Contribution To Your Community

Second Edition: March 2007
Prepared by dmA Planning and Management Services and Southern Ontario Library Service

This manual will assist you to demonstrate your library’s value to your community in terms meaningful to your key funders. Working from key community issues, the manual guides you through the development of your Contribution Strategy from selecting relevant library outcomes from among six contributions and twenty benefits, through collecting and interpreting your data and constructing your argument. The result is a cogent description of your library’s contributions specifically linked to issues of high importance in your community, and creating a persuasive case for support.

Endorsements

Wendy Newman writes of the new edition:

“This new edition has all the strengths of the original and some new features that will substantially improve its usefulness. The measures have been refined, but the major refinement is the calculated selection and strategic use of data. Libraries who follow the easily understood guidance will be better advocates for their libraries in our intensely competitive environment. They will be more adroit about the measures they choose and more confidently equipped to position their results with decision-makers in their own communities. The new edition facilitates that essential breakthrough to a strategic mindset, moving the library from earnest data gathering to effective positioning.
Bravo!

Charles McClure wrote of the first edition:

"Librarians tell me they can't find resources for measuring their libraries' social and economic contributions. I tell them to use The Library's Contribution to Your Community - it's excellent. I'm the planning and measurement guy, and let me tell you, this is an excellent planning and measuring tool. It's also a political tool - it's about communicating to your funders.
I'm a big proponent of working the political side."

"Measuring your library's social and economic impact just got a whole lot easier
with The library's Contribution to Your Community. Get it. Use it."