Needs Assessment

A needs assessment is a systematic process that provides information about social needs or issues in a place or population group and determines which issues should be prioritized for action. The term ‘social issue’ as used here is intended to be deliberately broad and essentially denotes an identified problem in a place or population. Social issues, or ‘needs’, can include health-related topics such as the increased prevalence of poor mental health in a population or high smoking rates, or issues such as low levels of literacy or child development. In this context, a social need or social issue is something that can be addressed by service providers (or community members in a community development initiative). Ultimately, a needs assessment gathers information about the issue that can then inform service provision or policy development.

A needs assessment in this context moves beyond individual assessment and explores the needs of a community. Community is frequently defined in terms of a geographical area, but a needs assessment could also explore the needs of a specific population group; for example, the needs of single-parent families. A needs assessment in a geographical area may also have a focus on priority population groups.

A needs assessment is most often undertaken in order to allocate or redistribute resources and design programs, policies, and services. However, needs assessment can also be considered as a form of evaluation, or as a component of program evaluation, because it involves collecting information in order to make an evaluative judgement about what needs exist in a community, what needs should be prioritized, and how a particular policy, service, program or suite of activities will address those needs. A needs assessment can also provide baseline data that can be used in an evaluation.

Importantly, a needs assessment is best undertaken as a systematic process (Altschuld & Kumar, 2005; Rossi, Lipsey, & Freeman, 2004):

1. Decisions are made about the scope of the needs assessment.
2. There is a plan to collect information.
3. Data are collected and analyzed.
4. These data are used to determine priorities and make decisions about resource allocation, program design, and service delivery.