Definitions

Definitions to familiarise yourself with before using the tools in the value and impact toolkit.

Unless referenced, the following definitions are mainly based on the British Standard, Methods and procedures for assessing the impact of libraries BS ISO 16439:2014.

Impact

The influence of libraries and their services on individuals and/or on society. The difference or change in an individual or group resulting from the contact with library services.

Note: The change can be tangible or intangible. It may only be possible for the library to contribute to an impact rather than be solely responsible (e.g. length of stay, patient care).

Find out more about impact.

Value

The importance that stakeholders (funding institutions, politicians, the public, users, staff) attach to libraries and which is related to the perception of actual or potential benefit. The input is converted into output by means of processes. The output can have direct, pre-defined effects (outcomes). Output and outcomes can lead to impact and finally to value.

Bawden et al.  in Understanding our value; assessing the nature of the impact of library services define benefit or worth as including monetary value and impact and/or utility or usefulness, is determined by the service user and is difficult to disentangle from quality. 

Find out more about value.

Input

Contribution of resources in support of a library (e.g. funding, staff, collections, electronic resource provision, space, equipment).

Metric

A criteria against which something is measured (Showers, 2015); A criterion or set of criteria stated in quantifiable terms (Oxford English Disctionary).

Set of interrelated or interacting activities which transforms inputs into outputs (e.g. lending, reference service, training, literature search service).

Outcome

Markless and Streatfield, in Evaluating the Impact of Your Library define outcome as the direct, pre-defined effect of the output related to goals and objectives of the library’s planning (e.g. number of users, user satisfaction levels) (3.44) or the consequences of deploying services on the people who encounter them or the communities served.

Output

Products of library processes (e.g. loans, downloads from the electronic collection, reference questions answered, literature searches undertaken, training sessions performed).

Process

Set of interrelated or interacting activities which transforms inputs into outputs (e.g. lending, reference service, training, literature search service).

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