Knowing a community enables library and information professionals to prioritize the community's information needs and design appropriate services for them. "Assessing Information Needs: Managing Transformative Library Services" was written to provide the rationale for community analysis, a model for gathering community data, and a process for analyzing data and applying it to the management of an information agency.

The book explains why information professionals "should" customize services, as well as the "how to" of collecting data. A model for gathering community information is...