"But WHY do we have to do Cost Benefit Analysis?"

Yes, it's the middle of the night and I'm watching Dr. Who while I post another entry in an on-going blog. At the YS meeting on Thursday, (March 23) the question was raised as to WHY we have to do still MORE cost benefit analysis. I thought I had answered that thoroughly last year, but there still seems to be some confusion about it. So I decided that it would be a good idea to go through the reasons one more time, and maybe if anyone has comments or questions they could respond to this entry and we could get some dialog going.
Last year when we completed the work on branch programming trends and benchmarks, we used cost analysis information that was several years old. In an attempt to be accurate, up to date and as fair as possible in determining costs, we made the decision to do the cost benefit analysis again this year so we could determine the base line cost of doing specific types of programs. In other words, just how much DOEs it cost to conduct a storytime for 15 children? Or a book discussion group for 12 adults?
These baselines, or benchmarks as they are more commonly called; provide us with one measurement by which we can evaluate our success or lack of success. They help us establish a baseline for job performances by the development of an "average cost per program" that we can compare an individual's or branch's programs to. This baseline can help us determine who might need additional training and what branches are doing programs more cost effectively.
These cost benefit anlysis forms, when combined with program statistics, branch activity and customer demand can help us make decisions about what areas we need to develop and what areas we need to place less emphasis on. While it would be lovely to be able to do everything we want to do anytime we want to do it; that's not possible anymore. As our funding belt gets tighter, we need to be able to establish priorities for services based on what works, and what uses our resources most efficiently.
In a perfect world, we'd pass a levy tomorrow, double our funding and be able to do anything we want to do anytime we want to do it and never pay attention to the cost or effectiveness of the program. But this isn't a perfect world, and we may be facing some tough decisions. I for one, prefer to make my decisions based on facts and concrete information and not on guesswork alone. Evaluating our services, making deliberate decisions about what works and what doesn't work; and choosing our options with this knowlege makes us stronger and helps us to control our future instead of just letting it happen to us.
Nobody likes all the paperwork that goes with service quality processes and evaluations, and that includes me. We don't ask for information that we're not going to use; and we (administration staff especially) really do try to consider everyone's workload when we request information. If there are times that you're asked to do something or fill out paperwork and you don't understand why, call us up and ask. If you're uncomfortable with the idea of what happens to the information when you give it to us, ask about that too.
If you've got questions, comments or things you'd like to talk about, comment to this posting, call me up, send me an email, drop by the office. I'll be happy to answer your questions and explain the process in more detail, I find it very interesting.