BOOK AND SOFTWARE REVIEWS
Dorner, Daniel G., Gorman G.E. and Calvert, Philip J. Information needs analysis: principles and practice in information
organizations. London: Facet Publishing, 2015. xviii, 268 p. £49.95. ISBN 978-1-8560-4484-4.
The title of the book on information needs analysis seemed to be promising or useful. When I got through reading it I placed it firmly in the category of useful for practice. If that was the goal of the authors, they have definitely achieved it.
Two authors of this book come from New Zealand, though Professor Gorman currently is working at the University of Malaya. I would say that this is not a very usual authorship for a European publisher. Though of course, most of them at present are global companies. But it is also relevant to mention as they have a particular approach to the topic that makes it quite practical and ready for application.
The book consists of ten chapters rigorously following the process of information need analysis, that authors define as
information needa analysis is the process of making value judgements regarding solutions to an information-related problem faced by a client group, service provider or facility in order to facilitate fulfillment of a necessary, useful and defensible purpose (p. xv).
This pragmatic definition and the pragmatic character of the book are its strength, but also places certain limitations on the text.
Thus in the first chapter on the background of needs analysis the concept of needs and information needs is presented. However, the usual array of authors related to the development and definition of the 'information need' concept are absent from the text. Belkin, Dervin, Wilson and others are absent from the text, not to speak of more recent authors writing in the tradition of information practice. The authors are not interested in academic concepts, they pursue a managerial route to information needs analysis.
The following chapter on the context of information needs analysis is also highly pragmatic and treats context in terms of somewhat truncated understanding of culture and social segmentation. This is a fairly straightforward and uncomplicated representation of a context that causes so many battles in the academic setting of information science.
The authors also offer several models fro conducting information needs analysis and in the further chapters present and describe the stages of the process from the general overview, data collection through existing sources, surveys and interviews. Two final chapters include the process of analysing and integrating the data and reporting the results
The style of the book is easy to follow, it is transparent and practical. The application of the presented methods and instruments should not be a complicated matter. For information managers in organization this book will be very useful. It is also of the kind that most students appreciate very much: it provides unambiguous answers to potential questions and solutions to the problems that are commonly met at everyday work.
Its main audience would be practitioners and information specialists in quite many organizations, but academics and lecturers at higher education institutions might expect something more in the approaches to information needs analysis.
