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Step Six: Document Your Findings

Your collaboration’s next step is to prepare a report that documents the findings from the needs assessment. The report will serve as the centerpiece for your collaboration’s decisions about improvements that are needed to fill gaps and the development of your collaboration’s strategic plan. Additionally, it will to inform the larger community and can be used to demonstrate need and secure additional funding.

Writing Your Report

  • Executive summary: This section provides a summary of the full report with an emphasis on the report’s major findings, recommendations, and conclusions. It should be designed for people who may not have the time to read the entire report and may need to rely on the information in the Executive Summary to help them make decisions.
  • Introduction: This section provides the reader with the context for understanding the report. It should include information on your collaboration including its mission, history, and members. It should also include information about the purpose and goals of your needs assessment, including why it is being conducted and how the information will be used. Finally, it should introduce the reader to the major sections of the report.
  • Methodology: This section includes an overview of your needs assessment design and process including the research questions, data sources and key informants, methods used to gather information, strengths and challenges of the process, and any limitations. Copies of the instruments used should be included in an appendix in the report.
  • Key findings: This section provides an overview of the key findings. The findings should focus on those that are relevant and important given the purpose and goals of the needs assessment. Try to use a variety of strategies to represent the findings including narrative summaries, graphs, charts, and quotes.
  • Implications: Summary of what your results suggest about needs, service gaps, or systems issues that should be addressed by agencies or organizations and strategies that were suggested to address them.
  • Conclusion: This section includes a brief summary of key findings and a discussion of the collaboration’s next steps.

Reviewing and Finalizing the Report

Once your collaboration has completed a draft of the report, circulate it to members of the collaboration for their feedback and ultimate approval. Also, consider having people outside of the collaboration review it. They can help you make sure the report is user-friendly and avoids using technical words or phrases that people new to your collaboration or outside of it would not understand.