Advantages of statistics
The main advantages of statistics are:
• they are familiar to library staff and managers
• they can be analysed relatively quickly
• information is collected in a standardised way
• they are usually straightforward to analyse
• they overcome the difficulties of encouraging participation by users
• they are often required and respected by decision-makers within the institution and beyond eg funders, government
• they support qualitative data obtained from questionnaires, interviews etc with 'hard facts'
• they are useful for benchmarking purposes.
Disadvantages of statistics
The main disadvantages of statistics are:
• they are not an appropriate method to understand issues in great depth and identify ways to solve problems highlighted
• they are not suitable to evaluate user opinions, needs or satisfaction with services
• it may be time-consuming to arrange methods of data collection eg contacting vendors, liaising with IT departments
The main advantages of statistics are:
• they are familiar to library staff and managers
• they can be analysed relatively quickly
• information is collected in a standardised way
• they are usually straightforward to analyse
• they overcome the difficulties of encouraging participation by users
• they are often required and respected by decision-makers within the institution and beyond eg funders, government
• they support qualitative data obtained from questionnaires, interviews etc with 'hard facts'
• they are useful for benchmarking purposes.
Disadvantages of statistics
The main disadvantages of statistics are:
• they are not an appropriate method to understand issues in great depth and identify ways to solve problems highlighted
• they are not suitable to evaluate user opinions, needs or satisfaction with services
• it may be time-consuming to arrange methods of data collection eg contacting vendors, liaising with IT departments