1

Needs Assessment Cycle

Ashley Enos
CUR/528
April 4, 2016
Justin Atwood

2
Needs Assessment Cycle
Career Ready Campuses is a non-profit company that partners with larger companies and
colleges across America to outsource work to college students part time and allowing them to
earn money toward their college tuition. The University of Arizona is providing students skilled
in customer service to work with customers of GoDaddy to take care of all their customer service
needs. GoDaddy has requested that additional training be delivered for the email portion of
customer services because they are finding that customer services emails are not being handled at
the desired level. Stakeholders through Career Ready Campuses have requested a needs
assessment in order to begin to develop a training program specific to GoDaddys request.
According to "Your Complete Resource Site on Needs and Needs Assessments." (2008),
Needs Assessments are used to identify strategic priorities, define results to be accomplished,
guide decisions related to appropriate actions to be taken, establish evaluation criteria for making
judgments of success, and inform the continual improvement of activities within organizations.
Thus, from training to systems engineering, Needs Assessments play an active role in the
accomplishment of individual, team, organizational, and even societal results. (para. 2)

Purpose:
The purpose of this needs assessment is to determine the validity of lack of training for
specific customer service skill especially through email support. Identifying this need will allow
for Career Ready Campuses to create training material focusing on a specific section of customer
service improving in the area of email support.
Level of Assessment:

3
The needs assessment will be conducted based on data that will have been collected from
past and current email logs. In addition there will be a comparison of both positive and negative
customer service reviews. Managers and employees with be interviewed to gather important
feedback of the needs and desires of those directly affected.
Stakeholders:
Because this is a company that works with both the College and Corporation clients there
are various stakeholders. University of Arizona stakeholders are the President, Administration,
Campus personal, and student employees who all have an important part in making this program
successful. GoDaddy has shareholders who are CEOs, board member, training mangers, and
managers to be able to outsource their work at a lower cost to them. Career Ready Campuses
stakeholders are the Board of Directors, Leadership Teams, training managers, managers, and
supervisors. This program is vital to Career Ready Campuses in order to continue the success of
the program and to potentially expand the program to potential future corporations.
Budget and Available Resources:
During the process of the needs assessment there will be two assessors on site working to
break down the data. During the time that they will be working Monday through Friday and
Conducting onsite interviews.
Hourly rate per assessors

$30.00 x2

8 Hours per day

$240.00 x2

5 Days per week

$1200.00 x2

4 weeks total

$4800.00 x2

Completed Needs Assessment

$400.00

Complete total for both Assessors and Assessment

$10,000.00

4
There is already an allocated budget for training classes, and both Career Ready
Campuses and GoDaddy have staffed Trainers and Curriculum Designers in order to create the
materials. A decrease of student employees available during work hours will need to be factored
into the budget. This is suggestive to a reduce in customer service time, which could cost the
company.
Time Allotted for the Assessment:
GoDaddy has requested that this training roll out not later than June 1st. So that the
training be a part of the initial summer training classes scheduled. Therefore, I have allotted one
month to gather and complete all the required documentation to appropriately and adequately
assess the need for this desired training program.
Information Needed to Measure Using the Needs Assessment:
The information that is needed to sufficiently assess the need for the training is data from
the past six months to current number of emails that the company, Career Ready Campuses via
GoDaddy, get daily. Data from positive and negative customer service surveys specifically
stating feedback from email related services. Personal one on one or small group interviews with
managers to gather information on assessment of employees under their leadership. One on one
or small group interviews with current employees that are working directly with email
correspondences. This is to gather information concerning level of training, knowledge, and
experience with working with email specifically for the company.
Does the Information Required Already Exist:
Career Ready Campuses and GoDaddy already have the data for the six months to current
records needed in both the number of emails and the positive compared to negative emails. I will
have to submit a request for this information through their statistics department. Once the request

5
has been submitted, the department will provide a copy within 48 hours of the initial request. In
regards to the interviews, that information will be to be obtained. Interviews will take place
during business hours and be no longer that 30 min per interview session. These will be
completed within the first two weeks of the needs assessment period, in order to be able to
review within a timely manner.
Methodology and Instrumentation:
During the Needs Assessment process we will be analyzing existing data that has already
been collected by the company. When reviewing the data we will be focusing on determining if
there is a shift of a high number of emails received over a six month period (high shift is a
consistant or steady 25% increase). The second group of data collected will be evaluated for a
40% or greater increase in negative customer service reviews over the six month period. Below
you will see a copy of the questions that will be asked through the interview process with each of
the current employees and managers.
Employee Interview Questions:
Employee Title________________________
1. How long have you worked for Career Ready Campuses?
2. What type of trainings have you gone through with the company?
3. How many customer service emails do you receive daily?
4. Do you feel that you have enough knowledge of the email system in order to adequately
support a customer through email?
5. Do you have access to a mentor or someone who is versed in the email systems to go to if
the need presents itself?

6
6. Do you feel that you and your team would benefit from email specific training? Why or
why not?
Manager Interview Questions:
Employee Title________________________
1. How long have you worked for Career Ready Campuses?
2. What type of trainings have you gone through with the company?
3. Are you aware of your training requirements as a manager? If so what are they?
4. How many customer service complaints do you get weekly directly relating to email?
5. Are you available to your employees to assist them with any questions or concerns they
might have?
6. Do you feel that you and your team would benefit from email specific training? Why or
why not?
Conclusion:
A Needs Assessment Cycle is going to provide your company with a data driven answer
to implementing a new training based off of evidence, facts, and the desired needs of the
company.

7
Resources:
Your Complete Resource Site on Needs and Needs Assessments.. (2008). Retrieved from
http://www.gapsinresults.com/
Paul F. McCawley/ University of Idaho. (2009). Methods for Conducting an Educational Needs
Assessment
Retrieved from Paul F. McCawley/ University of Idaho, BUL 870 website.