An Organizational Model for Digital Library Evaluation

Evaluation is a central digital library practice. It provides important data for managing digital libraries and informing strategic decision-making. Digital library evaluation and management are organizational as well as technical practices. What evaluation models can account for these organizational factors, in practice as well as in theory? To address these questions, this paper integrates two models, one from the organizational literature (Porter’s value chain), and one from the evaluation literature (evaluation logic models), into a generic, flexible and extensible evaluation model that supports the goal-oriented evaluation and management of digital libraries in specific sociotechnical contexts. A case study is provided.