Managing for Value and Performance: Processes in Developing Library Plans and Best Value

Citation

Harrison, D. (2001), "Managing for Value and Performance: Processes in Developing Library Plans and Best Value", Library Review, Vol. 50 No. 6, pp. 314-314. https://doi.org/10.1108/lr.2001.50.6.314.5

The present government in the UK favours strategies and plans as service development tools, particularly since they enable central government and its politicians and civil servants to have a closer degree of control over their local government equivalents. In the public library field we now have Annual Library Plans, Public Library Standards, the People’s Network, Lifelong Learning and the Early Years Strategy, to mention just a few. To these must be added the planning procedures now required of local government generally and which impact on public libraries – modernisation of local government, best value, local cultural strategies, Connexions and so on. The document under review attempts to assist library managers faced with the imperatives of sustaining, if not enhancing, the quality and range of services whilst deriving optimal value from scarce resources. It comprises the contributions from several specialists and managers concerned with service evaluation and development delivered to a seminar held at Loughborough University in March 2000.

This date is one of the problems in evaluating the book under review. A week may be a long time in politics, but a year is almost as long in the life of the Department of Culture, Media and Sport, let alone the Department of the Environment, Regions and Transport (DETR). When these papers were given, Public Library Standards were a gleam in Chris Smith’s eye they have now been published in their final form. The Local Government Act 2000 had not been enacted with its subsequent DETR guidance to local authorities on preparing community strategies issued after the Act’s enforcement in October 2000. By the time this review appears, there will probably have been a general election, so no one knows what will be the outcome of that for local government generally and public libraries specifically. This rapid change has already dated the information in these presentations.

Having said that, there is much stimulating and interesting matter to consider here. Graham Combe and Hilary Ely from Surrey County Council Community Services describe their approach to a Best Value Review which sought to integrate libraries, adult education and youth services and in particular, how the Best Value Review can be linked with the DCMS Annual Library Plan procedures. Although there are a few “discontinuities” between the two, mainly caused by the highly prescriptive nature of the DCMS guidelines, Hilary does demonstrate to the reader that the two processes can work together and that there are resulting economies flowing from this approach. Unfortunately, Lesley Ray was unable to supply a paper, but a series of slides have been included for her contribution on Best Value planning in a dynamic environment. These manage to show us that the result of the Best Value process in Greenwich was a more responsive, efficient and up‐to‐date service which has succeeded in attracting more people through the doors.