Technology and Management in Library and Information Services

Citation

Monie, I.C. (1998), "Technology and Management in Library and Information Services", Library Review, Vol. 47 No. 1, pp. 45-46. https://doi.org/10.1108/lr.1998.47.1.45.1

This book deals primarily with the management of technology, and to a lesser degree with the use of technology to facilitate or improve management. F. Wilfred Lancaster, Professor Emeritus in Library and Information Science at the University of Illinois, has edited Library Trends since 1986 and has written ten other books, six of which have won awards in America. Beth Sandore is Professor of Library Administration at the University of Illinois, and has written a number of articles on technology in libraries and systems evaluation. These authors have restricted themselves to dealing with the major issues of fundamental changes in library operations and services that are being brought about by technology. They have avoided discussing specific “systems”, licensing agreements, copyright in the electronic environment and general issues such as “fee versus free” which are not exclusively linked to technology.

The work is divided into three parts, each containing at least four chapters. The first section deals with broad management issues such as the effects of technology on management, on organizational structures, and on library staff. It also covers instruction and training, management data from automated systems and collection management issues. The following section discusses the effects on services and users by technologies such as CD‐ROM, and online access either through telecommunications connection to a remote site or by loading an electronic resource on the institution’s computer. It deals with document access and delivery, primarily of publications in electronic form, and with general issues such as “disintermediation” or self‐service by library users made possible by new technologies. The final section deals with special issues in the management of technology such as the impact of the Internet, evaluation of automated systems, and prospects for artificial intelligence and expert system technologies.

Scattered throughout the work are some assertions or research findings which demonstrate the tension between service delivery and demand. It is claimed that professional librarians are now involved in system development and implementation, learning system capabilities, teaching and design and operation of new services; they spend more time now in training, in committee and at task force meetings and their hours of contact with users may have actually declined. Instead of helpful, smiling people, a friendly customer service is now the friendliness of computer menu screens. But research indicates that users rarely take time to read online help screens, and their expectations of traditional library services and response times have escalated due to a culture of instant gratification. The introduction of CD‐ROM databases has resulted in a considerable increase in requests for one‐to‐one instruction.

In this text it is argued that another delivery medium, the Internet, is the electronic resource that is now having the most significant impact on library services and operations, and on the professional activities of librarians. A radical change in scholarship is possible through networked academic publication by universities and other research institutions. Whatever happens to scholarly communication, and to the library as an institution, collection development librarians (as primarily gatekeepers identifying a portion of the universe of information resources) will be even more important than they are today. The Internet is the librarians’ full employment act of the 1990s. However, the future of the library is not so secure. If libraries do not improve their services so that they remain an essential teaching tool, they will decay into little more than study halls. Libraries will become vastly more expensive or they will become useless.

Most of the extensive list of over 500 works cited were published in the 1990s; three items are for works in progress to be published in 1997, and six references are in the form of URLs. Some older relevant studies are included, five from the 1960s, one published in 1956, and the oldest reference (to Zipf’s principle of least effort) having appeared in 1949 before the library careers of nearly all current practitioners. The bias is heavily in favour of North America, with scant mention of research published in Australia or Europe. Three British Library Research Papers, and CATRIONA, ELINOR, ELVIRA and UKOLUG are cited, but there are no direct references to eLib, JANET or JISC. Nevertheless, British librarians, especially those in the academic arena, will find much of value in this book, and even the busiest are recommended to read “Summary and possible trends” in the final chapter.