Managing the Twenty-First Century Reference Department: Challenges and Prospects

by Linda S Katz

Overview

Learn the skills needed to update and manage a reference department that efficiently meets the needs of clients today—and tomorrow!

Managing the Twenty-First Century Reference Department: Challenges and Prospects provides librarians with the knowledge and skills they need to manage an effective reference service. Full of useful and practical ideas, this book presents successful methods for recruiting and retaining capable reference department staff and management, training new employees and adapting current services to an evolving field. Expert practitioners address the changing role of the reference library worker and how longstanding traditions and practices can be re-evaluated and re-applied. The information in this book is ideal for librarians and students of library studies looking to take their skills to the next level.

Reference departments continue to evolve as the number of applicants qualified to run them declines. Managing the Twenty-First Century Reference Department: Challenges and Prospects explores the dynamics of leadership and management as well as a variety of other characteristics needed in a Head of Reference. It recognizes the increasing need for visionary leaders who can deal with shrinking budgets, soaring costs, expensive electronic resources, and high user expectations and provides you with practical advice on finding, training, and keeping these individuals.

In addition to the training and recruitment techniques documented in this book, you will find extensive information on:

• setting and achieving goals
• creating and maintaining a positive work environment
• how to deliver quality services
• how to improve job satisfaction for library staff
• problem solving strategies
• the importance of communication
• making your reference department task- and employee-centered

Managing the Twenty-First Century Reference Department: Challenges and Prospects also provides an inside look at Oregon State University’s Valley Library’s new management model. The library’s information professionals detail this new model’s current function, potential hazards, and multiple advantages. The user-friendly information documented in this chapter and in the book as a whole makes Managing the Twenty-First Century Reference Department: Challenges and Prospects an essential read for any librarian or student of library studies looking to meet the demands of an increasingly technical field.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780789023322
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	03/03/2004
Series:	The Reference Librarian Series
Pages:	132
Product dimensions:	5.44(w) x 8.50(h) x (d)

About the Author

Kwasi Sarkodie-Mensah

Table of Contents

• Introduction
• Managing an Academic Reference Department
• From Core Competencies to Desired Traits: Hiring a Head of Reference for the New Millennium
• Managing the 21st Century Reference Department: Competencies
• Training the New Head of Reference: Focusing on the Supervising Relationship as Technique
• Collaborative Leadership: A Model for Reference Services
• It Takes a Village to Manage the 21st Century Reference Department
• The 21st Century Reference Department: Working to Provide Quality Service to Users
• Leadership or Management: Expectations for Head of Reference Services
• Index
• Reference Notes Included

Editorial Reviews

Reviewer: Maureen Diana Sasso, BA, MLS (Duquesne University)
Description: This book on the future of the reference department covers such aspects as management versus leadership, core competencies and training needed by reference managers, and collaborative leadership. It also describes examples of nonhierarchical management models.
Purpose: Its theme is meeting the challenge of leading a reference department in the 21st century by taking advantage of new technology, adapting internal processes, and providing a vision that leads to satisfying changing user expectations.
Audience: Although the book's promotional information proclaims its audience as academic library managers planning to hire heads of reference, it is better targeted to aspiring or newly hired heads of reference. The chapter authors appear to be subject specialists and instruction librarians who provide reference service and who speak from the perspective of practitioners, rather than experienced heads of reference.
Features: The treatment is so broad as to be superficial and the quality of the chapters varies both in terms of writing and content. The approach is very practical and highly descriptive, but offers relatively little new insight. The book's strongest chapter is Crowe's discussion of collaborative leadership. Well written and researched, it presents Joseph Rost's theory of transforming leadership and its applications for academic reference departments. Leahy's chapter on managing an academic reference department uses an appealing NFL metaphor to describe the roles of reference teams and leaders.
Assessment: The book suffers from some editing problems. There are inconsistencies in citation between the textual references and end of chapter references, which also vary in style. Some references seem dated for a work discussing skills needed to bring management skills into concert with the evolving expectations of users and staff in the new century. While the authors do relate management and leadership concepts to the library setting, readers looking for more in-depth analysis might prefer to turn to the management literature. Though attractive, the hard bound cover is not sturdy. Individual articles are available for purchase from the publisher. Not an essential purchase.

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