Apply the fundamental principles of planning, management, marketing, and advocacy;

Introduction

A professional within the field of information science must have a strong background in planning marketing, management, advocacy. At some point in their careers, most librarians will be tasked with managerial responsibilities. There is no shortage of theories on how to manage a business and its staff, but one commonality of library management is the reliance on a three to five year strategic plan. As part of the planning process, top leadership must ensure that the institution has sufficient funds to sustain its operations. This may require management to secure funding through advocacy and fundraising.

Management personnel should be familiar with the policy and regulatory framework of their institution. Ignorance of the law is not an excuse. In addition, they should appropriately apply management principles to the personnel that they supervisor so that library resources used effectively to achieve the library’s mission. In the below explication, I will discuss the planning and management of the staff and the institution as a whole as well as the management, marketing, and advocacy of library resources.

Explication

Strategic Planning

Institutions do not stumble into good management as a fluke. Good management us preceded by competent strategic planning. A strategic plan is a blueprint to the future of an institution that is valid for three to five years. It articulates the institution’s mission, vision, values, and strategic priorities. A mission statement serves as a part of a larger strategic planning process. In such a process, the mission statement is paired with a vision statement. A vision statement outlines the goals the institution hopes to achieve given ideal conditions. A mission statement establishes how the institution will work toward attaining those goals (Millar, 2017, p. 125). Mission statements of a public library explicate an expansive vision. While there is variation, public libraries seek to strengthen the communities they serve, enrich the lives of the inhabitants of those communities, and connect them to the larger world. The Fresno County Public Library’s mission statement reflects this.

“FCPL transforms lives and strengthens communities by providing opportunities to connect, grow, and be inspired” (Fresno County Public Library, 2019).

A strategic plan is a living document that gets renewed with each cycle. Internal departments and external stakeholders should all be consulted in its development. Evaluation and assessment provide essential feedback to the strategic planning process. In particular, SWOT analysis (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats) is essential to set realistic expectations for the next few years. After the strategic plan has been published, any departmental plans or short-term objectives should be modified to align the new strategic plan. The strategic planning process marshals disparate departments and outlying facilities towards achieving a slate of stated strategic objectives.

Management

Management personnel should be familiar with the operating environment as well as the regulatory and policy framework of their institution.

Laws that relevant to the management of libraries include:

• “copyright and intellectual property
• access to information
• protection of personal privacy
• admissibility of evidence
• data protection and information security
• criminal acts
• employment and labour relations
• taxation and financial management

(Millar, 2017, p. 130)

Librarians should pay heed to the principle of ignorantia juris non excusat—”ignorance of the law is not an excuse” (Millar, 2017, p. 130). A librarian will not be forgiven when he or she acts unlawfully.

Upper management must ensure that the organization has the appropriate funding to sustain its operations. To ensure the effective usage of funds, managers must have an accurate idea of how funding is actually spent. To this end, managers should employ activity-based costing by assigning cost drivers for direct and indirect costs (such as overhead) to appropriate actions or outcomes (Banton, 2020).

Unfortunately, personnel in the field of information science will sometimes find themselves carrying increased levels of work due to reduced funding. It is up to managers to decide how an organization will cope with such financial stress. One strategy is to outsource pieces of an organization’s operations. Outsourcing is “a business strategy that moves some of the organization’s functions, processes, activities, and decision-making responsibility to outside providers. Outsourcing generates better services and savings because specialized firms enjoy the benefits of economies of scale, division of labor, and a good balance of onsite support for employees (Gilman, 2017, p. 59).”

One of the issues facing libraries of all types and sizes is how the rising cost of online resources outstripping funding. Institutions defray some of the costs of online resources by coming together in consortiums. One concrete example of this is the RDA co-publishers discount to the RDA Toolkit. For consortiums consisting of five or more institutions, their member institutions can obtain a discount on the price of subscriptions. For consortiums of 20 institutions or more, the discount maxes out at 13% (RDA Toolkit, 2021).

Overseeing capital improvements falls under the purview of upper management, unfortunately funding such endeavors is tricky. “The key to the success of library facility planning are fund-raising efforts. Many institutions have run successful capital campaigns (Gilman, 2017, p. 61).” In many institutions, the cost of new construction can be partially covered by naming library rooms and library areas after major financial contributors.

Management has a duty to maximize the effect of the institution’s resources. Optimizing the expenditure of resources often calls for changing the duties and routines of existing personnel. My observations have been that overseeing personnel is the most difficult aspect of management. Classical Management Theory postulates that compensation is the primary motivator of employees. Behavioral Science Theory recognizes that individuality plays a role in how multiple factors motivate a person to work. Human Relation Theory establishes a paradigm where the organization is a social entity with morale playing a key role in the productivity of a work environment (Villanova University, 2022).

Effective management of personnel is a skill that is largely learned on the job. As leaders of their institution, librarians endeavor to “treat co-workers and other colleagues with respect, fairness, and good faith, and advocate conditions of employment that safeguard the rights and welfare of all employees of our institutions” (American Library Association, 2021). While it is great to be knowledgeable on a set of best practices, my observations drawn from my current and previous work environments have led me to conclude that even the best-intentioned supervisors will make mistakes—and that improvement in the management of personnel will most likely come from correcting these mistakes when these mistakes are identified.

Marketing

Libraries must verify their preconceptions on who their clientele base is and what their expectations of the library and what they desire from the library are. Such an assessment requires the deliberate implementation of research methods of users of the library. Marketing is a cyclical process. As economics, demographics, lifestyles, and technology change so too will the aspirations of a library’s clientele. Marketing plans will need to be renewed to match these changes.

Social media has incredible potential to reach patrons. Libraries of all types engage their clientele through social media. Those libraries that are seeking to increase or optimize their social media footprint are advised to develop a channel strategy. A channel strategy involves the crafting of content to be fine-tuned to the norms of a particular channel and only engaging in channels only when they make sense for a particular library and its patrons (Datig, 2018, p. 64). While it is all well and good to decide that your institution is going to be everywhere. The reality of the situation is that staff will have limited hours to spend and that creating content, checking for responses, and responding to responses does consume time. There is no point in creating content for a channel if no one is looking at it.

Advocacy

Libraries will always have to demonstrate their value to their stakeholders to justify their funding. When advocating for funding and other resources, evaluations and assessments can attest to the benefits that institutions confer on their client population. When these benefits are appropriately framed, assessments of the organization serve as a useful tool of advocacy for future funding.

Advocacy achieves results through the formation of personal relationships and community partnerships with local organizations. This is doubly true for funding authorities. Funding authorities for a public library are often members of a board of supervisors or a city council. For a public library that benefits from a sales tax measure, the voting public is a key constituency that the public library would be wise to appease.

Librarians should also be advocates of net neutrality, open access to scholarly resources, privacy, intellectual freedom, and the freedom of speech. Advocacy is one of the methods in which librarians as professionals and libraries as institutions can have a global impact.

Evidence

Evidence 1: Fresno County Public Library Organizational Analysis

As evidence of my ability to engage in the strategic planning process, I offer this Organizational Analysis of the Fresno County Public Library (FCPL). This presentation demonstrates my understanding of the role of management and the factors that can influence their decisions and addresses the concepts of the strategic planning process and the SWOT analysis. This analysis also demonstrates my ability to gather demographic information and interpret that demographic information into service needs. This group presentation also covers how a public library can meet such service needs.

Evidence 2: Non-Degreed Librarians: A Pathway for Progress for Academic Libraries

I have put forward this white paper (from INFO 230 Issues in Academic Libraries) to attest to my knowledge and comprehension of the oversight role that librarians exercise over paraprofessionals within a library setting. It is unfortunate reality that librarians have the power to mistreat the paraprofessionals they work with. Sometimes the capabilities of a library paraprofessional equals or exceeds that of their librarian co-workers. Naturally the question is should there be a pathway to obtain the recognition of librarian to these select and outstanding paraprofessionals. This white paper discusses some of the problems with paraprofessional and librarian relationships and the prospect of non-degreed librarians.

Evidence 3: Daniel Pearl Magnet High School Press Release

As evidence of my ability to advocate with the media on behalf of libraries, I offer this press release (from INFO 282 Grant Writing and Alternative Funding Resources). As the primary author of this press release, I used my education and previous experience to craft an announcement that extolled the generosity of the Ahmanson Foundation and the good work the Daniel Pearl Magnet High School’s school library would complete in this simulated approval of a grant application.

References

American Library Association. (2021, June 29). Professional Ethics. ALA American Library Association. https://www.ala.org/tools/ethics

Banton, C. (2020, November 4). Activity Cost Driver Source. Investopedia. https://www.investopedia.com/search?q=cost+driver

Datig, I. (2018, July 9). Revitalizing library websites and social media with content strategy: Tools and recommendations. Journal of Electronic Resources Librarianship. 30(2). 63–69. https://doi.org/10/1080/1941126X.2018.1465511

Fresno County Public Library. (2019). Strategic plan: 2019-2022. https://www.fresnolibrary.org/about/mission.html

Gilman, Todd. (Ed.). (2017). Academic Librarianship Today. Rowman & Littlefield.

Millar, L. A. (2017). Archives: Principles and practices. (2nd ed.). Neal-Schuman.

RDA Toolkit (2021, September 5). September 2021 RDA toolkit release. https://www.rdatoolkit.org/node/245 9/5/2021

Villanova University. (2022. June 30) Management theories: Classical, behavioral, and modern approaches. https://www.villanovau.com/resources/leadership/an-overview-of-management-theories/