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Recharging the Corporate Library with Public Library Ideas - by Nancy Maloney, Electronic Resources Librarian at BP Information Services - Naperville, IL
After 15 years as a corporate librarian, it has been refreshing to spend time with my public library peers. The Synergy Illinois Library Leadership Program as well as involvement in my local library system has invigorated my approach to business librarianship. Special librarians generally work within larger organizations that have little interest in the nuts and bolts of library work. Our response to customers’ daily needs is driven by the business environment. While aligning ourselves with the customer is fundamental for good service, we risk losing perspective by focusing on putting out fires.
The corporate library must be more than a service group if it can survive in challenging times. It is essential to position the library as an enduring and responsive institution within the organization. We can gain inspiration by looking toward the public library as a model for corporate library service, especially in challenging economic times. Below are a few ideas that may help reinvigorate our perspective on corporate libraries.
- Embrace Your Mission -- The Public library is the only local government agency people visit by choice because of its mission to serve the whole community’s information and educational needs. Its mission is larger than meeting quarterly targets.
As a corporate library, embracing your organization’s mission is vital. The selection of materials and services depend on understanding the mission so the library can uniquely support its customers. Aligning your library with the goals of your community makes it a place users want to visit and an institution they will support.
- Be Public -- Public libraries are public places, sitting on the real and virtual village green. As a public institution, it constantly communicates its events, challenges and services to its community.
Corporate information centers should open the doors to the physical and virtual collections and services for all their patrons. Report your projects; submit an annual report detailing how well you are meeting organizational needs. As much as possible, de-mystify your services --- your deliverables and the materials you select won’t impress anyone if kept hidden.
- Be a Community Institution -- Public Libraries serve a unique role in communities, offering unique settings which meet ongoing educational and civic needs of its community.
The special library can be a community hub by hosting document collections for other groups, making connections between our clients, sharing its meeting spaces. As experts on organizing and retrieving information, we can be guides and consultants within the organization.
- Make Friends -- Friends groups understand and support the public library’s mission. These volunteers lend a hand in services, spread the word about services and champion the referenda process.
The corporate information center needs all the friends it can get; without friends it’s just a line item in the budget. Library advisory groups are a touchstone for testing new services and spreading the word through the organization. At budget crunch time, supporters at different levels of the organization can save the day.
- Market to diverse populations-- Public librarians tailor their collections to meet the interest, language and difficulty level of the distinct populations they serve.
Diversity is a special library issue too; knowing what matters to each patron group increases value to the entire organization. Collect material and offer access to services that speak to your clients
- Go to your customers --- Public libraries use bookmobiles, off-site presentations and satellite collections to deliver the library into the community they serve.
Getting out of the library and meeting clients in their environment, is invigorating. Try making the rounds in the cafeteria, popping up in the lab or entering the online communities your users frequent.
- Tell Stories -- Story time is an active time at public libraries. Offering storytelling programs engages even the smallest library patron.
Insert storytelling into your presentations. Collect your clients’ stories to build internal knowledge and connections. Solicit testimonials from your clients to use in your marketing efforts. Communicate frequently with your patrons via in-house publications and participate in department meetings.
- Meet the Customer on their level -- Tables in the children’s department are sized for children, not the librarians. Materials, facilities and services are selected and promoted according to the customers’ needs.
Special libraries must be sure their customers can easily navigate its collections and participate in its services. Remember to use our customer’s language, not library jargon in all our messages. Physical and virtual reference areas should encourage comfortable conversations.
