21. Next meeting 7 th July 2010 Target Room, SLNSW 10am-1pm [email_address] [email_address]
22.
Editor's Notes
I am Corporate Librarian at the City of Sydney Library.
I am also a member of the NSW Local Govt Librarians Group. Today I am speaking to you on behalf of members of the group. Our members come from public libraries across NSW where there is a corporate library service in some form. At our last meeting we decided that we should take the opportunity offered by this 5 min spot to challenge those of you who don't already consider council staff in the delivery of reference services to think of why you should do so.
This is the universe in which councils operate….The big picture for local councils as an organisation.
Think about where the library sits within the structure of your council. When it comes to allocation of funds we need to be fully aware of the competing demands on council resources.
{Read slide} For public libraries to thrive into the future, for you to continue to provide reference services to the wider community then libraries must have the sustained support of the organisation as a whole. There are many ways libraries do this 1) By providing & measuring services provided to the public 2) Using the libraries as cultural venues 3) By delivering some council services and information from the library. As reference librarians we can make our own contribution.
Dr Gillian Hallam from QUT has recently done a literature review as part of the Queensland Government Agency Library Review. While she is talking about government agency libraries more as special libraries, she has highlighted the need for libraries to clearly articulate the value of the library service to the parent body. As a reference librarian you can play a role here.
{Read Slide}
Quote one:
{Read Slide} As a ref librarian you are placed to access these resources on behalf of staff across the organisation.
These are the sort of responses you will get simply by providing a prompt ILL, locating references on a reading list or through or sometimes just by doing a smart Google search – it’s amazing what non-librarians have trouble finding on the net!
{Read Slide} It’s amazing what a phrase search on Google will find! There was an article in the SMH the other day about the fairly poor results students in NSW achieved in IT literacy…….if you think all council staff can simply find what they need on the internet, this is not the case.
Where public libraries have established corporate l
In my case, while I do purchase books for the general library collections, my focus in on providing a targetted service via a corporate library intranet site.
Weblinks for Womens in Leadership program…..Diversity project.
Sutherland Library’s Corporate Library Service – Blog, Journals, delicious links
Library cards: try and encourage staff to join the library – we have done membership drives with prizes – free tickets etc Once staff are members it’s easier to encourage them to use databases etc… Individual resources: e.g If you subscribe to Business Source Complete then let senior management know about HBR and how to access it using their card. Web 2.0 Delicious links, blogs, wikis, rss feeds (yahoo pipes to aggregate a number of sources Major project
More information on Corporate Library Services. You will need to send us an email request – we can join you up to access the wiki and listserve. Ref Questions, journals list, corporate profiles, minutes of meetings etc. Join the group you can then access our Wiki. Whether you are a member or not you can attend our meetings.
Please contact us if you have questions about the design of corporate library services or if you have a ref question you need help with.
