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What Administrators TalkAbout When They Talk AboutLibrariesBarbara McFadden Allen aa Committee on Institutional Cooperation (CIC)Published online: 12 Oct 2008.

To cite this article: Barbara McFadden Allen (2002) What Administrators Talk AboutWhen They Talk About Libraries, Journal of Library Administration, 36:3, 39-44, DOI:10.1300/J111v36n03_04

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What Administrators Talk AboutWhen They Talk About Libraries

Barbara McFadden Allen

SUMMARY. The author gives personal suggestions about ways in whichlibrarians might think about their own work and role in leading their librarytoward the new hybrid of print and digital collections and services. [Arti-cle copies available for a fee from The Haworth Document Delivery Service:1-800-HAWORTH. E-mail address: <getinfo@haworthpressinc.com> Website:<http://www.HaworthPress.com> © 2002 by The Haworth Press, Inc. All rights re-served.]

KEYWORDS. Committee on Institutional Cooperation (CIC), traditionalvs. electronic collections

For the past three years, I have had the pleasure of working with and forthe senior administrators of the twelve CIC member universities (theeleven members of the Big Ten Athletic Conference and the University ofChicago). Prior to accepting this position as Director of this consortium, Iserved to lead and direct the program of library collaboration for the CICknown as the CIC Center for Library Initiatives.

While libraries are the jewel in the crown of our collaborations, wehave collaborative programs and research projects across the entire spec-trum–from sharing study abroad and less commonly taught language of-ferings across our institutions; to multimillion dollar annual purchases ofscientific supplies, to entirely new programs of instruction and researchsuch as our newly formed American Indian Studies Consortium, the CIChas a 42 year history of deep collaboration.

Barbara McFadden Allen is Director of the Committee on Institutional Cooperation

(CIC).

[Haworth co-indexing entry note]: “What Administrators Talk About When They Talk About Libraries.” Al-

len, Barbara McFadden. Co-published simultaneously in Journal of Library Administration (The Haworth Infor-

mation Press, an imprint of The Haworth Press, Inc.) Vol. 36, No. 3, 2002, pp. 39-44; and: Electronic Resources

and Collection Development (ed: Sul H. Lee) The Haworth Information Press, an imprint of The Haworth Press,

Inc., 2002, pp. 39-44. Single or multiple copies of this article are available for a fee from The Haworth Document

Delivery Service [1-800-HAWORTH, 9:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m. (EST). E-mail address:

getinfo@haworthpressinc.com].

2002 by The Haworth Press, Inc. All rights reserved. 39

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I’m going to summarize my conversations with a variety of senior admin-istrators in our member universities, talk about why those impressions are im-portant to your success and that of your libraries, and offer some suggestionsabout ways in which you might think about your own work and your role inleading the library toward the new hybrid of print and digital collections andservices. In my opinion, the most successful libraries will lead this changethrough a combination of stakeholder education and influence building, care-ful management and stewardship of existing staff and resources, and astutelycapturing every available resource to focus attention on the future and movingforward into the future while protecting areas of excellence in the “tradi-tional” or print-based collections.

As you’ve doubtless guessed, my observations come from the research uni-versity perspective, but I believe are relevant for those working in any academicenvironment, and while the thoughts of administrators in the public, special, orschool library setting may differ, I believe those of you from outside the acad-emy will gain some value from these remarks, as well. Particularly if you thinkabout administrators as those who, ultimately, influence your finances and whocan support or abandon you through challenging and difficult times–not unlikea board in a public institution. Also, I hasten to point out that most of my obser-vations and recommendations are just that–my own observations and that ofothers gathered by and large through informal means. Nevertheless, I believethese observations to be valid when considering how effective we are, and inthinking about ways in which we could improve our libraries and the serviceswe provide. That digital and electronic information resources and servicesgreatly improve access to information is a given in my remarks. Others herewill speak on the specifics of these benefits. I will start from the assumption thatwe will need to collect and manage both traditional and electronic collections.

I recently posed four questions to administrators in the CIC memberuniversities, polling 12 research vice presidents, 12 deans, and 12 pro-vosts. I received 13 responses, and there results were as follows:

Thinking about research libraries in general, please “grade” libraries ontheir application of new computer and information technologies to im-prove and transform various library functions:

Deans(3) VPs(4) Provosts(6)Enhancing access to digitalinformation B A A-Providing enhanced research tools B A- B+Enhancing access to traditionalcollections B+ C+ B

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Improving customer service B B+ B+

I should also point out that in their responses, administrators almostuniversally noted the challenges to libraries presented by increasing pricesfor print and digital publications, the need to juggle expectations of usersto provide both, and the great strides libraries have made in successfullyadopting new technology. Most interesting to me, and relevant to my dis-cussion today, is that the one mildly negative comment I heard from a pro-vost was, “While I know libraries have made progress in all these areas,especially in digital access, I’m not hearing positive feedback from myfaculty, which tells me that they do not share my high opinion”–an in-stance when there may be a lack of communication between the libraryand the faculty.

In other conversations provosts have had about libraries, I can tell youthat:

• They support out libraries’ efforts to expand access to collectionsthrough cooperative collection management;

• They believe we should aggressively expand our collections to in-clude digital resources;

• They understand the dynamics of the scholarly communicationchain and the underlying economics and are willing to contribute tothose discussions (here, in fact, the provosts of the Big XII and theGreater Western Library Alliance have also been leaders);

• They encourage us to change our old models of comparative data onour collections as increasingly meaningless; and

• They see our libraries as leaders in identifying entirely new modelsof publishing for our research universities–so much so that in ouruniversities the provosts have invested in a pilot project to create anew electronic publishing partnership between our libraries andpresses.

Let me draw from another example. In 1999, I conducted a modeststudy, along with Chandra Prahba of OCLC to gauge faculty response andsatisfaction with our CIC Virtual Electronic Library (allowing patrons un-mediated access and interlibrary loan to the library catalogs of our mem-ber universities). The most amazing finding, was that no matter how hardwe make it for patrons to find information on the web and through our cat-alogs, they consistently perceive that their service was faster and betterthan the “old” methods of access, ILL, and delivery. Whether they wereretrieving digital or print materials, and whether or not the items were held

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in their home library–those we interviewed perceived they had access tomore information than was available in their library alone, and perceivedthat they had faster access to those materials–apparently owing to the factthat the user felt they controlled the process.

Now, let me jump from the realm of the leaders, faculty, and library us-ers in our universities, and travel to the realm of the public sector and thosewho hold the increasingly smaller purse strings of our universities: thestate legislators. I was recently at a meeting of state government leadersfrom a number of Midwestern states. These included, usually, the chairsof the house and senate budget committees for higher education, the headof the states higher education board, and a smattering of employees fromthe offices of the governors or other state officials. The meeting kicked offwith a very provocative and erudite oration from the President of a large,public research university. As an ice-breaker and audience interaction ex-ercise, the speaker asked the group to consider the following question:What is the single greatest waste of resources on our campuses? The an-swer the speaker was seeking was “our students time.” But, to my greatshock, the audible response from the audience was “the library.” Followedby much grumbling about the exorbitant prices of electronic informationsources and a perceived lack of good resource management.

What are the key themes emerging from these responses? From the ad-ministrative and faculty side within the CIC members universities:

• Recognition of the centrality of the library to the mission of the re-search university

• A very positive perception about the ability of the library to trans-form service and collections through the application of digital tech-nologies

• Trust in the ability of the library to provide stewardship of the collec-tions

• An encouragement to pursue collaboration as a strategy for increas-ing access to information and collections

• Recognition and acceptance of the role of collaboration in deliveringservices

• And, of course, this is wholly unscientific and anecdotal, and thosewho did not respond may not share these feelings, and those who didrespond may simply not realize things could be any better.

From the anecdote about the state meeting, I believe what we are seeingis symptomatic of the uninformed and uninvolved. I believe that 5 yearsago, some of those same university administrators I spoke with might ac-

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tually have answered the same way. Our library leaders have done a ter-rific job of leading and influencing decision making about and support forlibraries.

The perception of a strong library yields benefits in political support,which I posit translates into financial support (ultimately). Administratorswho understand the library support the library: those who are ignorant donot.

Let’s look at what this means for you. Our librarians face enormouschallenges in providing stewardship to some of the greatest print-basedcollections in the world. They face staggering costs for journals, and in-creasing pressures to provide digital services and collections–though noone is willing to give up their print access. Others here will recite the hor-ror stories about how large your collection budgets would have to be tobuy everything in every format and provide access to it all.

There are a number of strategies that might be used to transition to thishybrid print/digital future, to develop and promote entirely new servicesof which we’ve not yet even conceived, and protect and provide access toour print resources.

The collection manager stands in what many consider an unenviableposition: with this vision of the hybrid collection shining like a beacon onone side, and the realities of the budget, the old guard faculty and suspi-cious staff members on the other. I well know how disheartening it can beto push for change in the collection budget and with the staff and faculty,only to have someone in upper administration fold on the issue at hand.

Unfortunately (or fortunately) that is the job of the collection manager.If we needed only someone to manage the budget, we would hire accoun-tants. If the bibliographers and subject specialists and faculty all workedtogether amazingly well and resources were unlimited, there would be noneed for you to work with them and lead them to new visions of the li-brary.

Leadership and influence building are your jobs! You must understandand embrace this role. Specialists (be they faculty or bibliographers) existto specialize and they are going to fight fiercely to protect their turf–andthat is the nature of their job. Your role is to blend these disparate interests,maintain momentum for areas of investment in programs and collectionsof excellence, while also leading toward the future. In such a strategy onemight:

• Maintain and protect existing areas of excellence in the collectionand services

• Devote every new dollar to target areas of strategic focus

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• Blend the interests of many into a cohesive, simple message and tellthat story over and over and over again–supporting a move to newand better vision through influence building

• Recognize, champion, celebrate all of the successes• Interact constantly with all stakeholders–human interaction is essen-

tial.

In the end, it is about where you focus your attention. Assuming thatyou have outstanding management skills including personnel and fiscalmanagement and that you are doing all you can to achieve efficiencies andfocus your energy and that of your staff on service over process, the realtask of the library leaders is to sustain support for the existing collections,while pushing forward new initiatives–no matter how small those new in-vestments. There are many individuals (often hundreds of them in any oneresearch library) focusing on the specifics, lobbying for their area. It ischallenging, but you must synthesize these needs and desires and shiftyour attention to the larger picture. In a way, it is like assembling one ofthose pictures from a million different photos. You can end up with just amillion different photos or with a bigger, grander picture that emergesfrom these many individual efforts. And there is so much more we coulddo if we look at this bigger picture: shared campus-wide investments innew technologies, and collections; investments in experiments and collab-orations leading to entirely new forms of scholarly communication;shared help desk and IT support infrastructures. Every little step contrib-utes to moving up the mountain! Do such strategies work? You bet theydo: the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign library was held harm-less on the budget cuts and recessions. In the CIC, presses and libraries areworking together to lead an effort to transform publishing on our cam-puses–with funding and support from the provosts.

When I look back over these past 10 years, we’ve made enormousstrides as a profession in meeting the demands of the digital age–in spiteof the dire predictions of many. Your message about scholarly communi-cation has been heard and understood, new partnerships are emerg-ing–with IT divisions, with presses, with colleges–to develop entirely newservices. Share your love and passion for your work with everyone. It isabsolutely infectious and an essential ingredient to your ultimate success.

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