The Corporate Librarian

This is going to be pretty general on the work end of things, since I prefer to err on the side of not saying too much rather than saying too much about work.

I’ve been to two industry conferences, co-written a research report (and I’m helping gather data for another one), helped build and maintain some online databases and now I’m catching up on contact and document management activities as well. I’ve also done ad hoc research for colleagues for articles, on behalf of clients, etc..

We’re tech-friendly, within the limits of a parent company IT department that’s (rightly) concerned about security. I try to keep an eye out for new information sources.

One thing I wrestle with is the extent to which formal processes and task-specific software is required for document management for companies of 10 people or less. I’ll have to see if anyone in SLA’s KM division has thoughts on that.

SLA – some progress on the blog – we’ve got a lot of people reading, mainly because their email addresses are signed up to read blog updates. I may have gotten an advertiser for the blog, we’ll see.

Other than that, constant process issues with the blog and the perennial joys of travel in the Bay Area without a car mean I participate very little in local SLA Chapter activities and don’t have much ability to change that. Which is a shame, as we’ve had (and will have) some great programs.

I was also infuriated (not an exaggeration – I left the meeting as soon as was politic after that) by one person at a joint chapter meeting who felt the need to lecture my generation on ethics. Our president and others are working on student outreach, so hopefully that was an isolated crank.

So late 2009-2010 may be the year I drop some of my associations, we’ll see. I feel more connection to and interest in national SLA and divisions. I’m years behind on the SLA IT Blogging Division blog, local Solo Librarians meetings run up against the travel issue and AIIP I only kept membership because I was nervous about how my job was going.

Despite the fact that most people seem to be working in different types of libraries from me and it seems like people have Google and Twitter fetishes at times, LSW is probably the ‘association’ I feel closest to.

Jorie Porter asked me to pass on this call for papers on corporate library-related topics, and honestly I’d like to see some of this stuff. So:

(call for papers below)

We are seeking chapter proposals for a new edited collection on corporate libraries. This book will be an edited collection of chapters describing best practices in a variety of corporate libraries worldwide, providing both a foundation of knowledge for scholars in library and information science areas and information and ideas for practicing corporate librarians. The editors have obtained an interest from the publisher, and a contract is pending a list of potential chapters and contributors.

Please submit a proposal of 250 words, or a full chapter, for consideration.

Topics may include, but are not limited to:

Planning a Corporate Library, including chapters on topics such as design, architecture, and facility planning, budget and staffing, long range planning, technology planning, hiring, recruiting, and training for a new library.

Collaborations, including chapters on interlibrary lending and borrowing, joint libraries, consortia and other types of collaborations and organizations.

Technology, including chapters on best practices, discussions of the use of technology, and the scope of a corporate librarian’s job such as what technological support they offer, web sites and internet databases in relations to corporate librarianship, electronic services.

Staffing, including human resources, continuing education, professional networking, core competencies, management, routines Communications, including articles regarding communications; for example, with satellite offices, with overseas branches, interdepartmental, computer mediated communication, and more.

Knowledge Management/ Organization, including topics covering how Corporate Libraries manage data and knowledge and organize it, and share it.

Special Issues This section will include articles about any special issues pertaining to Corporate Librarianship, such as current challenges, copyright and other legal topics, especially those that are unique to corporate librarianship.

Please send chapters or chapter proposals by July 28, 2009, through email to:

Sigrid Kelsey and Jorie Porter, editors

sigridkelsey@gmail.com

I  caught Ross Housewright’s article “Themes of Change in Corporate Libraries: Considerations for Academic Librarians” from a link posted on FriendFeed (hat tip to Peter Murray-Rust) and braced myself. Would it be yet another commenter looking lovingly over the fence at corporate libraries, imagining that they face none of the problems academic and public libraries face? Would it be yet another prescription for applying a one-size-fits all poorly-understood trendy business methodology to the academic library setting?

I was pleasantly surprised to see that Housewright addressed both the commonalities and the differences between academic and corporate libraries. He cites some of the sources you might expect – James Matarazzo’s work, Laurence Davenport and Thomas Prusak’s “Blow Up the Corporate Library,” but doesn’t stop with the 1990s and the outsourcing of corporate library functions.

Some tidbits:

• It’s not enough to establish measures and track them, the measures have to actually have something to do with value provided by the library. Telling me you had X number of transactions says nothing about whether the library should be handling all of those transactions, or what value those transactions bring to the library’s sponsor(s).
• It’s OK – no, it’s more than OK, it’s vital – to identify services that don’t make sense and to change them or stop offering them.
• Communicate with your sponsors and end users (and where Housewright shines is in stressing it’s not enough to market what you are doing, you have to actually listen to your sponsors and end users).

For people who wonder why I object to the notion of librarians as people who connect users with information:

In the traditional model described above, librarians acted mechanically and broadly, accepting simple requests and returning simple answers in high volumes, but this sort of activity was easily replaced by end-user research or simple outsourcing.

Housewright is honest enough to point out that a library can do all the right things and still close – these aren’t magic bullets. Some libraries were aware they needed to change, but couldn’t free up their resources or staff. Some libraries were and are not positioned effectively in their corporate hierarchies. And some solutions for corporate libraries may not fit academic and public libraries – the “let’s make  Walt happy” sentence here is

The experiences of the corporate library demonstrate that there is no ‘one size fits all’ model for the successful library; a library is successful if it serves the needs and priorities of its host institution, whatever those may be.

but in general I applaud the notion of libraries constantly assessing the services they provide in collaboration with other groups. I’m somewhat wary of the assumption that LibQUAL+ and the Balanced Scorecard methodology are necessarily value-driven metrics – I can’t speak to LibQUAL+, but Balanced Scorecard is easy to apply in a haphazard fashion.  Or such was the case when I last used it.

Housewright does recognize that academic libraries may have other concerns beyond immediate provision of value – he cites preservation as an example of this – but argues that libraries need to be willing to re-examine their missions and how their values play out in terms of services offered and roles played. Housewright also notes that some end-users may be quite vocal against a given change. Some of those users can be led to different behaviors, some may need specialized services.

I’m curious what academic librarians, as well as readers of this blog, think of the article. Is it an exercise in teaching one’s grandmother to suck eggs? Is it something to be printed out and shared with one’s peers?

I haven’t forgotten the blog, honest. Slowly making my way through Walt’s latest book and Libworld – library blogs worldwide is on its way.

I’m actually looking forward to local chapter SLA stuff in 2009 – anyone have opinions pro or con on the California Library Association?

In terms of conferences, Internet Librarian will be it. I’d love to go to the SLA Annual now that I have a clue on how to get more out of it beyond checking out job listings and vendor booths, but it’s the same time as my nephew’s Bar Mitzvah. Computers in Libraries is just Internet Librarian, East Coast Edition (read: higher transportation costs). I still have hopes that Code4you will happen, and I’m trying to figure out what I can tangibly offer towards its success (as opposed to just cheerleading).

I still ruminate about an online space for corporate librarians to share tips, commiserate, etc. – there aren’t many corporate librarians and researchers in LSW Meebo chat, and an attempt to start a room in FriendFeed didn’t go anywhere. Yes, I realize it would almost certainly be an after-hours and weekend thing. Yes, I realize some of the ground is covered by mailing lists.

I received an offer letter a few weeks back, and just this week sent in all the forms for insurance, getting paid via direct deposit and such. Got introduced as a new hire on the regular firm status call, and here’s my official company headshot:

The company is Novarica, a division of Novantas. I’m doing a combination of knowledge management and secondary research work.

Not surprisingly, there’s requirements around confidentiality, beyond the usual “don’t discuss clients or client business.” So I have to see what I can and can’t talk about – I expect any discussions of knowledge management efforts at the firm or the like will have to be very very general. I’ll have to figure out what this means for presenting at conferences. And I have to make sure to update the disclaimer on the blog.

Their Internet policy is pretty sensible – they understand some limited personal use of the Internet, but it means I’ll be around mostly on evenings and weekends on Meebo, checking FriendFeed less often and from my home computer. Which honestly, is probably a good thing. Typing this from my home laptop now.

I got back yesterday afternoon, caught up on some work, and slept a lot, honestly.

In general, I’d say Internet Librarian is good for hands-on techie librarians, though there’s always room for more enterprise sessions. It’s slanted towards public and academic librarians primarily, but there are plenty of sessions which are broadly applicable. Yes, there’s a bit of “the same crew doing presentations,” but there were a lot of new presenters this time around.

One thing Jason Clark brought up which I brood about more and more is the notion of hands-on lab type work. There’s discussion of things programmers can do, and discussion of baby steps non-programmers can take, but I really miss the hands-on element. Maybe something to bring up with the local SLA chapter – would there be a company or special library willing to host a computer lab for a day?

The pre-conferences are getting better and better, and I have to figure out if there’s anything a solo librarian with no physical library can offer in terms of presentations. WiFi continues to be a problem, but I expect Dick Kaser will have another editorial about how we all need to unplug from our gadgets or somesuch. OK, that was snarkier than I usually like to get, so props to ITI for getting more gear in once they noticed there were issues. I’m thinking next year I get a PCS card or a broadband modem. Also, I’ll bring an extra battery.

With respect to the blog, I’ve renewed the domain. At the corporate/special librarians dinearound, the idea was brought up of a group blog. The idea has appeal, offering the perspectives of solo librarians, librarians at large companies, librarians from different industries, etc.. But judging from comment frequency, I’m frankly skeptical posting would be any more frequent. So I have to think about things.

Catching up on industry news, I found an interesting post on CMS Watch’s blog by Kas Thomas (and if you’re not following CMS Watch’s blog or subscribing to their monthly newsletter and you’re interested in content management systems, I highly recomend it).

EMC, IBM and Microsoft are pushing a standard for platform-independent repository exchange, CMIS (Content Management Interoperability Services) as an OASIS (Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards) spec. Alfresco, OpenText, Oracle and SAP are also involved. As the post points out, this isn’t the first time there’s been a lot of hype about a proposed standard, but it will be interesting to watch. It will also be interesting to see how this plays with the vendors of blogging software.

Any reactions from content management pros reading this?

I just saw the news on BUSLIB-L (as reported by Gary Price on ResourceShelf, and if you’re not already following DocuTicker and ResourceShelf you’re missing out on some great information sources) that the SEC is transitioning from EDGAR to IDEA.

EDGAR is the current database for corporate filings – annual and quarterly financials, significant changes, filings from foreign issuers, prospectuses, etc. and is based on receiving filings from companies.

It sounds like the new approach is based on tagging elements of financial filings (I assume using XBRL) so that users and vendors can scoop up the data and add their own processing. Expect a lot of excitement about this in Semantic Web circles. What do you think?

Sorry for the delay in posting – a combination of honestly not having much to say, sending my faithful laptop in for repairs (broken hinge and a peeling top case) and focusing on job stuff.After three interviews (two by phone, one in person), didn’t land the latest job I was hoping for. Another four resumes sent out, a phone interview sometime next month and slow progress on the consulting website (I’ll include a link when it’s finished).  I’m helping the local chapter of SLA with their websites – so far I’ve gotten the tour from the person currently in charge along with another chapter member, we have to figure out when to get together and we have to talk to the person currently handling content for the website. If everyone’s OK with my taking that on, a great way to network and I’m told that a lot of the jobs in the area are gotten by knowing someone.Next post will be on the latest edition of Primary Research’s Corporate Library Benchmarks, once I’ve had a chance to go through all 118 pages. God help me.

Since I hadn’t seen this come up on the AIIP or BUSLIB lists.

Thursday’s Wall Street Journal had an article on the 2nd Circuit Court’s scrapping of a 2005 settlement between database operators and free-lance writers over a class-action lawsuit on unauthorized reproduction of the writers’ works. The issue was District Judge George B. Michael’s lack of jurisdiction over most of the claims (which involved infringement of unregistered copyrights).

The full opinion is here, for those more up-to-date on the legal wherefores. The case got sent back to the district court, with the operators and free-lance writers having up to 14 days to seek a rehearing before the whole circuit if they want to challenge the ruling of the 2nd Circuit Court.

The settlement had divided plaintiffs’ claims into copyrights registered prior to infringement, copyrights registered after the infringement but before December 31, 2002 and copyrights which were either registered after December 31, 2002 or not registered at all.

The database operators were still deciding how to proceed at the time of the article – affected companies include Dow Jones & Company, the New York Times Company, Reed Elsevier Group PLC and Voyager Learning Company.

The Freelance Rights blog is also covering the story, with alternative links to the majority opinion, a dissenting opinion and a note on why the 2nd Circuit Court judges did not recuse themselves despite being class members themselves. Yes, it’s a blog by objectors to the original settlement. I’m not sure why there’s nothing readily apparent on the National Writers Union website – it’s certainly covered on the Authors Guild site.