Over on the Annoyed Librarian blog, things are a little stirred up over the old ‘Run the library like a business’ proposal.  While it seems like it doesn’t take a lot to stir up librarians these days, and while blogs seem likely places for stirring with the opportunity to make anonymous comments, re-hashing tired arguments about using the business model in libraries is more than a little tiring.  If you don’t often visit the Annoyed Librarian blog, it can be mildly entertaining, and maybe that is the point since it gets a lot more views and comments than this blog.  Rabble rousers we are not, here at LL&M.  As far as the ‘like a business’ proposal, a look at the bleak economic climate that portends to stretch far into the future may be reason enough not to run a library like a business.  If we were running our libraries like a business during the meltdown of the past year, where would that leave us now?

The fact is, librarians never seemed to understand the comparison.  Suggestions for librarians to ‘run it like a business’ were geared more to borrowing best practices from business models, and not to adopt all business approaches in library administration.  One example are customer service and satisfaction models that the for-profit world has always used.  Libraries began to adopt these models in the 1980s and 90s.  Efficiency and accountability are other areas where useful ideas for improvement can be borrowed from business operations, but most libraries have been slower in adopting those.

Perhaps a new model for running could be suggested.  How about we run the library like the military?  All spit-shine and ‘ten-hut!’ and efficiency to the smallest detail.  Like the business approach, this isn’t a serious recommendation to place commando tactics in library administration, but rather an offer that military practices in some areas might be benchmarked, just as those in business, government, non-profits, and even the educational system might also be mined for best-practices.  That’s really all the ‘run it like a business’ suggestions ever meant anyway.  Now let’s all get back to work.

Eric C. Shoaf

Editor, LL&M

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