Managing Information Services

A Sustainable Approach

Jo Bryson

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781317101581
• Edition: 3
• Topic: Langues et linguistique
• Subtopic: Bibliothèques et sciences de l'information

This third edition of Jo Bryson's highly regarded Managing Information Services has been thoroughly revised with an emphasis on managing for a sustainable future. Libraries and information services face uncertain times and this new edition tackles the challenges of planning and managing change, future-proofing for tomorrow, and leading the transformation to a sustainable future. The text also addresses the integration of information services including librarianship, records management and ICT. Essential reading for information students, this text also serves as a comprehensive and detailed reference on the key management topics for information service managers.

PART I Management Influences in a Changing Landscape

The theme for Part I is managing the influences and drivers present in an unpredictable and increasingly complex environment; where survival and success is often founded on sustaining the organization and creating the next advantage from within. This requires an unprecedented measure of cleverness, ingenuity and flexibility on the part of the manager. They need to foresee and make sense of threats in the changing landscape that is typical of the global environment, whilst being highly creative and inventive in seeking out new opportunities. Their role has been likened to dancing on a moving carpet.

To put this in context, Chapter 1 explores a number of challenges facing management in the uncertain world of today. It explains some of the skills, new mindsets and roles of managers that are necessary to meet these challenges.

The environment in which information services operate is undergoing significant and continuous change. Chapter 2 describes different techniques for sustaining and future-proofing organizations by considering concepts of possibilities and probabilities and introducing the reader to some of the drivers of change and strategic influences in the external environment. Chapter 2 also explains the internal environmental characteristics that sustain organizations and which are most likely to be found in successful organizations.

Figure P1.1 Management influences in a changing landscape

CHAPTER 1 Managing in an Uncertain World

The challenges of an uncertain world

In the last two hundred years, Western societies have transitioned through economies and societies first based on agriculture, then on industry and knowledge. Now there is yet another dimension, that of the virtual world. The magnitude of these changes is such that they are called revolutions and each one has challenged the way in which people work, think, live and communicate. The virtual world that is a further development of the knowledge age differs little in its level of impact, its ability to present challenges and the associated requirement to rethink economies, societies and lifestyles from its previous counterparts. However, a key difference between the virtual world and the knowledge age and the first two ages is that the earlier ages were built on knowing how and knowing what. The knowledge age is founded on knowing who and why in an uncertain and now virtual world. We live and work in an era where unpredictable events have an immediate global impact, where corporate reputations can be destroyed through worldwide condemnation about their slowness to react or respond to situations, and where the market environment is no longer solely a physical presence as per the market place; it is increasingly a virtual presence, or market space. It is a learning age where an understanding of trends and possibilities goes hand in hand with identifying the inconceivable and making choices or preferences as to where to position for the future.

Recent developments influencing service delivery in the knowledge age are:

• Virtualization that enables information services to participate in global information- centric collaboration to deliver 24x365 services;
• The proliferation of mobile devices enabling anywhere anytime support and service delivery; and
• Information savvy generations who are using social networking tools in unprecedented ways.

All these are reshaping the organizational landscape and the demand for services.

The abilities to create, share and use knowledge in a virtual environment are key factors in the creation of wealth and high value employment, in stimulating creativity and sustainability, as well as improving the quality of life. Sharing knowledge, learning and creativity goes beyond the workplace and is evidenced in the rise of social networking tools that have become the most important means of communication. Community engagement, collaboration and participation in decision making, being the hallmarks of progressive governments, are also predicated on knowledge, know-how, knowing who and knowing why.

A feature of the current environment is that organizations face major uncertainty about their future and are subject to sudden strategic shocks in a global environment. These sudden, unprecedented shocks may originate from the other side of the world, but their effect is still profound. Their origins can be financial, economic, political, climatic or natural disasters. Examples include the Global Financial Crisis, foreign investment and takeover bids, the 9/11 attacks and the Boxing Day tsunami that caused widespread destruction in South East Asia. Creative and making-the-connections thinking is needed to envisage what these unprecedented risks and extraordinary shocks may be, and how to best prepare organizations to withstand them in the event of their happening.

To manage the challenges of the uncertain world, leaders and organizations have to think and act in new ways to anticipate change and:

• Sustain their impetus and operations;
• Develop new business opportunities and advantage;
• Attract and retain people with the required mindsets, skills and expertise;
• Better utilize their knowledge and information including social networking tools;
• Transform and rejuvenate existing products and services; and
• Prepare for sudden, unprecedented shocks.

Customers have raised expectations in service delivery, requiring organizations to transform the way in which products and services are delivered. However not all customers have the same needs and expectations. Employee, as well as customer, needs and expectations will differ according to their age group or generation, physical locality and personal circumstances. Therefore the information service must be prepared to deliver different solutions for different generations to meet different circumstances and sustain these in an environment of dwindling financial resources. Examples of customers might be:

• A field worker who requires corporate information provided to their laptop or mobile device whilst they are out of the office visiting clients or worksites;
• Senior citizens who are advised that their book reservation is available for collection through a text message sent to a mobile device or an email;
• A primary carer who may work from home and require access to corporate office and business systems;
• Office workers who work with both hard copy information and corporate business systems either at home or in the office;
• Researchers who require 24x365 support regarding the latest global research on complex issues;
• Students for whom the library is the gathering place conducive to study and discussion about issues; and
• Millenials whose preferred choice of communicating is through social networking applications using mobile devices.

Successful information services now focus on the management of relationships and opportunities to use technologies to enhance the customer experience rather than just transactions, as well as making better use of collaborative approaches in servicing customer needs. Mobile and other electronic delivery mechanisms make possible the availability and delivery of financially sustainable services and information 24x365 to anyplace, mobile and global, as well as providing avenues for social networking and input into decisions. Customers expect to see seamless services across multiple channels that are tailored to need; being customer centric rather than organization or discipline centric.

There are also sustainable financial reasons for adopting a customer-centric approach. Moving customers to online self-service anytime, anyplace reduces counter staff and other overhead costs as well as reducing the amount of travel, time and expense for the customer. One-stop integrated services can also lower capital and operational costs as well as adding value by increasing the level of customer convenience. For libraries, information services and other cultural institutions this means taking a multi-institutionalized and multi-disciplined collaborative approach to service delivery. It also means managing a range of flexible and integrated channels for service delivery in order to meet multi- generational preferences that include push services to mobile devices, social networking tools, traditional one-on-one service delivery and web enabled transactions.

To illustrate this, Parker et al. (2005: 176) quote Troll (2002) on the future of libraries, which is still relevant in the 2010s: 'As libraries struggle with the fallout of the digital age, they must find a creative way to remain relevant to the twentieth century user who has the ability and means of finding vast amounts of information without setting foot in a brick and mortar library ... The freely accessible information on the web, in conjunction with the escalating costs of library materials, threatens the traditional mission of libraries to create and sustain large, self-sufficient collections for their patrons'.

Alongside these challenges, new advantages and opportunities are arising that draw upon the skills and expertise of information workers. Large companies are developing and implementing sophisticated knowledge management systems to capture, store and disseminate much needed customer-related and other information gathered from their internal and external environment. Chief Executive Officers are improving their understanding of the role of information in the corporate environment. Increasingly they understand that an organization's information is a trusted asset that is essential for business strategy, applications, processes and decisions. An important role for the information service manager is to capitalize on this understanding by:

• Further developing the technical and business expertise and analytical skills of information workers;
• Developing strategies and principles that will guide the organization's efforts to exploit and create trusted information;
• Creating a culture to ensure that information is shared by all parts of the business;
• Instilling a single standard in data quality; and
• Paying attention to information accuracy, its value to the organization and governance.

The increasingly sophisticated expectations and knowledge-based activities described above are some of the drivers for change in libraries and information services. Libraries and information services managers have the unique and dual responsibilities for planning and managing their own corporate intelligence, knowledge and information, as well as facilitating access and disseminating knowledge and information to others that assists them to predict the future, facilitate decision making, create new products and for lifelong learning and personal development.

No matter what their title as Chief Information or Knowledge Officers or Library and Information Services Manager, the occupants of these roles will be strategic change managers. They will need to re-conceptualize their function and reinvent themselves as challenges, needs and opportunities come along. Those supporting business and corporate environments, research and development institutions will be at the forefront of change as their abilities to offer new information and services and exploit new opportunities in ICT will be critical to the sustainability and success of their parent organization. They will need to be versatile, proactive, strategic and willing to be innovative and measured in a complex and challenging world.

Managing for the future and survival

Uncertainty and change present new challenges that need to be managed from new perspectives in order to survive and prosper in the future. Progressive organizations recognized that their imagination, creativity and consequential business advantage are predicated on educated and skilled people who can create, share and use knowledge well. They look for ways to increase the level of innovative by establishing corporate values that encourage openness and originality. Information technology and business applications are also important to connect and harness collective intelligence.

The ability to sustain the funding base for many information services is being challenged. A whole generation of people have retired or are about to retire from the workplace or move to part-time employment, with a commensurate loss of workforce capacity, corporate knowledge and an income-related tax base which is a traditional source of funding for many information services. At the same time there is greater demand for knowledge and information in the corporate environment, fuelled by the use of social networking tools to assist collaboration, as well as by people making lifestyle and other decisions concerning their future. Managing in this environment requires the ability to make smarter decisions; especially in ensuring the sustainability of services in an era of decreasing financial contributions and loss of corporate knowledge.

Sustainability and diversity in lifestyle, the environment and in cultures are dependent on creative and innovative thinking, the sharing of knowledge and collaboration, and breaking down silos of institutions. In these environments, the opportunity exists for information services to be managed as valuable centres for living, learning, growing and connecting people.

There are also growing expectations that organizations will take a responsible attitude to social, energy, environmental and workforce sustainability in their management of capital, resources and the environment, in their family friendly work practices, and in their relationships with the community.

New skills, mindsets and approaches

It is also in this environment that the information services manager assumes a significant leadership and change management role in sustaining the organization whilst at the same time understanding and preparing for the challenges of tomorrow. Not just for the library or information service, but also for the whole organization or community that the library or information service serves. This leadership and change management role requires new skills, mindsets and perspectives, capabilities and aptitudes.

Management today embraces a way of thinking, an attitude and behavioural style that is global and innovative. Whilst strategic thinking, technical, interpersonal, knowledge enabling, conceptual and analytical skills are still used they are applied with a different mindset; for it is personal drive and initiative, a passion and an openness of mind that makes a difference. Those that really transform organizations incite a passion in others, build an organizational capability to view adversity as a challenge, and look for new opportunities in fast changing environments.

Of the skills, mindsets and approaches that follow, not all will be used in equal proportion across the organization. Executive management and team and divisional leaders will draw on different skills and mindsets and may apply them differently. For example, the following skills and mindsets will be used by executive management in a role model capacity as well as strategically in setting the direction for the future; whilst at the team manager level the skills and mindsets will be used with a more operational focus.

Creating and Sharing the Vision

First and foremost, leaders and managers have to inspire others, building and sharing a vision for the future of the information service, predictably in an increasing virtual world. As well as painting a picture that describes what the future services may look like, good managers exhibit leadership and build total commitment, enabling everyone to personally identify with and own the vision, working as a team to achiev...