Editorial

Citation

Thornton, S. (2013), "Editorial", Performance Measurement and Metrics, Vol. 14 No. 3. https://doi.org/10.1108/PMM-10-2013-0031

Editorial

Article Type: Editorial From: Performance Measurement and Metrics, Volume 14, Issue 3.

A smaller issue this time, with just three papers, but what they lack in numbers they make up for in originality and vibrancy.

The first is a Viewpoint paper on “What is added-value” by Joe Matthews. This is a subject close to my heart, as it seems obvious to me that any organisation that does not add value in one form or another is no longer viable, and perhaps should cease to exist. Nowhere was this more apparent than in the post-Cold War libraries of the old Soviet bloc. At a couple of conferences I attended in the Crimea there were papers by librarians of tiny specialised libraries whose sole purpose was to exist. Users were, if not actively discouraged, looked on as potentially harmful irritants to the smooth running of the library, and the librarians saw nothing wrong with having fewer than 50 accredited users access them during the year. These librarians were calling for support, as funding was drying up and sponsorship from the State was evaporating. When asked what value did they think they were adding they looked blank. It was surely plain to the meanest intelligence that the preserved library of a relatively unknown Communist philosopher was of vital importance to the community, even if the majority of the community were not allowed access to it. In the cases I looked into, not one could prove any evidence of added value to the community, and for them the future looked bleak.

The conclusions I came to at the time were that:

1. Added value changes and shifts with time, and with client perception. What was seen as valuable during the Soviet era may not be seen as valuable (if at all) in a different age.

2. Client perception should be the only criteria for assessing added value. Just the Librarian saying that it is valuable doesn’t make it so. It needs a mass of vocal client support as a minimum.

3. It is sometimes possible to draw up some potential ranges of value identified with particular services, but these will be open to criticism and provisos. A financial figure may be identifiable for some of them, but should be taken as indicative rather than gospel.

4. We should not confuse added value with changes in added value. All services and products have the potential for adding value, depending on the time, community and environment.

Joe's paper comes to similar, but not identical conclusions, and I would like to discuss the exact meaning of some of his with him over a beer or two. For example, his final conclusion is that we should let go of traditional activities and embrace the crowd. I disagree with that emphasis. Embrace change, yes: change where change improves added value, yes; but embrace the crowd, not necessarily. We should be leading the crowd, and tempering the crowd's demands with professional knowledge and leadership. Still, that's the point of a Viewpoint paper, to get you thinking, isn’t it?

From Iowa State University, Sarah Passoneau gives us a study which examines locally designed assessments available on Association of Research Libraries (ARL) members’ web sites and maps the data to the standard ISO 11620 – Library Performance Indicators (PIs). By looking at the data holistically, processes and assessments become part of the larger strategic plan. The data can be strategically mapped to goals and PIs, which can show areas of challenge and strength over time.

Linking ARL members’ data to ISO performance indicators is a bold initiative, and one that permits the creation of valid benchmarking criteria. I look forward to seeing other organisations taking on similar initiatives.

Our final paper is by Tamer Shahwan and Abdoulaye Kaba, and examines the relative efficiency of academic libraries among The Cooperation Council for the Arab States of the Gulf (GCC) member nations – the United Arab Emirates, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, the State of Qatar, the State of Kuwait, the Kingdom of Bahrain and the Sultanate of Oman – using Data Envelopment Analysis. This is a relatively unused technique in the PMM armoury, and we have only carried one paper using the method, when Peep Midla and Konrad Kikas reported on a study which looked at public library efficiency in Estonia (Midla and Kikas, 2009). I said at the time that “DEA shows real promise” […] (but) “as a hard and fast measure of efficiency it needs to be treated with caution”. My caveats with the tool lie not with its elegance or robustness, but from the fact that it should only be used as an indicator. When used it will show up areas of concern, and should be used by senior administrators as a pointer to where further investigatory and/or ameliorative work needs to be done. But an excellent paper nevertheless. With sums!

Stephen Thornton

Reference

Midla, P. and Kikas, K. (2009), “The efficiency of Estonian central public libraries”, Performance Measurement and Metrics, Vol. 10 No. 1, pp. 49-58