Critical choices for library financial managers

Citation

Walther, J.H. (2001), "Critical choices for library financial managers", The Bottom Line, Vol. 14 No. 1. https://doi.org/10.1108/bl.2001.17014aaa.001

Critical choices for library financial managers

Critical choices for library financial managers

As library users continue to demand services that are increasingly costly, managers must find answers to critical financial questions now more than ever. The articles in this journal provide tacit, yet practical, approaches and techniques for managers upon which to make important financial decisions for libraries and their users. Working within fiscal constraints does not mean sacrificing excellence in service to patrons. From examining costs of serials to focusing on financing a family literacy program, this issue excels at how librarians can work within budgetary mandates, yet surpass at patron expectations.

Our new guest column, "Dollars with sense", focuses on practical, business applications for librarians. Mr Klassen of Wesleyan University gives us a provocative approach of using citation data to balance the costs of scholarly communication, examined here through the lens of the academic library. What other selection criteria can be implemented to continue to serve library patrons in an era of access of information versus ownership of exclusive collections?

Libraries face difficult issues in dealing with serials. Research is a circular process, forcing the researcher to not only be interested in their own ability to publish, but to examine the further adaptation and growth of their ideas with their colleagues on a global scale. Researchers examine how often and how well they are cited by others and how their research is perceived in the scholarly record. Therefore, it is the goal of the researcher to have access to the widest variety of scholarly communication to examine the weight, value and influence of their own scholarly activity. This demand for access increases the size, amount and variety of types of publications in a given library. Academic libraries have became part of the complex social system of the modern university, providing essential services as the nodes in the scholarly communication process for the members of the university (Dain, 1990). The goal of being efficient should be matched with achieving cost effectiveness in the parameters of such a social system. Through innovation and sound business ideas presented here, all librarians can find ways in which to deal in these hardest of financial times for libraries and information centers.

James H. Walther

Reference

Dain, P. (1990), "Scholarship, higher education, and libraries in the United States: historical questions and quests, in Dain, P. and Cole, J.Y. (Eds), Libraries and Scholarly Communication in the United States: The Historical Dimension, Greenwood, Westport, CT, pp. 1-44.