Handbook of Information Management, 8th ed.

Citation

Reid, C.D. (2002), "Handbook of Information Management, 8th ed.", Journal of Documentation, Vol. 58 No. 3, pp. 342-343. https://doi.org/10.1108/jd.2002.58.3.342.10

First published in 1955, the Handbook of Special Librarianship and Information Work is recognised as the seminal work on modern information theories, procedures and practices. It is four years since the last edition appeared and this new eighth edition has been retitled Handbook of Information Management to “reflect a broader spectrum of managed information services and structures than merely the management of a physical collection of materials”. This change in title emphasises the diverse nature of information work today. In the twenty‐first century information professionals are just as likely to be knowledge managers, chief information officers, Web site developers or intellectual capital managers as they are to undertake the traditional tasks of running an information service.

As in earlier editions, the chapters cover a wide spectrum of topics relevant to special librarianship – although much of the information should be relevant to all sectors. The basics of running an information service are dealt with in chapters considering the selection and acquisition of resources; organising access to information; performance measurement; records management; financial planning; marketing; copyright; data protection and project management. The enquiry service chapter gives a great deal of sensible advice, particularly in the examples given on how to identify exactly what the enquirer really wants.

New to this edition are chapters dealing with legal issues of the Internet; freedom of information; the hybrid library; digital library research; the effective Web site and intranets. The chapter which worked least well for me is the one dealing with library management systems. The selection of a management system can be one of the most crucial decisions to be made by the solo information professional and I would have liked more detail than that given in this chapter. It is also one of the few chapters without references for anyone wishing to explore this issue further.

Guy St Clair has written an excellent chapter on “staffing the special library” in which he not only highlights the skills and aptitudes required of today’s information professional, but also portrays the constantly changing and challenging environment in which we work – “the splendid information services continuum” as he calls it. Service provision in the corporate arena has moved from the provision of “just‐in‐case” and “just‐in‐time” to “just‐for‐you” services. The competencies required to deliver such a service are highlighted here. However, as you move into the knowledge management area, the key skills required are rather different. Neil Munn rises to the challenge of explaining knowledge management and the strategies required to connect people to people, and people with information. Knowledge managers are required to be leaders, strategists, technologists, change managers, ambassadors, content managers, communicators, promoters, facilitators and trainers. The underlying theme, however, is change. As Jim Clemmer of the Clemmer Group put it: “You can’t be what you must be by being what you have been”.

The users of special information services are critically important – if a service is not used or valued, it will not remain for long. Two chapters early on in the book look at the information needs assessment and the information audit and how to carry these out.

The final chapter is one of the most thought provoking. It considers the digital information user. Here, David Nicholas and Tom Dobrowolski argue that “the information profession is imprisoned by a Renaissance vocabulary, which represents a largely print based world”. To change the profession’s thinking, we have to change our vocabulary. They put forward the term “information player” as a replacement for information user. They see this as conveying both individuality and action. With this change in terminology should also come a shift in the evaluation of information units as the quality and skills of the players are more relevant that the quality of the systems. It will be interesting to see if i‐player dominates the next edition of this work.

Each chapter is very readable and full of commonsense advice. They have been written in the main by practitioners, although some have been penned by consultants or academics. Scammell, in her introduction, states that the intention behind this handbook is to provide “a comprehensive coverage of current best practice building on a corpus of knowledge and expertise spanning many decades of research, development and practice”. This volume succeeds in achieving this by bringing into one source a guide to the main concerns facing the information manager today. This new edition should continue to be a valuable resource for practitioners.