Competency D
All organizations rely on the fundamental aspects of planning, management, marketing and advocacy. Libraries and non-profits face particular challenges that for-profit organizations do not face. These principles involve many aspects of building an organization and if there is one particular area in which librarians should continue developing professionally it should be in this area. While I believe that the work that libraries do is essential and influential for many organizations whether they are state institutions, corporations, non-profits, or others the library or information center is viewed as a fringe benefit and not an essential service. As librarians and information workers we must be effective in our management and advocacy skills in order to maintain our position and grow within these institutions.
In our current economy libraries are placed in a difficult position where states are slashing public services in order to balance their budgets and avoid bankruptcy. Due to the increasing unemployment numbers more people are using library services while money to libraries is decreasing. Libraries must fight every day to maintain the funds they are apportioned. At no time can they become complacent and not fight for their share of government money because especially in the current downturn the services of the library are even more evident. In order to avoid dire situations libraries and non-profits have to be smart, plan for such catastrophes.
What this principle entails is that information workers must learn the skills of management in order to preserve their institutions. By gaining these skills they become important assets to their organizations. Planning involves effectively managing resources and forecasting for events. Management skills must focus on maintaining order between the different workers in the library and issues that may be part of other departments. Managers must be flexible to understand the internal structure of the institution and promote the best of their colleagues.
Marketing is a complex task that requires understanding the marketing process. The marketing model involves conducting market research, market segmentation, creating the marketing mix, and evaluating the marketing model. The first step is researching what types of information that the library has on its operations and serving its customers. The library must participate in a Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats, dialog as well as asking many questions to determine many different types of data sources. As well as identifying external organizations that participate in similar activities to determine what kinds of services and customers the library can target. Once the library has better understanding of its patrons and the products and services that it offers it can start segmenting its market and providing differentiating services to different groups of patrons. The next step is creating the marketing mix known as the four Ps of product, price, place, and promotion for the library based on the collected data. With these initiatives in place the library can begin to evaluate their efforts and collect data and alter the mix for better efficiency. Finally advocacy can be a significant part of the marketing mix or a separate entity altogether to connect the community with the library by offering ways that people outside the organization can interact. Some options of advocacy can involve advocacy of legislation, donor drives, and other options.
The courses that emphasize the importance of planning, management, marketing, and advocacy are LIBR 204 Information Organizations Management, LIBR 283 Marketing of Information Products and Services, and LIBR 282 seminar in Information Management: Entrepreneurship. All of these courses have emphasized different aspects of operating an information organization and focused on different types of organizations and the challenges they face. LIBR 204 was an important course for understanding the development of management models that have developed through time and the importance of providing a supporting structured environment for workers. As part of my evidentiary I have included a paper I wrote that discussed how non-profit organizations work to minimize stress for employees and managers in their institutions. Evaluating work processes and managerial processes are a necessity for providing a healthy environment for employees to work together in.
In LIBR 283 I learned a great deal about marketing for a non-profit organization. I had the opportunity to analyze my own local library and other non-profit organizations like Planned Parenthood and Goodwill of Orange County. LIBR 283 stressed the importance of developing marketing programs for non-profits organizations and informed students how to conduct these for a wide variety of organizations. In one particular article for the class I wrote concerning Planned Parenthood I conducted a SWOT analysis. From there I determined important input publics and examples of external environments that should be analyzed as well. I decided that Planned Parenthood was a great example because it is composed of a wide variety of local run organizations tied together through a federated cause. The exercises throughout the course created a concrete example of applying the skills learned in the course and putting them to work in a variety of different organizations and environments.
LIBR 282 focused on entrepreneurship and developing a business of one’s own. The skills I have learned in that course a directly applicable to developing new services in libraries and other organizations. Developing a business plan, planning market research, investigating products, prices and plans for new markets is an area that all business are able to benefit. In the entrepreneurship course there was a focus on marketing as well but focused on a broad area. The emphasis on marketing for entrepreneurs consists of developing good relationships with customers, outsourcing work to others when applicable, offering discounted research work to colleagues, participating with the public through conferences and social media, and giving discounts to regular customers. While not all of these are applicable to libraries themselves libraries are able to take advantage of many of the new tools at their disposal and explore the market for new opportunities to serving their community through a wide variety of services.