Sandra Parker

The performance measurement of public libraries in Japan and the UK

Purpose – To present the results of a study of the public library system in Japan and contrast it with that of the UK and the other G8 countries.Design/methodology/approach – Makes comparisons under the headings: libraries per head of population; library use; reference and enquiry services; funding; social capital and social inclusion.Findings – Performance measurement is by its nature culturally dependent, with societies measuring what is important to them at any one time. Social cohesion and inclusion issues are not the same in Japan as in the UK; therefore the services needed from the public library systems are different. The statistics prove that Japan has the busiest public libraries of the G8 countries, but far fewer of them. It is a very densely populated country, with more than 50 per cent of the population concentrated in only 2 per cent of the land mass. Book borrowing in the UK overall is much higher than in other G8 countries, but has fallen in recent years. The culture of public library manag...

The bidding culture in the UK public library – a case study approach

Effective participation in the competitive bidding arena is one of the main vehicles for securing the necessary additional funds to maintain and develop UK public library services. This paper documents the extent and scale of bidding by public libraries and presents areas of good practice emerging from research into the effects that the bidding culture has had on the development of English local government archive, library and museum services. Key findings suggest that approaches to external funding should be strategy‐driven taking place within a framework of purpose and rationale; that success is often highly dependent on the leadership and networking skills of library managers; and that partnership working should be encouraged and adopted. Successful proposals should demonstrate the benefits and credibility of proposers to deliver; provide evidence of properly resourced project management including methods of monitoring and evaluation; explicitly address the relevant funding criteria and be well‐researched and carefully planned.

The LOGOPLUS project: a seamless transition?

Presents the findings of the LOGOPLUS project. The aim of this project was to ascertain to what extent the move to unitary authorities during the 1995‐1998 re‐organisation of local government was seamless for public library users and staff. Case studies were undertaken in nine local authorities. Representatives formed the Steering Group which identified the following significant areas of change to be investigated: politics, finance, integration, co‐operation, staff, communication and users. Research findings have indicated a number of success factors which contributed to seamlessness: councillors and managers who were committed to the provision of excellent services; transitional finance sufficient to cover the process of the change; effective leadership; clear definition of mission and goals; multi‐skilling where appropriate and supportive users. However, some libraries have suffered because councillors or managers did not have a clear vision; there was insufficient finance; managers were not good commun...

The role of library and information services in supporting students in resource-based learning : Some findings of the IMPEL2 Project

abstract The IMPEL2 Project is a JISC‐funded eLib Project based at the University of Northumbria at Newcastle. It has been engaged in a 2‐year (1996‐98) investigation of organisational and cultural change in the increasingly electronic environment in UK Higher Education HE. The selection of Case Study sites was purposive; some had participated in the previous IMPEL1 study. A qualitative methodology, using analysis of documentation, semi‐structured interviews and questionnaires, has been used to examine complex and sometimes sensitive issues. Through Case Studies at 24 Universities and HE Colleges and over 300 interviews, with a range of academic staff, library and information services staff and computer services staff, the Project team has gained insights into the impacts of electronic information provision on academic and student users, the impacts of resource based learning and training, and considered the implications for the training and development of library staff. This article gives some of the fin...

Bidding for records: local authority archives and competitive funding

If competition, in the form of Compulsory Competitive Tendering or the Local Management of Schools, for example, was a key feature of the so-called new public management of local government in the 1980s, competitive bidding for funds would in turn become a characteristic of the public service managerialism of the 1990s. Resource allocation by competition has become a reality of contemporary public policy. The decade saw the introduction of many such schemes, the best known in the field of urban policy perhaps being initiatives such as TEC Challenge or the Local Initiative Fund (1991), City Challenge (1991), the Single Regeneration Budget (1994), Estates Renewal Challenge (1995) and Capital Challenge (1996), to mention only a handful of examples. The advantages of allocating funds in response to competitive bids, rather than by traditional methodologies revolving around census-derived statistical indicators of ‘need’, were deemed to include less bureaucracy, cost savings, better value for money, more innovative, enterprising and imaginative proposals, sharper strategies, greater flexibility, more local choice and enhanced responsiveness as well as greater policy integration through partnership. Critics, on the other hand, pointed to finite and diminishing resource bases, the substitution of core funding with opportunistic funding, the large financial and human costs of bidding, fragmentation, and the distorting allocative and distributional effects of sexy bids, glossy submissions and slick presentations succeeding at the expense of genuine indicators of local need. Local authority archive, library and museum services have not been insulated from these developments. Indeed, some of the earliest challenge fund initiatives such as the National Heritage Memorial Fund (1980), The Arts Pairing Scheme (1984) and the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF, 1994) all addressed aspects of heritage provision. Over recent years, funding from a diverse range of bodies such as the Department for Bidding for Records: local authority archives and competitive funding

Securing funding in the local government bidding culture: are records sufficiently ‘sexy’ to succeed?

This paper presents some of the findings from research into the effects that the emergent bidding culture has had on the development of English local government archive, library and museum services. The project was funded by Resource and undertaken by the Information Management Research Institute at the University of Northumbria at Newcastle. The research revealed that the extent of involvement by archives and record management services in competitive bidding for external funds was dependent on a number of factors including the level of existing resource bases of archive services; the geographical and cognitive locations of archives; and the focus of external funding opportunities. However, the need for archives and records management services to engage in effective bidding is not likely to disappear, and it is suggested that these organisations must adopt a dynamic approach to bidding and marketing, asserting that their needs – ‘sexy’ or otherwise – deserve appropriate funding.