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Beyond Survival Managing Academic Libraries in Transition
Elizabeth J. Wood, Rush Miller, Amy Knapp
Book Code: LU3373
ISBN: 1-59158-337-3
ISBN-13: 978-1-59158-337-0
224 pages, figures
Libraries Unlimited
Publication: 12/30/2006
List Price: $45.00 (UK Sterling Price: £25.95)
Availability: In Stock
Media Type: Paperback
Trim Size: 7 x 10
Subjects: Reviews:
  • Academic libraries must change! This message appears in print regularly, usually accompanied by dire warnings of doom if change does not happen quickly. A similar message is found here, but this new book, coauthored by Wood, Rush Miller, and Amy Knapp, also provides lots of helpful advice on what kind of change is needed and how that change might be accomplished. They devote the first three chapters to background details on the need for change, along with an overview of managing change, including strategic planning, organizational development, marketing, and team-based organizations. The next four chapters describe organizational change at the University of Arizona and University of Pittsburgh libraries (Miller was the architect of Pitt's transformation), showing how various management concepts were applied to transform these organizations successfully. The final two chapters address assessment....Recommended for graduate and professional collections.
    —Library Journal     May 15, 2007
  • Wood, Miller, and Knapp have produced an extremely useful volume that has something in it for most academic librarians....A careful study of the information presented in this book will help librarians chart that new course and continue to add quality to the educational experience. In fact, I am going to read this one again!
    —Technical Services Quarterly     Vol. 25(3), 2008
  • In recent years, libraries have heard that they are potentially an endangered species in their current incarnations. In Beyond Survival, the authors provide guidance and inspiration to academic libraries wanting to move past the status quo....[w]ell thought out and presented and is an excellent guide to academic libraries looking to embrace change.
    —Reference & User Services Quarterly     Winter 2007
  • [W]e need to fully embrace change, and adapt successful business models like strategic planning and organizational development in order to turn change into an opportunity. In addition to theory, authors Elizabeth J. Wood, Rush Miller and Amy Knapp provide detailed case studies on how libraries at the University of Arizona and the University of Pittsburgh managed the kind of transformative change needed to position the academic library for a "vibrant future."
    —American Libraries     May 2007
  • Although this book is written for librarians at large universities, it contains information useful to the many college librarians who are also experiencing the fallout and opportunities created by institutional, instructional, economic, technological, and social changes across higher education and culture in general. The authors provide a good discussion of the meanings and results of change in theory and practice, and they provide examples of how change has been managed at specific libraries. Readers will find cautions as well as possible actions to take to maintain the library and the position of the librarian within the educational enterprise as changes occur. The desired outcome is not just to survive but to enhance librarians' contributions to the institutions where they work.
    —Booklist/Professional Reading     May 1, 2007
  • Three library science scholars with business experience from U. of Michigan and U. of Pittsburgh borrow techniques from the business world to offer advice to managers of academic libraries undergoing changes compelled by both internal and external factors. Supported by case studies of two university libraries, chapters discuss the reasons for change, short term vs. long term solutions, the theoretical underpinnings of change, strategies for embedding and perpetuating alterations, the pros and cons of using teams, how to stand up to scrutiny and plan for the future, and barriers to change, among other topics.
    —Reference & Research Book News     May 2007
Description: While there is a great deal of anecdotal evidence that significant organizational changes are taking place in academic libraries, the literature suggests that most of these changes take the form of evolutionary, or incremental improvement. But what happens when libraries find themselves in a society characterized by increased information availability compression of time and space, and growing turbulence and unpredictability?
These are conditions with which the business world has been grappling for years, conditions that require not an evolutionary approach, but nimbleness and rapid response. One part theory (borrowed from business world), one part practice (including detailed case studies of the University of Pittsburgh and the University of Arizona), one part inspiration, Beyond Survival shows you how the transition tactics and strategies developed by businesses can be adapted to academic libraries. By judiciously adopting the same organizational development tools and concepts espoused by the business world, academic libraries can not only survive in the short term, but can take advantage of emergent opportunities to ensure long-term excellence.
LC Card Number: 2006027895
LCC Class: Z675
Dewey Class: 025
PDF Catalogs:
LU Academic Library Spring 2008.pdf
LU Textbook Catalog Fall 2007.pdf
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