Beyond Survival

Elizabeth J. Wood, holding an AMLS and BA in German from the University of Michigan and an MBA from Murray State University in Kentucky. Author of the first in the Greenwood Library Management Series Strategic Marketing for Libraries (1988) as well as a chapter in James Rettig's Distinguished Classics of Reference Publishing (1992), Elizabeth was keynote speaker at the 1986 LOEX Conference, has written several articles, and has presented many workshops about academic library marketing and strategic planning. A veteran of more than 30 years of academic library service and some 12 years as head of the Information Services Department at Bowling Green State University library.Dr. Rush Miller earned the BA, MA and PhD in Medieval History along with the MLS. His library administrative career spans 32 years, including 12 years in his current position as Hillman University Librarian and Director of the University Library System at the University of Pittsburgh. Prior to Pittsburgh, he was Dean of Libraries and Learning Resources at Bowling Green State University, and Director of Libraries at Sam Houston State University and Delta State University. He has authored numerous articles and presentations dealing with subjects ranging from management, digital libraries, organizational development, fund raising, diversity, and staff development. At Pitt, he is known as an innovative leader and has launched a number of wide ranging initiatives on campus and internationally. He has served on the Boards of ARL, PALCI, PALINET, and other professional organizations.Amy Knapp, Assistant University Librarian at the University of Pittsburgh's University Library Systems, holds an MA in English Literature, an MLS degree, and a Phd in Library Science all from the University of Pittsburgh. For several years before accepting her current position, she paid her dues and learned the realities of academic library work as Assistant Head of Database Searching and Coordinator of Library Instruction. Amy has taught classes in Information Retrieval and US Government Resources in the Graduate School of Information Sciences at the University of Pittsburgh for ten years. Her dissertation research focused on how faculty access US Federal Government documents in an electronic age. A long-time advocate of a user focus in academic libraries, she has published in the areas of faculty and student use of electronic resources and applications of LibQUAL+TM data to academic library planning and operations.

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.