‘Librarians Need To Go Beyond Cataloguing’

In a bid for librarians to compete favourably with other professionals, a librarian has stressed the need for them to go beyond their traditional role of cataloguing.
A librarian in the Department of Library and Information Science, University of Port Harcourt, Millie N. Horsefall stated this recently at the 3rd annual Seminar/Workshop organised by the Association of Women Librarians in Nigeria (AWWLN).
In a paper titled Effective Marketing of Library Services Challenges: Strategies and Implication,” Horsefall noted that “for there to be effective marketing of library and information service, libriarians need to perform better in their services.”
According to him,  “they should seek partnerships in other areas, out sourcing of traditional functions such as cataloguing is one source of partnership that Libraries have participated in.
He also stressed the need for, liberians to continue to learn about resources and users needs outside their area of specialisation by always learning.  This, the paper stated, will enhance the development of Nigeria  library’s access to information.
Librarians, the paper continued, need to create awareness in the library environment, thereby learning how to market themselves.
“They need to get out of the library environment and introduce themselves to facilities, staff and student , through fliers, magazines, placing their library home page prominently on a departmental web page with their name on it, especially the faculty librarians”.
Beyond these, Horsefall said, librarians must focus on self promotion and review resources allocation in an increasingly competitive feel.
While doing this, “they must keep basic principles of librarianship and merge them with the charging face of knowledge, information and society.
Above all other consideration, the librarian “need to continuously update his/her professional knowledge and skills through relevant staff trainings and development programmes by going to conferences, workshops, seminars, educational centres and in-house trainings,” the paper concluded.