Tuesday, April 04, 2006

Frusatration

For all of those who don't know it, a librarian is a person whose purpose in the library is to help users/patrons/customers/whatever-name-we're-giving-them-this-week find the information they're looking for. Yes, we have many side projects that make us look busy. We have to scan in books, read professional stuff, tidy things up, file things away, do research for many different reasons - but our primary goal, especailly those in public libraries, is to help patrons. That's why we're here. If we didn't want to do that, we'd become specialized researchers and go work for some fancy professor at a research university somewhere and make twice as much money. But we like people, so we're here to help YOU! As an added bonus, we get to make little marks on our statistics charts every time someone asks us a question. The more hash marks on our charts, the busier it looks like we've been (even if we're just being asked where the newspapers are 10 times an hour), and the more our bosses like us.

So this study that just came out of the San Francisco area is really frustrating. This is the statistic that caught my eye and started this little rampage (the bolds are all my doing):
To put all these means scores into perspective, 77 percent of residents responded that they would be either “Much more” or “Somewhat more likely” to use the library if it “Offered customer service to help you find what you’re looking for,” whereas only 43 percent replied that they would be either “Much more” or “Somewhat more likely” to use the library if it “Provided links to online booksellers such as Amazon.com.”
They think we don't offer customer service? grrrr.....

1 comment:

wthenrest said...

here here!!! You tell em!! I can't believe it is the same in other places. I thought I was alone...mmm curious.