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Management of online search services in schools
563
Book Reviews
Personnel Administration in Libraries. 2d ed. S. CRETH, F. DUDA (EDs.). Neal-&human, and London
New York
(1989). x + 343 pp., $37.50, ISBN l-55570-036-5.
Personnel Management in Libraries. R. RUBIN (ED.). Library University of Illinois Graduate 0024-2594.
School of Library and Information
Trends 38(1):1-151 (Summer 1989), Science, Champaign. $15.00, ISSN
A constant complaint from library administrators is that graduates of library school programs are not well informed about personnel issues, even though most of them assume supervisory positions early in their careers. These two publications should help remedy the problem. In addition, they provide valuable insights for personnel librarians who need more practical advice for certain aspects of their job responsibilities. The monograph compiled by Creth and Duda is important for the updated information it contains. The earlier edition, published in 1981, outlined the central issues associated with personnel work in libraries, and the most significant essays remain in the new edition. Two excellent chapters have been added: “Management and Personnel Administration” and “Compensation Management.” Both reflect the importance of personnel policies and procedures being directly linked to organizational objectives. More than ever, the need to make this linkage is understood by library managers, and the editors have done an excellent job in placing personnel in an organizational context. This perspective is equally useful for librarians new to their personnel positions and for library science students. Although the editors note in the introduction that several civil rights and affirmative action cases were pending in the court as the book was going to press, very little attention is given to these issues in the book. The chapter entitled “The Legal Environment” lists the several areas of legal concern to the personnel administrator, but given the enormous changes during the 1980s in the areas of civil rights and affirmative action, it is unfortunate that no more space was devoted to them in the book. When the first edition of the book appeared, it was a desperately needed contribution to the literature. Complexities of personnel administration have increased to the point of making this volume more necessary than ever. Written from the perspective of the personnel administrator, it will be useful to those librarians in charge of personnel matters in large and medium-sized libraries. In addition, it will be a highly useful textbook in library school courses that include personnel management. The appendix, containing lists of resources and organizations pertinent to personnel, may be the most useful such compilation a new personnel librarian could hope to find in one place. The compilation of articles in Library Trends provides a more academic approach to personnel issues. Personnel librarians will not find the same type of practical advice available in the monograph, but the bibliographic essays on personnel topics are nonetheless useful. Historical perspectives and comprehensive bibliographies more than compensate for the lack of practical tips. Articles with especially useful information include Kathleen Heim’s “Organizational Entry: Human Resources Selection and Adaptation in Response to a Complex Labor Pool” and Charles Martell’s “Achieving High Performance in Library Work.” Bibliographies accompanying each of these sections tend to be highly selective and, as a result, very useful. Frederick Duda’s article on compensations systems is similar to the article on the same topic in Personnel Administration in Libraries. Both publications are useful additions to the literature on personnel management, and will be required reading for librarians with an interest in personnel issues.
School of Library and Information Catholic University of America Washington, DC
Science
DEANNA MARCUM
Management of Online Search Services in Schools. E.S. AVERSA, J.C. MANCALL. ABC-Clio, Barbara
Santa
(1989). xv + 175 pp., $27.50, ISBN O-87436-513-9.
Drs. Aversa and Mancall have delivered an exceedingly well thought-out, planned, and executed volume that brings to the school librarian the mental furniture necessary to assess, plan, justify, implement, and communicate online services. Six chapters (“Planning for the online environment;” “Policy preparation and use; ” “Professional development for potential online managers;” “Service initiation and maintenance;” “ Marketing the online service in the school;” and “Allocating resources for online searching in the school”) are augmented and supported by six appendices which provide materials and forms for implementation. The information is precise and concise with a notes/bibliography section at the end of each chapter. The volume is indexed.
564
Book Reviews
In the age of Information Power,’ the new guidelines for school library media programs, this volume is of great worth. It is valuable not only for its immediate application to the management of onhne services, but as a model of how to think about the choices that confront us, and how to communicate these choices to administrators and boards of directors in a way that will provoke action as well as respect. REFERENCE 1. American Association for School Librarians and Association for Educational Communications and Technology. Information Power; Guidelines for School Media Programs. Chicago, IL: American Library Association, 1988. Conneily School Potomac,
LINDA KNOWLES
MD
Descriptive Statistical Techniques for Librarians. A.W. HAFNER. American Library Association, cago and London (1989). vii + 261 pp., $20.00 pbk., ISBN o-8389-0510-2.
Chi-
As the author notes in his preface, this book “is intended to serve as a textbook for a first course in research methods for library and information science students” (p. v). It is also intended to serve as a reference manual for practitioners. The author’s stated objective is to explain how statistical methods are used and how to evaluate and interpret the meaning of the various statistical measures. “No effort is made to train the reader to become a statistician” (p. v.). The work covers statistical techniques that are, in Hafner’s opinion, the “most useful, most widely referenced in library journals, and most essential for further study” (p. v). As the ti!le indicates, however, the work is limited to descriptive statistics. Each of the six chapters opens with “learning objectives” and concludes with summaries of critical concepts, definitions f)f key terms, quizzes (with answers), and discussion questions and problems. As Hafner notes, the problems represent “many areas of librarianship and the business side of information management” (p. vi). These learning aids seem to be well conceived and should help the reader to review the preceding material. The first chapter provides useful definitions of common statistical terms, though one could argue that a few of the definitions are cursory. For example, user surveys are defined as “carefully planned questionnaires or interviews designed to assess user satisfaction or dissatisfaction” (p. 4). In fact, user surveys are not limited to questionnaires and interviews nor to assessing user satisfaction and dissatisfaction. This chapter also includes measurement and types of scales. Chapter two covers rounding; ratio, proportion, and percents; comparison measure analyses; data point labeling and summation notation; and a brief discussion of quantity and quality. The discussion of quantity and quality seems somewhat out of place in this chapter, if not the book, and is too short to deal adequately with the complex issues related to output measures, standards, and mission statements. The section on comparison measure analyses is useful and includes techniques, such as benefit-cost analysis, not typically found in a statistics text. The next chapter presents a good introduction to different types of graphs and how they can be used and provides several guidelines for designing graphs. However, the degree to which Hafner describes how to construct a specific type of graph varies. Chapter three also covers data arrays and frequency distributions and has a section (which seems to be out of sequence) on relative and cumulative distributions. Chapters four and five, like the preceding chapters, reflect modest, attainable objectives and provide appropriate, useful examples of the techniques under consideration. In the fourth chapter Hafner addresses measures of central tendency such as mode, median, and mean. His descriptions of how to calculate such measures are straightforward and clear. Much the same characteristics hold true for chapter five, which covers measures of variability such as percentiles, mean deviation, standard deviation, and coefficient of variation. Hafner does a nice job of explaining standard deviation and how it is used. It is not clear why he chose to insert a short section on “Economies and Diseconomies of Scale” in this chapter. Regression and correlation analysis are treated in the final chapter. In some texts these techniques are considered to be inferential (rather than descriptive) statistics, but they seem appropriate for this work regardless of such distinctions. Regression and correlation are relatively difficult techniques to deal with in one chapter, and readers may find it desirable to turn to supplementary textbooks.
Book Reviews
Personnel Administration in Libraries. 2d ed. S. CRETH, F. DUDA (EDs.). Neal-&human, and London
New York
(1989). x + 343 pp., $37.50, ISBN l-55570-036-5.
Personnel Management in Libraries. R. RUBIN (ED.). Library University of Illinois Graduate 0024-2594.
School of Library and Information
Trends 38(1):1-151 (Summer 1989), Science, Champaign. $15.00, ISSN
A constant complaint from library administrators is that graduates of library school programs are not well informed about personnel issues, even though most of them assume supervisory positions early in their careers. These two publications should help remedy the problem. In addition, they provide valuable insights for personnel librarians who need more practical advice for certain aspects of their job responsibilities. The monograph compiled by Creth and Duda is important for the updated information it contains. The earlier edition, published in 1981, outlined the central issues associated with personnel work in libraries, and the most significant essays remain in the new edition. Two excellent chapters have been added: “Management and Personnel Administration” and “Compensation Management.” Both reflect the importance of personnel policies and procedures being directly linked to organizational objectives. More than ever, the need to make this linkage is understood by library managers, and the editors have done an excellent job in placing personnel in an organizational context. This perspective is equally useful for librarians new to their personnel positions and for library science students. Although the editors note in the introduction that several civil rights and affirmative action cases were pending in the court as the book was going to press, very little attention is given to these issues in the book. The chapter entitled “The Legal Environment” lists the several areas of legal concern to the personnel administrator, but given the enormous changes during the 1980s in the areas of civil rights and affirmative action, it is unfortunate that no more space was devoted to them in the book. When the first edition of the book appeared, it was a desperately needed contribution to the literature. Complexities of personnel administration have increased to the point of making this volume more necessary than ever. Written from the perspective of the personnel administrator, it will be useful to those librarians in charge of personnel matters in large and medium-sized libraries. In addition, it will be a highly useful textbook in library school courses that include personnel management. The appendix, containing lists of resources and organizations pertinent to personnel, may be the most useful such compilation a new personnel librarian could hope to find in one place. The compilation of articles in Library Trends provides a more academic approach to personnel issues. Personnel librarians will not find the same type of practical advice available in the monograph, but the bibliographic essays on personnel topics are nonetheless useful. Historical perspectives and comprehensive bibliographies more than compensate for the lack of practical tips. Articles with especially useful information include Kathleen Heim’s “Organizational Entry: Human Resources Selection and Adaptation in Response to a Complex Labor Pool” and Charles Martell’s “Achieving High Performance in Library Work.” Bibliographies accompanying each of these sections tend to be highly selective and, as a result, very useful. Frederick Duda’s article on compensations systems is similar to the article on the same topic in Personnel Administration in Libraries. Both publications are useful additions to the literature on personnel management, and will be required reading for librarians with an interest in personnel issues.
School of Library and Information Catholic University of America Washington, DC
Science
DEANNA MARCUM
Management of Online Search Services in Schools. E.S. AVERSA, J.C. MANCALL. ABC-Clio, Barbara
Santa
(1989). xv + 175 pp., $27.50, ISBN O-87436-513-9.
Drs. Aversa and Mancall have delivered an exceedingly well thought-out, planned, and executed volume that brings to the school librarian the mental furniture necessary to assess, plan, justify, implement, and communicate online services. Six chapters (“Planning for the online environment;” “Policy preparation and use; ” “Professional development for potential online managers;” “Service initiation and maintenance;” “ Marketing the online service in the school;” and “Allocating resources for online searching in the school”) are augmented and supported by six appendices which provide materials and forms for implementation. The information is precise and concise with a notes/bibliography section at the end of each chapter. The volume is indexed.
564
Book Reviews
In the age of Information Power,’ the new guidelines for school library media programs, this volume is of great worth. It is valuable not only for its immediate application to the management of onhne services, but as a model of how to think about the choices that confront us, and how to communicate these choices to administrators and boards of directors in a way that will provoke action as well as respect. REFERENCE 1. American Association for School Librarians and Association for Educational Communications and Technology. Information Power; Guidelines for School Media Programs. Chicago, IL: American Library Association, 1988. Conneily School Potomac,
LINDA KNOWLES
MD
Descriptive Statistical Techniques for Librarians. A.W. HAFNER. American Library Association, cago and London (1989). vii + 261 pp., $20.00 pbk., ISBN o-8389-0510-2.
Chi-
As the author notes in his preface, this book “is intended to serve as a textbook for a first course in research methods for library and information science students” (p. v). It is also intended to serve as a reference manual for practitioners. The author’s stated objective is to explain how statistical methods are used and how to evaluate and interpret the meaning of the various statistical measures. “No effort is made to train the reader to become a statistician” (p. v.). The work covers statistical techniques that are, in Hafner’s opinion, the “most useful, most widely referenced in library journals, and most essential for further study” (p. v). As the ti!le indicates, however, the work is limited to descriptive statistics. Each of the six chapters opens with “learning objectives” and concludes with summaries of critical concepts, definitions f)f key terms, quizzes (with answers), and discussion questions and problems. As Hafner notes, the problems represent “many areas of librarianship and the business side of information management” (p. vi). These learning aids seem to be well conceived and should help the reader to review the preceding material. The first chapter provides useful definitions of common statistical terms, though one could argue that a few of the definitions are cursory. For example, user surveys are defined as “carefully planned questionnaires or interviews designed to assess user satisfaction or dissatisfaction” (p. 4). In fact, user surveys are not limited to questionnaires and interviews nor to assessing user satisfaction and dissatisfaction. This chapter also includes measurement and types of scales. Chapter two covers rounding; ratio, proportion, and percents; comparison measure analyses; data point labeling and summation notation; and a brief discussion of quantity and quality. The discussion of quantity and quality seems somewhat out of place in this chapter, if not the book, and is too short to deal adequately with the complex issues related to output measures, standards, and mission statements. The section on comparison measure analyses is useful and includes techniques, such as benefit-cost analysis, not typically found in a statistics text. The next chapter presents a good introduction to different types of graphs and how they can be used and provides several guidelines for designing graphs. However, the degree to which Hafner describes how to construct a specific type of graph varies. Chapter three also covers data arrays and frequency distributions and has a section (which seems to be out of sequence) on relative and cumulative distributions. Chapters four and five, like the preceding chapters, reflect modest, attainable objectives and provide appropriate, useful examples of the techniques under consideration. In the fourth chapter Hafner addresses measures of central tendency such as mode, median, and mean. His descriptions of how to calculate such measures are straightforward and clear. Much the same characteristics hold true for chapter five, which covers measures of variability such as percentiles, mean deviation, standard deviation, and coefficient of variation. Hafner does a nice job of explaining standard deviation and how it is used. It is not clear why he chose to insert a short section on “Economies and Diseconomies of Scale” in this chapter. Regression and correlation analysis are treated in the final chapter. In some texts these techniques are considered to be inferential (rather than descriptive) statistics, but they seem appropriate for this work regardless of such distinctions. Regression and correlation are relatively difficult techniques to deal with in one chapter, and readers may find it desirable to turn to supplementary textbooks.