Collaboration: the key to superior services and research

This is going to be more my personal thoughts and opinions than serious academic writing, but I have some very strong opinions on how important collaboration is for LIS professionals.  Collaboration has been one of the keys to my success in the field and I firmly believe that it is the key for success in an organization.  I would also offer the final caveat that I am an academic librarian, and have never worked in any librarian role outside of an academic library. This post reflects that bias.

Historically, collaboration has been at the heart of library and information service, and this is still just as true today.  Perhaps even more true.  As the information field has increased specialization, and now includes complex web-based resources, no single librarian can be expected to be an expert in everything. Collaboration goes many different directions, and collaboration is necessary both internally with other information professionals in the organization, externally with users, faculty, IT professionals etc…

External collaboration

I myself am in charge of Web content and Web usability, but I am not a programmer (I know enough about using drupal, and enough XHTML and CSS to get by) and get to work closely with programmers and IT experts who can implement the changes needed based on usability testing.  This sort of collaboration between librarians and IT staff is necessary in order to offer our users the best possible web content. Apart from that it is enjoyable.  I kind of wish i was a programmer and I enjoy getting to work with programmers and learn from them.

Most academic librarians serve a faculty liaison role and this too is a form of collaboration.  Both the faculty and librarian want to see the students succeed academically (at least in an ideal situation the faculty and librarian do).  This of best done through collaboration.  The most successful librarians I have seen, have gotten faculty buy-in with regards to library services, IL instruction, and collection development.  successful liaison librarians often attend faculty meetings, sit on a committee such as the curriculum committee and at the very least get syllabi for the large courses taught in that faculty.  This allows them to customize the collection and services to the topics discussed in classes, and directly to the assignments that students are doing.  Again as seen above, collaboration not only helps both parties, but helps offer the students the best possible service and best possible chances for academic success.

Internal collaboration

Reference

I don’t know how I would do reference if it wasn’t collaborative.  Sure we all know how to guide someone to academic search complete and find basic information for their English 102 assignment (at least I hope everyone at the reference desk of an academic library does).  But when someone needs statistics on job turn over rates of real estate brokers in Alberta, I’m glad there is a business librarian on hand to work with.  We all have different strengths and in my view collaboration is when all parties work together for a common goal.  Even if it isn’t a long term project, asking a librarian who is more experienced is collaborative, because it is two people working together for thecommon goal of helping that student find the best information possible.  And if you ask me that is a worthy goal when doing reference.

Research

I have been fortunate enough to be involved with a few collaborative research projects and they were not only rewarding, but so much easier than doing it on your own.  Although I must admit that my solo research on subject guides has been very rewarding and helped with my career, it was much more time consuming than joint projects I have worked on.  In the last year I worked on 2 research teams and it makes life so easy to have one person focus on the literature review, one person develop the focus group guide, and another work on ethics and recruiting.  Everything goes so fast, and you learn and can incorporate the collective knowledge of the group into your research. The result is quicker results, more publications with less work from each individual, and ultimately a better product.

I don’t know if I can convince anyone, or if anyone needs convincing.  But I hope I have made the case for collaboration in all areas of LIS. Of course sometimes you just need to close the office door, put some music on finish spending your budget on anthropology books.  But collaboration has been a huge part of everything I have been successful at in this field.

I am grateful to work with and work for such amazing people who help me everyday, and who allow me to help them when in areas I have more experience.  In the end, collaboration allows us to offer better services to students, and as far as I am concerned that is my bottom line as a reference librarian.