Abstract
After a reduction in full-time equivalents, 2 libraries in large teaching hospitals and 2 libraries in small community hospitals in a western US statewide health system saw opportunity for expansion through a regional reorganization. Despite a loss of 2/3 of the professional staff and a budgetary decrease of 27% over the previous 3 years, the libraries were able to grow business, usage, awareness, and collections through organizational innovation and improved efficiency. This paper describes the experience--including process, challenges, and lessons learned--of an organizational shift to regionalized services, collections, and staffing. Insights from this process may help similar organizations going through restructuring.
Highlights
Established in 1856, PH&S is a not-for-profit Catholic health care system with locations in Alaska, Washington, Montana, Oregon, and California [11]
Due to a hiring freeze, it was determined that the 2 library manager positions would not be filled and instead a new position—director of regional library services—would be established to oversee all of the libraries in Oregon
Individual meetings of thirty to sixty minutes gave stakeholders an opportunity to share their feelings about the current state of library services as well as thoughts on areas for growth or improvement. From these information gathering sessions came overall themes that were consistent across disciplines and institutions: & lack of awareness of what was available through the libraries or, in some cases, that the libraries even existed & uncertainty of how to access resources & complaints that it was too difficult to access resources, especially remotely & requests for more online resources & requests for more training opportunities
Summary
Heather J and Delawska-Elliott, Basia, "Combining resources, combining forces: regionalizing hospital library services in a large statewide health system." (2015). Combining resources, combining forces: regionalizing hospital library services in a large statewide health system*. This paper describes the experience—including process, challenges, and lessons learned—of an organizational shift to regionalized services, collections, and staffing. Insights from this process may help similar organizations going through restructuring. The notion of combining library staffs and resources into regional or system-wide bodies is not new to hospital librarianship. In their 2006 article, Thibodeau and Funk found that 1989–2006 ‘‘survey data support[ed] reported trends of consolidation of hospitals and hospital libraries and additions of new services’’ [1]. The review of literature reinforced the authors’ belief that sharing the PH&S experience would be useful to other health system libraries working to improve and expand services, while facing staffing and budgetary challenges
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