Margaret Zelman Law. Cultivating Engaged Staff: Better Management for Better Libraries. Santa Barbara, CA: Libraries Unlimited, 2017. 128p. Paper, $55.00 (ISBN: 978-1-4408-5222-0). LC: 2017004832.

Abstract

A library’s most valuable resource is its staff. It is the library staff who ensure excellent customer service and research assistance to our communities, who purchase, preserve, and make accessible print and electronic resources of all kinds, and who keep the doors open early in the morning and late into the night. The work and care of library staff (including librarians and library assistants alike) keep libraries running, and they deserve the best possible support from their managers and supervisors. Patrons get the best service from staff that gets what they need from their work environment. Margaret Zelman Law’s insightful and detailed volume can help you learn more about both individual and team needs and how to better meet them. Having worked in both public and academic libraries, as well as library consortia, the author is now a consultant to libraries worldwide on organizational development and other management challenges, as well as an instructor at the School of Library and Information Studies at the University of Alberta. With advanced degrees in both information studies and business administration, Law brings together her experiences and the research in both fields to demonstrate how management practices impact organizational climate and provides concrete examples for how practices can be changed to improve staff engagement in any kind of library.