Andy Stephens and Marie Jackson
Describes the main thrusts of the British Library’s aims for the year 2000 and explains the processes which have been developed to ensure that the vision can be realized. Looks…
Abstract
Describes the main thrusts of the British Library’s aims for the year 2000 and explains the processes which have been developed to ensure that the vision can be realized. Looks forward to the period following the opening of the Library’s new building at St Pancras and establishing a single Library, operating a single collection, based on the two major sites at St Pancras and Boston Spa, and offering maximum access through full use of new technology, including electronic networks.
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CD‐ROM (Compact Disc‐Read Only Memory) products have arrived for library and information professionals in North America! If more proof were needed than the proliferation of…
Abstract
CD‐ROM (Compact Disc‐Read Only Memory) products have arrived for library and information professionals in North America! If more proof were needed than the proliferation of journal articles on the topic, the journals dedicated to this medium alone, and the publication of a guide to CD‐ROMs ‘in print’, the midsummer exhibition of the American Library Association (ALA), in San Francisco (June 1987) provided it in abundance.
This study examines how assurors make sense of sustainability assurance (SA) work and how interactions with assurance team members and clients shape assurors’ sensemaking and…
Abstract
Purpose
This study examines how assurors make sense of sustainability assurance (SA) work and how interactions with assurance team members and clients shape assurors’ sensemaking and their actual SA work.
Design/methodology/approach
To obtain detailed accounts of how SA work occurs on the ground, this study explores three SA engagements by interviewing the main actors involved, both at the client firms and at their Big Four assurance providers.
Findings
Individual assurors’ (i.e. partners and other team members) sensemaking of SA work results in the crafting of their logics of action (LoAs), that is, their meanings about the objectives of SA work and how to conduct it. Without organizational socialization, team members may not arrive at shared meanings and deviate from the team-wide assurance approach. To fulfill their objectives for SA work, assurors may engage in socialization with clients or assume a temporary role. Yet, the role negotiations taking place in the shadows of the scope negotiations determine their default role during the engagement.
Practical implications
Two options are available to help SA statement users gauge the relevance of SA work: either displaying the SA work performed or making it more uniform.
Originality/value
This study theoretically grounds how assurors make sense of SA work and documents how (the lack of) professional socialization, organizational socialization and socialization of frequent interaction partners at the client shape actual SA work. Thereby, it unravels the SA work concealed behind SA statements.
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In May 1993, the British Library published For Scholarship,Research and Innovation, its statement of strategic objectives forthe year 2000. Describes the background to this, its…
Abstract
In May 1993, the British Library published For Scholarship, Research and Innovation, its statement of strategic objectives for the year 2000. Describes the background to this, its third strategic planning document, and summarizes its key thrusts. The corporate nature, interdependency and pervasiveness of some of the action lines arising from the strategic objectives required that alternative means of pursuing implementation, other than through normal management lines, be found. The chosen approach for achieving single point responsibility and accountability is through the appointment of senior corporate “champions” to develop the Library′s role in four key performance areas: corporate collection management, corporate collection development, user satisfaction, and access improvement. Also describes a computer resource allocation model showing linkages between the four areas.
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The British Library (BL) faces a significant challenge with storage space predicted to run out within the next three years. However, alongside a plan to create additional…
Abstract
Purpose
The British Library (BL) faces a significant challenge with storage space predicted to run out within the next three years. However, alongside a plan to create additional capacity, the BL also intends to take the opportunity to rethink the integration of storage and workflows in order to implement a fully optimised end-to-end model of content management. This approach will incorporate not only storage and workflow design and integration, but also the physical environments and facilities for staff and users.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper draws on years of experience in the context of systemic industry changes to lead the reader into new thinking and opportunities in relation to print preservation and access. It should be noted that some of the aspirational new thinking described within this article may not come to fruition due to construction market inflation and resulting budgetary constraints.
Findings
As the national library of the UK, BL, like all libraries, has the responsibility of storing (preserving) its collections while making them accessible to everyone. Traditional models of physical storage can often operate in isolation from the processes that accompany them – creating silos of materials, completely remote from either the acquisition and description processes that precede their storage, or misaligned with the processes in place to support access.
Practical implications
The presentation of this conceptual thinking could help inform other libraries planning to build new print repositories.
Originality/value
The strategic approach outlined within this paper has adopted ideas and concepts from non-library applications, bringing them together to form a holistic solution that delivers the ultimate aims of a library within a modern context.
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Jonathan H. Turner and Alexandra Maryanski
Purpose – The purpose of this chapter is to bring data to suggest that group processes have a biological base, lodged in human neurology as it evolved over the last 7 million…
Abstract
Purpose – The purpose of this chapter is to bring data to suggest that group processes have a biological base, lodged in human neurology as it evolved over the last 7 million years.
Design/methodology/approach – The method for discovering the neurological basis of group processes is labelled evolutionary sociology, and this method revolves around: (1) cladistic analysis of traits of distant ancestors to humans and the great apes, with whom humans share a very high proportion of genes, (2) comparative neurology between the great apes and humans that can inform us about how the brains of humans were rewired from the structures shared by the last common ancestor to humans and apes, and (3) ecological analysis of the habitats and niches that generated selection pressures on the neurology of apes and hominins.
Findings – A key finding is that most of the interpersonal processes that drive group processes are neurologically based and evolved before the brain among hominins was sufficiently large to generate systems of symbols organized in cultural texts remotely near the human measure. There is, then, good reason to study the neurological basis of behavior because neurology explains more about the dynamics of interpersonal behavior than does culture, which was a very late arrival to the hominin line.
Research implications – One implication of these findings is that social scientific analysis of interpersonal processes and group dynamics can no longer assume that groups are solely a constructed process, mediated by culture and social structure. There were powerful selection pressures during the course of hominin evolution to increase hominin sociality and especially group formation, which required considerable rewiring of the basic ape brain. Since groups are not “natural” to apes in general and even to an evolved ape-like humans, it is important to discover how humans ever became group-organizing animals. The answer resides in the dramatic enhancing of emotions in hominins and humans, which shifts attention away from the neocortex to the older subcortical areas of the brain. Once this shift is made, theorizing and research, as well as public views on human sociality, need to be recast as, first, an evolved biological trait and, only second, as a most tenuous and fragile of a big-brained animal using language and culture to construct its social world.
Originality/value – The value of this kind of analysis is to liberate sociology and the social sciences in general from simplistic views that, because humans have language and can use language to construct culture and social structures, the underlying biology and neurology of human action is not relevant to understanding the social world. Indeed, just the opposite is the case: to the extent that social scientists insist upon a social constructionists research agenda, they will fail to conceptualize and perform research on more fundamental forces in the social world, including group dynamics.
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Posits that the use of library space has become criticalin UK academic libraries. At Reading UniversityLibrary a working group analysed the nature andextent of the problem and…
Abstract
Posits that the use of library space has become critical in UK academic libraries. At Reading University Library a working group analysed the nature and extent of the problem and considered the parts to be played in a solution by stock weeding, additional accommodation, making better use of existing accommodation and the use of non‐print media The project demonstrated the need for involvement of a wide range of library staff, good communications with academic staff, the need for detailed information on costs and on usage of stock. This will become increasingly important as alternative means of delivering information become more widely available.
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The selection and evaluation of CD‐ROM disks are important steps in the planning of a CD‐ROM facility. The choice of databases depends upon, among other factors, the objectives of…
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The selection and evaluation of CD‐ROM disks are important steps in the planning of a CD‐ROM facility. The choice of databases depends upon, among other factors, the objectives of the library, the projected use of each disk, and financial considerations. In this article we review the literature that deals with these matters. We begin with what is available on disk selection, via both printed directories and in the journals. We next discuss reported methods of disk evaluation. Finally, we cover existing reviews of various CD‐ROM products.