A library is not a business
After reading the “Managing by Numbers” series of articles in the Winter 2006 issue of netConnect, I started thinking about the increasingly common idea that libraries should be run more like businesses.
The netConnect articles do not make that case; in fact, they provide a nicely balanced picture of library assessment when read together. However, the comparisons to corporate ways of doing things got me thinking. It sounds good to say that libraries should strive to be more efficient, like businesses, but we have to remember that libraries have very different missions from most businesses.
I don’t really need to elaborate on this, though, because folks over at ACRLog have made the same point in responding to a different piece. Lorcan Dempsey’s comment in particular gets at the heart of the matter.
