Beyond the Core: Supporting Information Needs of Users Outside the Business School at the University of Michigan
Nathan Rupp | Kresge Business Administration Library | University of Michigan
Environment
Business Information Needs of External Users
RSB Institutes
Departments
Accounting
Business Economics & Public Policy
Business Information Technology
Finance
Law, History, Communication
Management & Organizations
Marketing
Operations and Management Science
Strategy
Others: http://www.bus.umich.edu/
FacultyResearch/ResearchCenters/
Market Research
Many external groups find market research useful. These include
engineers and medical researchers developing new products that they
hope to take to market; entrepreneurs creating a business plan for a
new idea or invention; and professionals in non-academic units like the
university’s Office of Technology Transfer. In some cases, librarians can
recommend that users look at specific market research reports for their
industry, while in other cases, such as very local or micro businesses,
they can recommend that entrepreneurs take “a step back” and think
about how they might want to approach an investigation of the local
market. For example, no database the library licenses will have
information about downtown office rental rates, but the librarians can
recommend that these entrepreneurs interview owners of local
businesses who are already operating businesses in the community.
International Business
Colleges, Departments, and Schools
Non-Academic Units
Organizations, groups, and entrepreneurs looking to market their
products overseas need market and demographic information pertaining
to the foreign countries in which they plan to operate. For example, the library was recently invited by the U. S. Department
of Commerce’s US Commercial Service through its ExportTech
program to give an overview of international business content
that could be leveraged by owners of small businesses looking to
expand their businesses overseas for the first time.
Datasets
Other Universities
TEMPLATE DESIGN © 2008
www.PosterPresentations.com
Entrepreneurs
Many PhD students, faculty members, and other researchers outside the
business school utilize datasets in their projects; these include historical
time series of a company’s financial statements and stock prices or even
analyses of how the make up of a company’s board of
directors has changed over time. Questions regarding
these resources can be particularly problematic because
datasets are one type of the library’s resources that is
particularly “locked down” and unavailable to researchers
outside the business school. In addition, the library finds it difficult to
budget time to work on these projects as the researchers involved with
them often wish to revisit the data many times to tease out new
information and trends.
One Library Balancing Many User Groups
Strategic Partnerships
Successes/Lessons Learned
Staying within Boundaries
Financial Contributions
Successes
It is important to establish policies and priorities beforehand when
considering the support of external groups. Kresge Library maintains an
“open door” policy which has been communicated to library staff. The
clearest example of this policy is the fact that the library maintains open
stacks. At the same time, it can be difficult during hectic periods of activity
to balance the needs of the Library’s primary clientele with the needs of
users outside the business school. It is important to establish guidelines
beforehand to prioritize the order in which users groups inside and
outside the business school can be assisted.
A number of organizations on campus have partnered with Kresge in the
purchase of library resources and databases; these include the following:
Increased Partnerships. In serving these diverse user groups Kresge
Library has had the opportunity to partner with other librarians on UM’s
campus as well as librarians at other regional organizations to explore
ways to work together to serve researchers on campus outside the
business school and entrepreneurs throughout the local community.
Kresge librarians have also had the opportunity to connect with non-library
organizations like SPARK and SCORE that have been established to help
serve some of these user groups.
It is not enough for the Library to follow its own policies, procedures, and
regulations when serving clientele outside the business school. It also
needs to follow the guidelines its vendors establish for the electronic
content it licenses. It can be difficult for the Library to explain that access
to some resources is restricted to some users,
especially when those users are from other
departments on campus and don’t see any
different between their department at UM and
the UM business school. In some cases Kresge
librarians have had to be very creative in
assisting non-business school users with business-related questions, deploying strategies such as the utilization of free
web-based resources to provide users with the information they are
looking for.
Partner
Database
Office of Tech Transfer
Frost & Sullivan
University of Michigan Law
School
Social Sciences Research
Network (SSRN)
RSB Center for International
Global Markets Information
Business Education
(CIBE) for Other
Database
(GMID) & ISI
Training
Librarians
Emerging Markets
Business Information Expertise at Other Organizations
In some cases, Kresge librarians aren’t really qualified to answer
business related questions; for example, although the Library has a
subscription to Gale’s Business Plans Handbook series so that
entrepreneurs can see examples of business plans, the librarians do not
have expertise in writing actual business plans, but the Kresge Library
has identified other organizations in Washtenaw County that can assist
entrepreneurs. These include::
Library visitors seem to fall on opposite ends of the spectrum when it
comes to taking advantage of the library’s physical presence in
downtown Ann Arbor.
On the other hand, patrons at the university but outside the business
school may know where the business library is on campus but require
that the Library’s services and resources are available to them via their
desktop, and the library has attempted to do this for both business school
and non-business school users on campus through its web site, online
database user guides, its wiki, and other similar tools.
Broadened Expertise. In serving these various groups Kresge librarians
have been able to broaden their own expertise in the use of the various
resources and tools needs to assist multiple user groups.
Creativity. Kresge librarians have also become quite creative in offering
up freely available information solutions to non business school users who
don’t always have access to the library’s licensed content.
Lessons Learned
Consistency. The Library has found that it is important to be consistent in
offering the same levels of service to user groups both within and outside
the business school.
Location, Location, Location
On one hand, it seems that entrepreneurs outside the university
altogether often have little difficulty in identifying the library as a source
for business information and come to the library first for assistance with
their business ventures before approaching other organizations in the
community specifically set up to assist them.
Communication of the Kresge Brand. These extracurricular activities
have allowed Kresge Library to communicate its brand of excellent service
across campus and across the region to other departments and
organizations that aren’t necessarily connected with the business school.
The Library has also explored partnering with these organizations and
other libraries in the county through an organization called “Washtenaw
County Libraries Serving Small Business” to form a clearinghouse of
resources to help provide owners of small businesses and entrepreneurs
with the information they need to operate their businesses.
External Training Efforts
The Library has provided training to non-business librarians at the
University in the use of business databases and recently partnered with
librarians in the health science and engineering libraries to do a series of
cross training sessions on the use of databases that contain information
that will help researchers working at the intersection of business,
engineering, and medicine.
Clarity. Yet at the same time, the Library has learned the importance of
prioritizing its services, first to its core group of users at the business
school and then to other groups within the community. This includes being
up front with non business school users about what services and
resources the Library can and cannot offer them. Non business school
users must be aware that users associated with the business school take
priority and that not all information resources will be available to them.
Conspicuousness. The Library has learned that its name “Kresge
Business Administration Library” draws the interest and attention of users
across campus and town who are not associated with the business school
but see the Library as having the answer to their business information
questions; because of this it must be prepared to serve a wide range of
user groups.