Library Revolution

So the baby is sick today, out for the count with an ear infection. Plus it’s pouring rain and just gross out. So I was delighted to realize that there was a local pharmacy with a drive through window where I could get my son’s prescription filled.

No need to get my cranky, sick, finally sleeping baby out of his carseat, wrestle him from the car into the store, wait 20 minutes trying to keep him from destroying the place, balance him on one hip (squirming and screaming) while I signed the pharmacy paperwork, then schlep him back out through the rain, and wrestle him back into the carseat. I drove up and handed the nice lady the prescription. My son slept while I drove over to the drive-through Starbucks for a cup of coffee. By the time I drove back to the pharmacy, the prescription was ready. I paid, signed, and we went home. And little Robbie got a good nap in. If you have to have a sick baby, this is definietly the way to go!

It made me think how nice it would be if my library had a drive-through window for the hold shelf. I’m definitely a “Drive-by” patron — I do my research online, request the books I want myself, and generally go to the library just to pick stuff up from the hold shelf and drop off the stuff I picked up last time. Browsing rarely factors in, and I’m just not a reference user or program attender (that’s a whole other blog post, let me tell you!). So I’d love anything that would make my drop off/pickup transaction quicker and more efficient.

As much as I like the idea of self checks, I never use the one at my library because they do not have a self serve hold shelf. (Another thing I would LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE.) So I have to trek into the building, stand in line, etc. waiting for someone to help me every single time. That wasn’t such a big deal pre-baby. But now that I have to deal with the aforementioned wrestle in and out of the carseat, the stroller, the toddler ready to wreak havoc, and so on, it is a big deal. Actually, now that I think of it, it really became a big deal when I was pregnant and hated dragging my elephantine ass out off the car and into the building at all. What a difference a drive through would have made then… and what a difference now!!

I can’t imagine that  I’m the only one that would appreciate something like this. Busy parents, the elderly, and people with physical limitations might all take advantage of a service like this, I think. Am I just being lazy? maybe. But I’d like to think I’m also being practical. I lead a busy life, and time is at a premium. So is my sanity, which would be saved a little if I didn’t have to deal with getting in and out of the car to do what is for me a weekly errand along the lines of dropping off dry cleaning (don’t some dry cleaners have drive-throughs?) or doing banking (they definitely have a drive through!). Anything that helps me do errands is welcome because it makes my life easier. And if library pick ups got easier, perhaps I would do it more… that’s good news for the library, right???

OK, OK… so maybe it’s not 100% practical for all libraries. Maybe you don;t have the space or a good building layout to accommodate a drive through. Who knows, maybe there are insurance issues with bringing cars right up to a public building with lots of pedestrians involved. I don’t know - I didn’t really research it. But the point is that we need to think about different ways to make library services easier to use.

As librarians, the library might be the center of our universe, but we really need to remember that for the rest of the population, it’s just another errand among many tasks and duties crowding our lives. Is there a way to make this particular task easier, faster, more efficient? If so, let’s do it! Then let’s make sure people know about it! I think we would all be surprised at the results!!

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It must have been a couple of months ago when a very excellent reference librarian I know was telling me an interesting anecdote passed to her from a friend. Apparently, the friend, an academic librarian working reference at a university, got an IM reference question. The question was no big deal – she asked the online patron to hold on a second while she got up to find the answer. While doing so, she noticed a student who was acting a little strangely while he sat typing into a computer at a nearby table. Of course, it turned out at the end of the story that this was the student who was asking IM reference questions… from about 10 feet away.

The story gave me a good laugh – it seems so silly to IM someone sitting 10 feet away when you could just ask, right? (which isn’t to say I haven’t done it myself…) But as we discussed the incident, the person telling the story used it as an example of how online reference can be “misused” by patrons. After all, wasn’t that student just being lazy? Wouldn’t have been better for him to just go speak to the librarian face to face? Is this what young people have come to? And are we just going to let them do this sort of thing? On the face of things, how could I but agree?

I’ve been thinking this conversation over ever since. And the more I think about it, the more I think we were wrong to jump to negative conclusions about the student, the technology, and the service. In the end, I’ve really come to view this situation as one where the librarian involved was perhaps mistaken when she confronted the student (did I mention that part?) and when she drew the conclusion that the service was being misused.

 After all, the reference librarian is there to answer questions and help students. Check. The student needed an answer, which he got. The librarian spent approximately the same amount of time answering his question online as she would have “in person.” The library got it’s reference statistic for the question. And maybe, just maybe, the student felt more comfortable conversing through IM, a format I’m sure he is quite adept at using. Plus, he doesn’t have to ace a big, scary libarian (let’s face it – our image isn’t all that great and you know it!)

The IM reference service is there to be used for the benefit of the patrons. It was used, and the patron benefited. Sounds good to me.

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One last word for today about the tings we say to our patrons. I recently heard about a library where the director has required that staff write down each and every time they say “No” to a patron - for anything. Then they go through the list at their weekly staff meeting to see if there was any way that the “No” could have been turned into a “Yes.”

The feedback has been amazing for customer service - not only do the staff get a chance to review, brainstorm, and get ready for the next time, but they have found that they think twice now whenever they say “No.” If you have to write it down and share it for discussion later, maybe there’s a little more incentive for putting in that extra effort to say YES.

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To follow up on my Cookie Monster post from yesterday (am I sensing a theme here or am I just hungry?)…

A quote from my husband, Chris, (an avid library user and non-librarian) regarding self service hold shelves idea:

“I love it! The only way that could get better is if they tied a cookie to each of the books!”

How about helping our patrons help themselves… and why not find ways to include an extra added bonus?

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