Posts filed under ‘Customer Experience’
Sigh
I just logged in to check my Comcast account and the following headline was in the top five:
“Dead? You still have to pay library fine!”
What started as a story in the local paper has been now picked up by the AP and is out on the wires. The AP version is brief and it was not until I found the detailed local one that I got truly disheartened, especially when I read this:
When she returned the book last week, Schaper said, “I explained that my mother had died suddenly and that I was returning a book she had checked out.”
Schaper said she was stunned when the man behind the library counter informed her of the 50-cent late fee.
…
Schaper said the man, whose name she doesn’t know, “showed no compassion or understanding at all.”
“He didn’t say he was sorry and didn’t offer to waive the fine,” she said. “He did say he would cancel my mother’s library card. He seemed to have ce in his veins, and he had the demeanor of a robot.”
In the end, Schaper said, “I gave him two quarters and left in total isbelief.”
Honestly, is this kind of bad PR worth the 50 cents? And it is no longer just bad PR for that one library now that it has been picked up by AP and is flahsing as a headline for everyone in my region of NJ who is logging on to their Comcast account tonight.
Back to the Future: Phone Reference “OnCall OnDemand OnSite”
Gerry McKiernan of Iowa State University recently put a post on the dig_ref listserv (DIG_REF@LISTSERV.SYR.EDU) that dealt with a topic I have been talking about and thinking about for quite a while now, namely that:
NOW IS THE TIME TO PROMOTE PHONE REFERENCE SERVICES!!!
The ubiquitous nature of phones in everyone’s hands should make it a totally no brainer that we should definitely, absolutely, without question be actively marketing this underused service.
To quote Gerry: “Another Radical (but Conventional) Idea for OnCall, OnDemand, On Site Reference Service. Publicize the Library Hip Reference Help Phone Number… via Library Newsletter/Blog/Liaisons/Campus Groups/Table Tents/Billboards/TV Commercials/Facebook/etc. Why Chat When You Can Really Chat [:-)”
I agree with what most of Gerry is saying, although my research shows that people choose chat over phone reference for reasons of convenience (some love the transcript) and avoidance of awkward silences that occasionally happen on the phone (I’m not kidding about this, just ask any teenager).
His wake-up call to promote phone reference, however, is totally SPOT ON! All his ideas for marketing library phone reference are excellent. Table Tents are an especially good idea since many library users WILL NOT LEAVE or PACKUP their laptops (who can blame them?) in order to approach the reference desk if it is more than 12 feet away from where they are sitting! It would be nice if they saw the phone number on a table tent and could call for help instead of shrugging off their information need. Of course then we have to lift the ill-advised and impossible to enforce ban on cell phones in the library (and replace this policy with one that asks users to be respectful of others when using cell phones in public areas).
September is also the perfect time to do classroom marketing, what with students in Universities and schools undergoing bazillions (ok, thousands surely, maybe even tens of thousands?) library use instruction or orientation sessions!
Here’s my script for anyone doing one of these sessions:
“Greetings students! I am now about to ask you to do something that NONE of your other teachers/librarians have ever asked you to do…” (wait… for it….)
“TAKE OUT YOUR CELL PHONES AND TURN THEM ON” (amid gasps & nervous laughter from startled students, but they will do it eagerly!)
“Now, enter this library reference desk number into your phone BUDDY list…” (give ref desk number…)
“Next, here are the library hours when you can call this number for reference help” (now the students ACTUALLY have a reason to pay attention to the times when the library is open).
Here’s the clincher… “AND during the OTHER hours we are available by…” (chat, IM, e-mail, whatever you have!!)
Thus marketing chat, e-mail, etc. services along with the phone service. Wow, what an exciting old/new idea!
Wouldn’t it be great to see phone reference stats go through the roof? It’s high time to shake our fear of being overwhelmed at the ref desk.
Now is the time! Go for it!
Customer Loyalty? It don’t enter into it.
Maria Palma over at “Customers are Always” recently posed the question, “What would make you stay loyal to a supermarket?” The question struck me as a bit odd, and my first reaction was to think, “Loyalty? It don’t enter into it.”
I regularly grocery shop at Wegmans, Superfresh, Target, and Costco, and where I lay my green depends on a number of factors. Each store offers me something different.
I get better service at Wegmans, but it’s a longer drive. I love the self-service at Superfresh, and the fact that it’s close to my home. Also, they are one of only a handful of stores that sell Goldenberg’s Peanut Chews, like, only the most perfect food on the planet. I love the prices at Target and Costco, as well as the opportunity to browse lots of non-grocery items and spend more money on stuff I don’t need, but lordy how I want it! Why just last week I went into Target to get a box of cereal and a birthday card and wound up with a new IPOD shuffle. Bliss!
But loyalty? I’m “loyal” to these establishments to the extent that they meet my needs, and not one whit more. Which is to say I’m not at all loyal. I want them, quite simply, to meet my needs. Just give me some combination of:
- what I want
- when I want it
- where I want it
- how I want it
- at a cost I find acceptable (Cost includes price, but is not limited to it.)
Making no overt attempt to tie this post to library services. Arf!
Putting my head back into the OPAC
A couple of months ago I questioned whether the quality of our library OPACs figures greatly into the overall satisfaction of our customers. Something I read in the New York Times this weekend: made me reflect on that post and wonder whether I was asking the right question. This is the what got me a’ponderin’:
Almost every Web film purveyor is planning to solve this bane of the modern culture consumer “too much choice” with some form of social networking. Recommendations, user reviews, friend lists and member pages are designed to help viewers determine which films they should watch.
When I read that, I found myself making these mental substitutions:
Almost every
Web film purveyorlibrary is planning to solve this bane of the modern culture consumer “too much choice” with some form of social networking. Recommendations, user reviews, friend lists and member pages are designed to helpviewerslibrary users determine whichfilms they should watchbooks, cds and film they might enjoy next.
Now I’m wondering if the question I should be asking is, “how much value could we add to our customers’ experience, how much more engaging could libraries be, if our OPACS were integrated with social software and offered reviews, friend lists, member pages and (not incidentally) filters and recommendations?”
Get your head out of your OPAC
So stipulated: Library OPACS, uh, lack the functionality we desire. We’re all agreed. OPACS should be much, much better.
Here’s my question: How does the quality of the OPAC ultimately affect the total quality of customer experience and customer satisfaction? I think the answer to that question may be quite different from library to library, depending on the needs of our different user populations. Public library users may be more inclined to be browsers, and may not really care that much about how good the OPAC is. Academic, school and special library users may be more inclined to search for specific titles, or titles within specified subject areas, and may therefore care more about the quality of the OPAC.
But even in libraries where customers rely heavily on the OPAC, I’m not sure that the quality of the OPAC figures that greatly into the customers’ overall satisfaction. (I suspect it often doesn’t…) I worked in a small special library that had a truly awful, terrible OPAC. It was one of them home-grown government agency deals–ugh! But our small, dedicated staff gave great customer service, did a lot of outreach, offered a good deal of training, and our user satisfaction was quite high. While I’m sure our users really would have valued a better OPAC, their overall library experience was not greatly affected. If we instead had offered a really super-great OPAC, but lousy customer service, I don’t think our users would have been quite so satisfied…
In Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, Stephen Covey suggests that we are most effective when we focus our energy at those points where our concerns intersect with our ability to influence. Clearly the OPAC falls into our collective sphere of concern. But I’m not sure how much influence we have over the quality of the OPAC. I’m not suggesting that we don’t try to influence the quality of the OPAC — by working with vendors, creating our own systems, or a combination of both. I’m truly thankful that John Blyberg and Casey Bisson are out there. But I do think that for many libraries, or more perhaps I should say for many librarians, we may be able to get more bang for our limited buck, more return on the investment of our time and resources, by focusing our energies elsewhere.
I’d like to see libraries looking at their own spheres of concern and influence and making critical choices about where their time, energy, and resources can best be used to improve the quality of customer experience. In many cases, I suspect that we can have a much greater impact on customer experience by focusing on (in no particular order) the quality of the library’s environment (“library-as-place”), the library’s customer service, the library’s webpage, the library’s collection, the library’s programs, the library’s outreach, and the library’s marketing (they can’t experience us if they don’t know about us.)
I’m particularly interested in how libraries can create better customer experiences and be more relevant to their user populations by improving their physical environments. How do our customers experience the actual library space including, the visual (displays, colors, lighting, layout), the tactile (comfy furniture) the olfactory (yum… coffee…), and the aural (zones of quiet, zones of noise, background music)? How does the library staff improve the quality of the environment? Are they warm, friendly, and hospitable? Are they visible? Are they proactive and helpful?
As Joshua Neff recently pointed out, I’m not the only one thinking about these things. Meredith Farkas, (in a must-read, smart, sensitive, insightful, and mostly-polite post) says that she doesn’t use her library because she, “found the whole atmosphere really unwelcoming.” Nicole Engard found that her local librarians “were not very approachable, knowledgeable, or friendly.” Jennifer Macaulay , “admits” that she’s not a library user either (and how many of us would “admit” the same?)
Now how many of you don’t use your library because the OPAC sucks? Just wondering.
Merchandising: Attractiveness as a form of access
At the Mount Laurel Library, we’ve been working in a “merchandised environment” for over 2 years now.
As the Trading Spaces: Reinventing the Library Environment project demonstration site we had the opportunity to get retail fixtures such as book gondolas, CD browsers and slat wall. We’ve also had training on how to keep our library collections both accessible and attractive to customers.
It’s worked! Our circulation leapt by 39% the first year and it’s been rising ever since.
Well, learning how to merchandise is one thing.
Our staff training uses handouts, slide shows, tip sheets plus hands-on experience to show how to better merchandise our collection.
Our merchandising goal for all staff is to spend on average 5 minutes each hour keeping the displays looking full (that’s about 30+ minutes a day for our full-time staff).
Keeping it all looking good, all the time, is another matter!
Have you ever been in a store that looks “picked over”? Well, it’s the same in a library if you don’t keep up on merchandising the collection.
Success means more circulation and that means we’re constantly filling in gondolas, flipping books cover out, and adding onto slat wall displays. In practice though, it’s hard to keep everyone focused on why it’s important and incorporate it into our daily routine.
To keep our eyes looking at the library from a customer point-of-view, we’ve just started is a twice weekly Walk-About. It’s a way for staff, individually or in a small groupers, to walk through the library and note:
- what looks good (to celebrate success)
- what area needs immediate attention (today, let’s do it now–together)
- what area needs work next
All of our staff share this task through a weekly rotation among our departments. We’ve also created Walk-About sheets to help staff keep track and make it easier to report back at our morning briefings (a quick heads-up meeting before the library opens).
One of the side benefits (besides improving the look of the library displays) is that it encourages everyone to get out and really see the entire library — even those areas they don’t usually work in.
The result — a better looking library and and better informed staff.
Library as Place
Posted by Peter Bromberg
Note: This piece originally appeared in slightly different form in the NJLA Fall (2006) Newsletter.
We are currently experiencing a unique convergence of three societal trends, and that convergence is creating an unprecedented opportunity for libraries.
The first trend is that people are increasingly using the internet in the privacy of their home for activities that were previously conducted in public spaces. Shopping, banking, conversing, researching, listening to concerts, and watching movies are just a few examples of such activities.
The second trend, pointed out by Robert Putnam in his insightful book, Bowling Alone, is that Americans are experiencing a marked decrease in social interaction as we become increasingly disconnected from our family, from our friends, and from each other.
The third trend is more subtle and presents a threat as well as an opportunity: Businesses are increasingly embracing the value of being a “destination of choice” and modifying their environments and their services accordingly. For example, we used to go to the hardware store to buy grout or drywall; now we go to learn how to tile our bathroom or put up a wall. We used to go to the bank to deposit our checks; now we go to attend a retirement planning seminar. We used to go to the bookstore to buy books; now we go to hear music, drink coffee, and, dare I mention, bring our children to story time…
Our customers have a greater need for shared spaces and social interaction than they ever have before, but they also have more options regarding how, and where, they choose to spend their free time.
LIBRARIES ARE TRANSFORMATIVE PLACES
Libraries are transformative places. By our very nature we offer people a “third place” (not home, not work) where they can come to explore, imagine, think, learn, play, and reflect. Our function as a “third place” has never been more important to our continued health and relevance. If libraries are to survive and thrive we must redouble our efforts and refocus our energies to ensure that we are not only “third places” but destinations of choice.
Thinking of “library as place” goes to the heart of the matter. It invokes the big question: Why would someone in our community choose to spend their time here rather than somewhere else? Related questions might be: What does the library look like, smell like, feel like, and sound like? What do our signs communicate? What kind of environment are we offering to the community and how do library staff contribute to the creation of a friendly, welcoming environment?
The thriving library of 2010 will have thoroughly considered these questions and be guided by the answers they have discovered. Many NJLA members are probably familiar with Mount Laurel Library’s success with their use of retail merchandising techniques. Those techniques were implemented as part of the “Trading Spaces” project. A do-it-yourself kit, replete with documentation, signage, photos, furniture vendor contacts, prices, and more is available at the project website http://www.sjrlc.org/tradingspaces. Taking a look at this resource page is a great place to start if your library is interested in becoming a destination of choice in your community.
SIX THINGS YOU CAN DO TODAY
Detailing a strategic direction for your library is outside of the scope of this short piece. But in the interest of practicality, here are six things you can do today to enhance your library’s status as a true “third place” in your community:
1. DO A SIGNAGE AUDIT: Have everyone on your staff, and maybe a couple of customers, walk through your library with these questions in mind: What makes it easy to find something? What makes it difficult to find something? Are signs readable from a distance? Are signs jargon-free? Do you use Dewey numbers instead of natural language? (Don’t.) Get rid of ripped signs and visible tape. Eliminate handwritten notes. Use positive, respectful wording and avoid parental tones.
2. OFFER FOOD AND DRINK IN THE LIBRARY: (Notice, I don’t say “permit”.) Having food and drink in your library helps create a welcoming environment. The role of our olfactory senses in creating a positive or negative impression of our environment cannot be underestimated. Translation? Coffee smells like comfort.
3. OFFER A VARIETY OF PROGRAMMING FOR DIFFERENT AGES/INTERESTS: This fits in very well with our traditional role and mission, and many libraries already do a wonderful job with programming. Do more. Take some risks. Ask yourself who’s NOT coming to the library and try to offer a few programs for that demographic. Think of five new places to advertise your programming (bulletin boards in laundromats, the Y, the Rotary Club, the carwash, etc.)
4. MAKE THE COLLECTION THE STAR: Use themed displays of face-out materials to highlight and promote portions of your collection. Tie themes in with current events, pop culture, current library programs, or anything else that seems relevant, playful, or fun. Make your collection browseable and your customers will reward you by circulating materials in record numbers.
5. INVOLVE YOUR CUSTOMERS: Ask your customers what they would like to see in the library. Ask them for help with walk-throughs and signage audits. Ask them for display ideas, or enlist their help in creating displays. Any way you can involve your community directly will pay off tenfold by giving you an inexpensive and highly effective marketing tool: a cadre of invested community members who will promote the library through word of mouth.
6. GO WIRELESS: Wireless Internet access is a must-have infrastructure. If you’re not offering it already, do it now. It’s cheaper than you think, and your wireless customers will come out of the woodwork.
Bibliography
Oldenburg, Ray. The Great Good Place. New York: Marlowe & Company, 1999.
Rippel, Chris, “What Libraries Can Learn from Bookstores”. Webjunction Marketing Forum. Dec 10, 2003 <http://webjunction.org/do/DisplayContent?id=1191>.
Rockwood, P. E. and Koontz, C. M., “Media Center Layout: A Marketing-Based Plan”, School Library Media Annual 1986, Volume Four. Ed. Aaron, S. L. and Scales, P. R. Littleton, Colorado: Libraries Unlimited, Inc., 1986. p. 297-306 <http://www.geolib.org/pdf/slma.pdf>.
Stanley, John, “The Third Place: The Library’s Role in Today’s Society”, MLS Marketing Library Services. Nov.- Dec. 2005: 1,8.
Blog-based library websites: An interview with David Lisa
I recently sat down with (ok, meebo‘d) David Lisa, Director of the West Long Branch (NJ) Public Library, to discuss how he recently converted his traditional library webpage to a blog-based webpage.
Pete: Thanks for joining me this afternoon.
Dave: Always a pleasure!
Pete: For starters, tell me a little about yourself and your library.
Dave: My name is David Lisa and I am the Director of the West Long Branch Public Library. We are a small municipal public library. West Long Branch has about 8700 residents. We have three full-time employees and 7 part-time, 3 pages (PT) and one volunteer. I’m the only professional on staff. Other than that, we are your normal small burg PL.
Pete: Thanks Dave. So tell us a bit about your decision to make your webpage blog-based.
Dave: I had worked on several different templates for the new version of our website and nothing was working. Then I attended the Web 2.0 seminar led by Michael Stephens and Jenny Levine and took what the speakers said to heart. It really seemed to me that if we started with a Blogger.com format and expanded upon that, we would be able to accomplish what we wanted to do. Namely to be able to give our users news about programming, spotlight our collection and keep them up to date on new additions to our collection. It also dawned upon me that we could utilize Blogger’s template structure to organize our website by listing the links to the various pages on our site in the right column and be able to provide an archive etc. It did everything we needed! So, I set to work setting it up, then “adapted” our extant pages to the Blogger template format.
Pete: Yes, the built-in archive feature is wonderful. Are there any other specific benefits that you see with a blog-based website? Any drawbacks?
Dave: Well we are getting lots of great comments about how up to date our site is. People really like seeing the latest news on the front page in reverse chronological order. And, of course, one big benefit is being able to offer an RSS feed through Feedburner. We like to stress that we can bring the news about the library to you on your schedule rather than you having to come to us all the time. One drawback has been that we have found that not a lot of people are acquainted with RSS feeds and we have to explain how to subscribe a lot.
Pete: That leads into my next question (or series of questions): Do you find that your customers understand the RSS feed? Are they using it? Have you done anything to promote the feed and/or teach your customers how to use it?
Dave: As I mentioned, there is some confusion about RSS still. I see that as being general initial confusion amongst the public at large. We really wanted to get the feed through Feedburner since they do a good job explaining it. We are pleased to have the feed in place and are actually waiting to see how it works out…right now.
Pete: Well, I think you’re ahead of the curve. I believe the next release of IE will have built in RSS detection and reader. At that point, knowledge and use of RSS among the general population is likely to grow quickly and exponentially.
Dave: That’s a good example of the confusion…try setting up an RSS feed with Firefox and IE and it’s a different experience. We wanted the user to be able to click through the experience and know little about what they had to do to make it work. Feedburner does a great job enabling that.
Pete: And of course Feedburner gives you great stats and bunch of other nice benefits!
Dave: Feedburner has a nice page that you get after you click on our Subscribe link and it explains the variety of choices of RSS readers.
Pete: How much technical ability is needed to create a blog-based website? Is it something anyone can do or is a certain level of technical know-how necessary?
Dave: Good question. I believe that the approach we took to revamping our website takes little web publishing knowledge and could be mounted by people with little experience. And I think that is the direction web publishing is taking. Jenny [Levine] and Michael [Stephens] mentioned that web publishing software (Dreamweaver, FrontPage, etc.) will be outmoded by this approach soon… and I believe them.
Pete: Well, Blogger, Typepad, WordPress really make it easy!
Pete: I see you have multiple authors. Who gets to post, and what do they get to post about? Did you and your staff come up with a blogging policy?
Dave: Glad you asked that question. From the get -go, I wanted our library website/blog to be a collaborative effort. I met with my Administrative staff and indicated that since we were re-creating the website in this fashion, I wanted them all to be involved. I also involved key members of the part time staff too (Book Discussion group moderator, etc).
Pete: That’s great!
Dave: I also wanted staff members that are posting to be recognizable by name to library patrons that read the blog and could answer questions. We crave a fandom. [smile]. This is a truly collaborative experience.
Pete: I salute you! The research going on in virtual reference shows that customers really like to have a name associated with the librarian (as opposed to being served by ‘librarian34’). Using names is a great way to bring about more of a sense of personal connection.
Dave: I wouldn’t have it any other way…I want it to be a personal experience for the user. We want to hear this: “Wow, Janice recommended the new DVD Lucky # Slevin. I checked it out and I loved it. Thanks Janice!”
Pete: OK, since we’re on the topic of collaboration… It doesn’t look like you have comments enabled. Any plan to enable comments?
Dave: We purposefully disabled it for now. We do have plans to enable them at some point, but we want to plan for it so we can handle it correctly.
Pete: Well Dave, I think you’ve done a great job with the site, and I appreciate you taking the time to share your experience with us. Is there anything you’d like to add before we conclude?
Dave: I’d just like to say that we actually stumbled upon this idea by accident, and it was all due to the seminar… so thanks for sponsoring it. We’re always looking for new and different ways to do things here at WLBPL and we are having lots of fun with the website/blog.
Pete: Credit for sponsoring the seminar goes to Princeton Public Library and CJRLC (although we also had Michael Stephens present for SJRLC members that same week.)
Dave: Thanks for interviewing me!
Pete: You’re welcome Dave. Thanks again for your time.
Dogmas Are Meant to be Broken: An Interview with Eric Reiss – Boxes and Arrows: The design behind the design
A little Friday lunchtime reading… If you like the Dogma, follow the link and read the interview with Reiss. I’m going to be re-evaluating mpow’s website with these 10 points in mind.
——————————————————————–
From: Dogmas Are Meant to be Broken: An Interview with Eric Reiss – Boxes and Arrows: The design behind the design:
“Web Dogma ‘06”
1. Anything that exists only to satisfy the internal politics of the site owner must be eliminated.
2. Anything that exists only to satisfy the ego of the designer must be eliminated.
3. Anything that is irrelevant within the context of the page must be eliminated.
4. Any feature or technique that reduces the visitor’s ability to navigate freely must be reworked or eliminated.
5. Any interactive object that forces the visitor to guess its meaning must be reworked or eliminated.
6. No software, apart from the browser itself, must be required to get the site to work correctly.
7. Content must be readable first, printable second, downloadable third.
8. Usability must never be sacrificed for the sake of a style guide.
9. No visitor must be forced to register or surrender personal data unless the site owner is unable to provide a service or complete a transaction without it.
10. Break any of these rules sooner than do anything outright barbarous. “
Use your good judgment in all situations…
In Janie’s first post she mentions that the quip, “sharing is the new black” has been rattling around her brain for a few days. One of the reasons I wanted to start this blog is because it’s beginning to feel like there’s no room left in my brain for anything to rattle. It feels more like that closet upstairs that’s already full, but every time I find some new interesting tchotske at a garage sale I bring it home and stick it in the closet. So now the closet’s full of cool stuff, but I don’t often stop to look at any of it, I just keep finding a little open space to shove in some more.
Library Garden is my place to take some of those ideas I’ve been accumulating and revisit them. Pay them some attention. Show them to my friends and colleagues. Talk about them. And in turn I hope to get turned on to some new ideas and develop a deeper understanding and a broader perspective on my own.
In no particular order here are some ideas/questions that have been stuck up in the old attic:
Customer Service
If you glanced at my bio you know I used to work for Nordstrom. It was one of my first “real” jobs (no funny hat, no dyno labelmaker nametag 
), so I didn’t have the perspective to appreciate what a wonderful organization it is. On my first day of work I was handed the “Employee Handbook”. The Handbook is a 5 x 8 inch card that says “welcome to Nordstrom” and then moves on the rules: “Rule #1. Use your good judgment in all situations. There will be no additional rules. Please feel free to ask your department manager, store manager, or division general manager any question at any time.”
An employee handbook with one rule? “Use your good judgment in all situations.”? That’s it??? Then the store manager — an actual Nordstrom boy, who worked his way up to Store Manager; like every upper level employee, he had to start at the bottom — tells us we will NEVER get in any trouble for doing ANYTHING as long as we can demonstrate that we were doing it to deliver good service to the customer. OK, now here’s the thing: He really meant it.
Think about that for a minute. One rule, “use your good judgment” (note, they don’t say “best judgment”; they give employees credit for having good judgment right from day one.) One rule, followed by the encouragement to do anything that the low-level, inexperienced employee deems appropriate to give good customer service. That’s employee empowerment, and it’s that foundation of trust that naturally gives rise to the famous Nordstrom culture of customer service.
Now think about the experience of library customers. What is the experience of the customer that walks through your doors (real or virtual.) How different would their experience be if libraries told staff to “go out and give great service”, and meant it, and supported it, and rewarded it. How different? How different would the customer’s experience be if we ditched the rules?
You can guess my answer. My little plea is this: Think like a customer. Try to experience your library from the customer’s point of view. Ask them what you do right and what you could do better, but remember that many of them think your “nice” and don’t want to hurt your feelings. Also their expectations may be rather low… So in addition to talking to them put yourself in their footwear and walk a few laps around your library in their shoes. Ditto for your website. What do you see? What do you smell? What do you hear? Try calling your phone system, does it work well? Try renewing a book on that self-checkout machine over in the corner (yes the one with community newspapers piled on top – – and oh yeah, don’t forget to plug it in.) Does it work? Is it optimally placed and signed for customer usage?
I’ll be posting more in the future about library walk-throughs and some of things we’ve been doing in New Jersey to help libraries think about “Library as Place“. In the meantime I welcome you to take a peak at some of the material we generated in 2004 when NJLA chose “Lessons From the Nordstrom Way” as our first “Leading Through Reading” selection (think “What if every library staff member in NJ read the same book?”)
Well, this was going to be a laundry list of ideas (Library 2.0 is next on the list) but time she has run out. Talk to yuz soon.
Library Garden 