I got these two reference questions within an hour of each other - they can be filed under “All Patrons are Local” (or “Yogi Berra sayings“).
First, an older couple walked up to the desk and the husband said:
Patron: We’re just in town from Florida for a funeral, and don’t know our way around. Can you suggest a good pizza place for lunch?
I am a big fan of pizza, so this is a question I can answer with some personal expertise. There are four pizza shops within walking distance of the library, so between the yellow pages and a local map have at the desk for patrons, they were on their way in just a couple minutes.
A little while later, the phone rings:
Different Patron: Hi, I’m one of your local patrons, and am in Florida for vacation. We don’t know our way around and don’t have a map, but we’re looking for this particular pizza place. Can you look it up on the internet and give me directions?
Finding the pizza shop wasn’t hard, and me giving her directions from where they were was a bit tricky, but we worked it out.
Before we hung up, I asked out of curiosity why her solution to this problem was to call her library in Massachusetts. She said it was because she had our phone number in her cell phone, and since we had access to the internet (and Google Maps), she felt my answer would be more reliable and safer than asking for directions from a stranger or at a gas station.
I thought that was nice, and something I hadn’t though of before. Maybe libraries should encourage patrons to add us to their cell phone contact list, to make it easier for them to call us when they need to know something. Or maybe we should all install pizza ovens.
Librarians can spend so much time thinking about how to run a library that we forget that we’re also patrons, and get to use the library, too. At least, I did.
I mean, I read a lot of library books, and also watch a lot of our DVDs. Popular materials are a valuable core library offering, but my own personal entertainment doesn’t feel like it should count as library use.
So I was happy that I was able to use the library for a bit of research and practical knowledge (and just a little bit embarrassed that using the library wasn’t my own idea).
A friend of mine gave me an old wooden rocking chair a few years ago, which was in pretty rough shape. I’d always meant to fix it up, but doing it right would have entailed recaning the seat. I’d put it off and put it off, but a few weeks ago I finally got around to starting the project.
Since I had to buy some caning supplies, and hopefully learn how to do it, I went to a chair store that did this kind of work. While talking to the guy there, he suggested I use The Complete Guide to Chair Caning as a guide. He went on to suggest that, instead of buying it, I should try to get it from the library - and then he asked if I ever go to the library. That led to a nice little discussion about the benefit of libraries, but it also left me feeling a little sheepish that I hadn’t already checked to see if my library had something that would help me with this project.
The next day I searched our catalog, and ended up requesting the book from another library in our consortium. After consulting the book, and a few days of work, I was able to fix up the chair’s seat, good as new (check out my progress).
For whatever reason, getting this book from the library and finishing this project is such a more rewarding and positive library experience than DVDs or audio books. I don’t mean to detract at all from popular materials, and perhaps I’m kind of biased being a reference librarian, but hooray for non-fiction. I’d forgotten how good it feels to be a library patron.
(and as a completely unnecessary sidenote, some of my other “research” was caught on video. At this year’s Westford Strawberry Festival, a woman was doing seat caning demonstrations. I probably watched her and asked questions for a good half-hour, and was so engrossed that I never even noticed the video camera five feet away from me. I’m the headless one in the gray shirt, about 0:54 seconds into it:
This is a long story, so I’m going to try to summarize as much as possible. It’s a good story, though, so stick with me.
A few months ago, an incident at my library finally brought a long-smoldering issue to the surface. My library doesn’t charge overdue fines, and we rely on patron integrity to get things back on time. So far, this policy works very well, and I know the staff enjoys not dealing with fines.
That being said, our system is abused from time to time. The culture in this library is to put customer service first, to give patrons a good library experience, with “getting to yes” as our unwritten rule. But since we had no written policy to that affect, and what rules we do have are considerably flexible, different staff would enforce overdue items in different ways (some would allow patrons to check out new items, some wouldn’t).
But worst of all, this situation allowed some patrons to “shop around” amongst desk staff until they got the answer they wanted, and this is what finally caused a blow up.
We (the department heads) decided we needed to ensure that patrons received consistent service, no matter who helped them. We rewrote a portion of our circulation policy, with the goal of making it clear and fair, while making sure it allowed for the highest degree of service but still punished those who flagrantly abused the system.
It took some time, and as Reference Librarian I was only marginally involved. But I was so impressed with what our Circulation and Childrens Librarians came up with that I wanted to share. The beginning of the new policy contains this preamble:
This library makes certain assumptions when dealing with the public:
The staff of this library works to “get to yes” with patrons
The vast majority of patrons are honest; therefore, we take patrons at their word
Patrons appreciate courtesy and understanding. Gentle reminders, along with compassion toward extenuating circumstances, are used to prompt people to return overdue items
It goes on from there into the technical nitty-gritty for enforcing the policy, and in general staff was very satisfied with the result. The goal is still serving patrons, but the more black-and-white desk staff now have an up-to-date policy in writing to guide them.
And since this policy has been in place, the number of abuses and difficult situations seems to have gone down.
I’m generally a rules-based person, but serving patrons as well as possible should always come first. It’s a fine line between completely meeting one patron’s needs and also serving the next patron in line equally and fully, but having a written yes-based policy goes a long way towards making everyone happy.
Last week, we received a large package from the U. S. Census Bureau. In it was a copy of Census Atlas of the United States and a letter that read (in part):
I am pleased to be able to present the Chelmsford Public Library with a copy of the recently-published Census Atlas of the United States, a volume which I cooauthered with several colleagues at the Census Bureau here in Washington, DC.
…I wanted to personally send a copy to the Chelmsford Public Library as a way of expressing my profound gratitude to the library for the role it played in helping me discover my career as a demographer.
I grew up in Chelmsford…and as a kid spent many rainy Sunday afternoons at the Adams Library. When an elementary school research project required me to incorporate census data, I found myself in the top floor of the old library, poring through Census volumes with the assistance of the reference librarian. I didn’t know it at the time, but those afternoons looking through old census volumes were my introduction to population statistics and to the Census Bureau, and a preview of what is now a rewarding and enjoyable career as a demographer and statistician for the federal government.
…Who knows - maybe [this donated volume] will inspire a future career path for some youngster spending quality in the library on a rainy Sunday afternoon.
Not only is this a wonderful story, and a nice sentiment, but the atlas itself is pretty incredible. It is large, 12-1/4″ x 15-1/4″ - and almost every page is a glossy, full-color map of a particular population breakdown. Definitely a nice addition to our reference collection, and probably one that I wouldn’t have purchased.
So, the moral of the story is, once again, a patron’s library experience is critical to the health and longevity of a library.
donation, donations, experience, libraries, library, patron, patrons, public
I’m going to be traveling for Thanksgiving, so I wanted to get this one in right away. Yesterday, 11/20/06 (yes, note the date: November 20th), a patron walked up to the desk and asks:
Patron: Do you have any tax forms yet?
Tax forms. It’s November, and this patron wants to work on filing his taxes already. Already. It’s November. At best, we don’t receive the forms from the IRS until January, and even that’s pushing it sometimes.
It’s bad enough that people are decorating for Christmas around Halloween (no kidding - I saw red and green Christmas lights up on Halloween night), but it’s not even close to tax time yet. Oh well, I guess the first request of the season had to come sometime.
I got these two reference questions within an hour of each other - they can be filed under “All Patrons are Local” (or “Yogi Berra sayings“).
