ABSTRACT:
Due to rapidly changing
information and communication technology (ICT), library science has been
incessantly evolving. The internet has further transformed the information
society into to a global society. The knowledge explosion and ICT tools have
equipped information and library science with immediate access to practically
limitless sources, plus quick storage, retrieval and sharing tools. In this
knowledge economy age information professionals’ roles have therefore
changed profoundly at both library practitioner and library school educator
levels. On the library side information professionals have evolved from
traditional cataloguer and research and reference service providers to value
added service providers, teacher librarians and, most recently, knowledge
managers. On the library school educators’ side, there is the constant challenge
to review the curriculum, keep up to date and extend personal capacity
according to the needs of the knowledge society. This paper looks particularly
at the importance of knowledge management for 21st century
information professionals; their evolving new roles, skills and challenges, and
finally recommends what is important to have in place for information
professionals to be part of this knowledge management economy.
Keywords: Librarians, Library school educators, Information
professionals, Knowledge management
Introduction
Since the early 1990s,
knowledge management has been a popular issue, relevant to and discussed
amongst all disciplines at all levels, including the business, service, private
and governmental sectors as well as libraries and information centres. Clearly
much has already been written on the importance of knowledge management for
libraries and information professionals (see for example: Chase, 1998;
Broadbent, 1998; Balcombe, 1999; Schwarwalder, 1999; Rowley,
1999, Duffy, 2000; Shanhong, 2000; Milne, 2000; Townley, 2001; Koina,
2003; Al-Hawamedeh, 2002; Ajiferuke, 2003; Pantry & Griffiths, 2003; Whilte
2004, Watson, 2005, Jones, 2008). Earlier literature often questioned whether
knowledge management was just another management fad or whether knowledge
management represented librarianship in ‘new clothes’ (Broadbent,
1998; Wilson, 2002). However, Ponzi & Koenig (2002) established that knowledge management is at least living longer
than typical fads and perhaps is in the process of establishing itself as a new
aspect of management. It is now
apparent that multi-disciplinary knowledge management is one of the hottest
topics of discussion today. “Every information manager needs to
appreciate fully the scope and opportunity that knowledge management (KM)
offers to the extended enterprise” (Duffy, 2000) because it can be used
as a competitive tool.
Sarrafzadeh et al (2006)
noted an increased awareness among library and information science (LIS)
professionals of their potential contribution to knowledge management, with a
high level of agreement on its positive implications for both individuals and
the profession. Many library and information science schools now include
courses on knowledge management. The
In spite of all this, there
seems to be a gap in knowledge management literature:
the absence of holistic consideration. Some authors focus on information
professionals’ new roles, some on skills, while others have looked at the
challenges they face. Some focus on practicing librarians and others on library
school educators. This paper is an attempt to discuss all these elements. So,
the purpose of the paper is to describe the role of information professionals
in knowledge management, their possible contribution, and skills and challenges
unique to the 21st century that they face as they seek to sustain
their critical positions and contribute to organizational performance. The
paper will look at:
¨
the concept of knowledge management for information professionals;
¨
information professionals as they fit in knowledge management and their
possible contribution to it and to their organisations;
¨
new roles of information professional;
¨
skills and challenges of and for
information professionals;
¨
the future of information professionals;
Before proceeding into
details, it would be appropriate to define two main terms used in the paper,
namely ‘information professional’ and ‘knowledge management
for information professionals’.
Information Professionals
Initially, the term
‘Information Professional (IP)’ was coined by and for
‘modern’ librarians. But, as ICT took off, IP became a far more
comprehensive terminology. According to Abels et al (2003), an IP refers to a
person, who “strategically uses information in
his/her job to advance the mission of the organization. The IP accomplishes
this through the development, deployment, and management of information
resources and services. The IP harnesses technology as a critical tool to
accomplish goals. IPs include, but are not limited to librarians, knowledge
managers, chief information officers, web developers, information brokers, and
consultants”. So, IP is wide-ranging. Anyone who deals in the
provision of information at any stage, whether in terms of technology,
education, systems or actual information services, can be called information
professional.
In the context of this
paper, ‘information professional’ refers particularly to
“academic librarians and archivists, who are revamping to become knowledge
managers; and library and information school educators, who seek to equip
practicing and trainee librarians with all the necessary skills and
competencies.
Concept Of Knowledge
Management For Information Professionals
Many people can still become
confused between the terms ‘information’ and
‘knowledge’. The force behind the origin of knowledge management
was the information explosion. Typically for example, every organisation
generates large amounts of data and information. Without effective management
it is difficult to identify and locate the information required in a specific
situation. As the next step knowledge
management came as a strategy to develop organisational knowledge and capacity
to derive relevant knowledge from information.
That is why knowledge is portrayed as the transformation of information:
information is a building block of knowledge which is the refined, relevant and
actionable output of information.
Knowledge management has
several definitions. According to
The author defines
knowledge management as a focused
management process to capture, exploit, share and apply both implicit and
explicit knowledge for the benefit of the employees, organisation and its
customers. Focus in the context of IPs at the library school educators side
is on capturing, storing, exploiting,
sharing and applying both implicit and explicit knowledge which can inform and
assist them to review/ curriculum to fit to the market demand and deliver in
most innovative ways. They need to focus managing customer & stakeholders knowledge, who come for
learning or who are potential learners, organisational knowledge, subject
knowledge, curriculum around the other universities to benchmark
themselves, ICT/innovative knowledge how
other educators are teaching innovatively using ICTs.
On
the library practising side, librarians need to focus on their customers’
knowledge and remain updated in their professional knowledge in order to
provide value adding services to their customers, anywhere and anytime and in
desired formats. They need to manage all
types of organisational knowledge to maximise its utilisation and align it to
the provision of information services.
The
major characteristics of knowledge management are: a holistic approach, its
action-oriented, ongoing process, ever-changing, people-oriented, emphases on
organisation performance improvement, and value-adding and goal-oriented or
visionary perspectives.
Position/Fit Of
Information Professionals In Knowledge Management
Knowledge
management has provided ample
opportunities for information professionals. A decade ago, Milne (2000:140) had
raised the question that “the opportunities are there, but are information professionals ready?” He further raised a concern, “do they
recognise too, that their attitudes must be in tune with the needs of this new
order if they are to become strategic partners
in the knowledge processes within their own organizations?” and again
“what are the messages for library schools as they prepare the
information professionals of the future?” It is true that knowledge
management is “a vehicle for enhancing the professional image and role of
the information professional” (Southon and Todd, 2001). What is less
clear is how eagerly and effectively information professionals have embraced
this vehicle. We might ask ourselves, are we in fact changing our attitudes in
keeping with the knowledge age; are we catalysing or pioneering change in our
organisations? Or we are just enduring challenges before us because we are
forced to survive? One critical
development is that information professionals have begun to realise that they
have a critical role to play in initiating knowledge
management and its success in their parent organization.
Ferreira et al (2007)
observed the close relationship between teaching schools and formation of
information professional skills and stated that if 21st century
skills were more commonly taught in library, archival, or information studies
courses, this could help bridge the gap between the skills acquired in
classrooms and those required by labour markets. This would help librarians,
archivists, records managers and others like them to maintain their
significance in an ever-changing and knowledge-intensive world". Clearly
this makes sense. But it brings into perspective the irony of library and
information school (LIS) educators trying to teach 21st century
skills which they have not in their turn had the chance to practice maturely in
an organisational environment. This is an issue that requires consideration.
Who is qualified to teach the new professional skills? The challenges facing
LIS educators are articulated later in the paper.
Within the higher education
environment there is often a close relationship between LIS practitioners and
LIS educators; thus jointly they can add value to their parent organization in
numerous ways and create a cycle of continuous professional development.
Librarians and archivists add value by managing organisational knowledge in the
most efficient and accessible manner and LIS educators by training future
professionals in all the necessary skills and promoting importance of holistic
knowledge management. Practicing librarians for example need to possess
“an ability to offer the value-added service of analyzing and repackaging
information to meet specific client needs (Milne, 2000:147), whilst LIS
educators as innovators have the responsibility to provide a strong base to
make their organisation innovative by undertaking a number of academic and
research activities in an extremely complex information environment. To ensure
their students’ success educators must continuously evolve their teaching
and learning pedagogy adopting quality assurance mechanisms and achieving
standards of excellence in adopting best practices and creating competition in
the global market (Rath, 2006).
Therefore information
professionals can contribute to knowledge management in the following ways:
Empowering knowledge workers: Empowering knowledge workers by removing
intermediary levels and facilitating direct access to knowledge anywhere and
anytime through providing necessary tools, system and services.
Bridging the gap between the skills
acquired and job market: Bridging the skills gap between classroom theory and professional
practice, making their skills more marketable and reducing unemployment.
Leading in ethical and legal issues: Playing a leading role in devising
and implementing standards for the ethical and appropriate use of information,
thereby also engendering professional respect for unique skills possessed.
Leading in information management
skills: Leading in
imparting their information management skills organisational wide as well as
externally, and ‘putting them in the good books’ of executive
management.
Innovative teaching for greater
collaboration and closer interaction: Providing web-based/online education
opportunities using multi-media educational resources. Information
professionals can thus make education more interactive and personalised.
Collaborative effort is critical in order to prosper in today’s
information age because there is so much information and knowledge out there
and no one knows everything. The
Creating knowledge management
awareness: Often
information professionals can be resistant to new ideas or initiatives and the
knowledge management concept is still new for many. So by promoting and raising
awareness of the benefits of knowledge management amongst the student
community, teaching faculties and all the other stakeholders, in order to
encourage them to buy in to it, information professionals (in this case
particularly LIS educators) can have an immense impact on organisational
performance and competitive power.
Recognition of and contribution to
maximising the potential of organizational knowledge: This has been a serious issue in the
library and information profession. Within higher education for example, when
institutional management documents like Learning and Teaching Policy, Research
and Development Policy, or University Research Strategy are referred to information
professionals particularly in libraries for discussion and commentary, those
staff members may fail to appreciate them or associate a direct relevance to
the library. They seem to believe that such documents are more relevant to
teaching staff. This attitude serves as a hindrance in the proper alignment
between information services and achieving the parent organisation’s
goals. It is important for information professionals to look at all
organizational documents, policies and procedures in order to customize their
services accordingly. For instance, a Learning and Teaching Policy would have
implementation implications for adequate library facilities and services.
Knowledge management is an
approach based on the central role of knowledge in organisations, with the
objective being to manage and support knowledge work and to maximise the added
value of knowledge for the organisation (Tissen et al, 1998). This is one of
the major characteristics of knowledge management. It presents a major shift in
focus regarding the development and use of knowledge and information in
increasing the effectiveness of any organisation. It is a great opportunity for
information professionals to make themselves relevant to their parent
organisations in a much more vital way than has generally been the case
(Southon and Todd, 2001). According to
Owen (1999), knowledge management is to add value for the organization at three
distinct levels: Improvement of existing business processes and cost reduction;
developing new products and services and improving organisational strategic
position by developing unique knowledge, applying knowledge to innovative
products and services, strengthening the competitive position, creating an
attractive work environment etc. Balcombe (1999) inspires information
professionals by saying, “our mindset as information professionals is to
share; to further the accessibility to and usage of knowledge. We can influence
our organizations to see sharing as vital to every job”. Information professionals
play a unique role in gathering, organizing and coordinating access to the best
available information sources for the organization as a whole. They are also
leaders in devising and implementing standards for the ethical and appropriate
use of information (Abels, et al, 2003). Knowledge management offers them a
wonderful opportunity to get out of the box of the library or information
centre and into the strategy areas of the organisation (Balcombe, 1999:91).
Thus, information
professionals need to understand the role of knowledge in every area of the
organisation. Understanding organisations is as useful to the information
professional as understanding information and knowledge (Southon and Todd,
2001). It is “a major challenge to information professionals to engage
with issues that have not generally been regarded as their task, either by
themselves, or by those for whom they work. It is clear that the phenomenon
implies a broader and more organisationally directed thinking on the part of
information professionals if they are to engage successfully in this
area” (Southon and Todd, 2001). Also, information professionals at
library schools should bear this in mind when developing a knowledge management
oriented curriculum. Then only would they be able to train and educate current
and future practising information professionals to create knowledge links
between organisational policies, resources, activities and outcomes and
consequently contribute to and enhance organisational performance, image,
visibility and competitive urge.
New Roles Of Information Professionals
The 21st century
brings with it new roles and requirements for different competencies and skills
for information professionals, beyond those traditionally practiced and understood,
thus requiring increased intellectual flexibility. Information professionals
now need to be equipped as, or capable of performing or adapting to, the
following new roles:
¨
Technology experts both in using and training technology.
¨
Knowledge mappers/engineers: representing or mapping tacit and explicit
knowledge to enable its classification, dissemination and identifying the gaps
in the knowledge.
¨
Knowledge gatekeepers: acting as
subject experts and familiar with evolving vocabulary (taxonomies, metadata,
metatags and filtering etc.).
¨
Knowledge editors to repackage knowledge into the most accessible,
appropriate formats.
¨ Networkers and Knowledge
Brokers, with good networks of contacts within and outside the organisation.
¨
Web designers to display and share knowledge in eye-catching ways.
¨
Programmers to customise their instructions and services according to
their customers’ needs.
¨
Knowledge and information disseminators rather than custodians of
information.
¨
Researchers both for personal and professional development and for
providing up to date assistance to patrons.
¨
Knowledge consultants to provide expert advice beyond the usual
operational zone.
¨
World knowledge content experts to keep updated with international news
in their specialised areas
¨
Metadata specialists able to describe and dictate management and
preservation strategies for digital information
¨
Knowledge Asset Managers to identify, evaluate advice upon and manage a
portfolio of knowledge assets, such as patents, trademarks, copyrights, etc.
(Chase, 1998).
New Competencies And
Skills Of Information Professionals
Clearly, to take on these
new roles effectively information professionals need to equip themselves with
new skills and values.
Personal Competencies are a
set of attitudes, skills and values that enable practitioners to work
effectively and contribute positively to their organizations, clients and
profession ranging from strong communication, to demonstrating the value-add of
their contributions in the ever-changing environment. Specific jobs and markets
might require certain sets of unique competencies at various skill levels
(Abels, et al, 2003). Literature reveals the following skills vital for 21st
century information professional:
¨
Good communication and interpersonal skills;
¨
Understanding flexible needs of customers and employers and developing
creative solutions;
¨
Ability to market the concept of knowledge management and its benefits;
¨
Negotiation skills, for dealing with suppliers and licensers;
¨
Creativity and long term vision;
¨
General management skills: Information management, human resource
management, project management, change management, strategic planning,
financial management, Liaison and negotiation skills (Halvegar & Tabuchi,
n.d.).
¨
Analytical and lateral thinking ability;
¨
Cultural adaptability skills.
Challenges For
Information Professionals
To summarise, library
school educators, library and archive practitioners all information
professionals are all confronted with several challenges. Educators for example
must design courses to develop generic and specific skills in future librarians
and prepare them for the real world of 21st century.
Some of the major
challenges faced by information professionals would include:
¨
Content development in digital format: Information professionals must
widen the scope of information management, identifying information sources and
providing effective, relevant and accessible information services and
capitalize on the library and information environment of the 21st century
(Rath, 2006).
¨
Continuing Education & Training Programmes: developing professional
skills through refresher courses, conferences, workshops, seminars etc.;
¨
Financial Support: developing appropriate infrastructure/resources;
¨
Intellectual capital management;
¨
Technological – trauma and infrastructure;
¨
Change management;
¨
Capturing of tacit knowledge;
¨
Introduction of multi-disciplinary growth of subjects;
¨
Need Based Curriculum: Education curriculum needs to be conceived in relation
to market needs and employer perceptions about the competencies of
professionals (Rehman, 2008).
¨
Balancing both tradition and technology while designing curricula;
¨
Ability to adopt a just-in-time rather than just in-case approach
(Jones, 2008).
¨
Balancing both tradition and technology while designing curricula;
¨
Creating innovations in teaching, learning and research methods to
improve the transfer of knowledge.
Future Of Information
Professionals
The future of information
professionals is full of opportunities as well as challenges. The new knowledge
era has provided tremendous opportunities to shine and cement a special niche
in the ever evolving information world. Information professionals need to carve
out a place for themselves within the core business processes of organizations
rather than being content to offer a traditional service from the sidelines
(Milne, 2000:149). The challenge is to constantly keep abreast of the latest
technology developments and subject knowledge. Due to information overload,
information professionals are needed more than ever to quality filter and
provide required information in an actionable or usable form (Abels, et al,
2003).
Conclusions
From the foregoing debate
it is apparent how information professionals are challenged to move from
librarianship to the cyberianship; from traditional classroom-based face to
face teaching to online and e-learning. To keep the pace with the knowledge
economy age and facilitate assisting the parent organization’s
competitive edge, it is important to appreciate and practice knowledge
management. “Librarians and information professionals are in a position
to transform themselves into value-adding knowledge professionals. However,
this will require a radical change in how they view their roles and jobs within
knowledge-based organizations. It will require them to visualize a world of
rapid change, instantaneous communications, and the transformation of
organizations from those based on identifiable boundaries to networks of
business relationships” (Chase, 1998). The thrust of knowledge management
in relation to information professionals is to enhance accessibility of
information, to promote strong relationship with customers and relevant
stakeholders by strengthening knowledge flow, offering value adding services
and training cost and time-effectively, customized to organisational needs.
Creativity and innovations in teaching, learning and research are essential in
the transfer of knowledge. Since, there is a close relationship between
teaching schools and practising information professionals, together they can
contribute considerably to knowledge management. It is essential for 21st century information
professionals to acquire the above discussed competencies and skills. This
requires a total dedication to professional development, training and
re-training, and changes of attitude to adapt and adjust.
Referring to 21st century
skills, (Ferreira et al, 2007) stress,
“if these were more commonly taught in library, archival, or information
studies courses, could help bridge the gap between the skills acquired in
classrooms and those required by labor markets. Although it is a major shift,
it can make information professionals more relevant to their parent
organisation. This paper concludes with
Abell and Oxbrow’s (2006:150) suggestion that, “the ability to work
across organisational boundaries and the willingness to take opportunities to
try different roles and ways of working are essential for information
professionals in knowledge environments, but it requires an understanding of
organisational dynamics and a particular mindset”.
Recommendations
In
order to contribute and catch-up with 21st century knowledge economy
information professionals need to have in place the following:
¨
Balance education, research and practice
¨
Balance between people and technology
¨
Internationalisation of library and
information school syllabus to fit in global market
¨
Constant learning for all information
professionals whether LIS practitioners or educators
¨
Conducive working environment
¨
Appropriate infrastructure
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Dr. Priti Jain, Lecturer,
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