The headline is tongue-in-cheek because I don’t believe it’s the end of academic librarianship. But I read the breathless, frenzied reaction to the latest news about the Harvard Library reorganization plan a few days ago, seen via Google+ and Twitter, with a jaundiced view.
The latest in a series of town hall meetings about the reorganization plan for library staff set off the fireworks on Thursday. One of the primary reporters of the news started her report with the dramatic statement that “The nature of academic and research librarianship changed today.” Um, no. A more accurate statement would have been: “The nature of Harvard libraries is finally catching up to realities everyone else has faced for years.”
I don’t want to seem insensitive to the real anxieties and concerns from those staff who are affected by the coming changes. It is worrisome and the prospect of losing one’s job, especially these days and wherever one is employed, is definitely upsetting. However, the idea that in this development, Harvard is leading a wave of change for the rest of academic librarianship is laughable.
From reading various accounts, it seems like the situation was mishandled. What is particularly telling is a report from a librarian in attendance that for most of the questions asked of them by staff, administrators could not or would not provide specific answers. (Hm, that sounds familiar.) Sometimes there is no easy way to communicate difficult news, but it is all too easy for administrators in any library or workplace to seriously botch an attempt at communicating major changes to staff.
The other thing that strikes me about the whole saga is how long it has taken for Harvard to get this far. The reorg plan has been in the works for over two years, apparently. I find that amazing. Sure, Harvard is big and academic environments are notoriously slow in their decision-making, but I think a lengthy timeline for major change dramatically increases the chances of disillusionment and discouragement for staff and significantly reduces the ultimate effectiveness of the proposed change. I can say this from direct experience.
One other point: I’ve read a few tweets from academic librarians, reacting to the Harvard news, along the lines of “Thank goodness I have tenure…” Nonsense. If we think of tenure as our security blanket then we shouldn’t have the tenure system at all. One person tweeted thankfulness for tenure not because of job security but because it gave her a voice in decisions at her institution. Let me tell you, if you need tenure to give you a voice or a say, then it’s not worth having. You should have ways to make yourself heard and to have influence without a tenure crutch. For example, for libraries, you should be clearly able to justify your existence by the excellent service you provide all of your users. You should be able to accurately demonstrate the wisdom of the ways in which you have spent the money you have been given. You should be able to prove beyond question the value that you add. If you can’t or don’t, you don’t deserve your job or career at all, and tenure has nothing to do with it.
I have worked in academic libraries for most of my career, although I currently work in a corporate library. Corporate and other special libraries face uncertainties and pressures like those at Harvard all the time. Many of them don’t exist at all any more. In my own situation, the company where I work will be splitting in two later this year and there is huge uncertainty about whether and how the library function will continue to exist. I think it would be foolish to assume that a centralized library function in either of the newly formed companies formed from the split is a given. In fact, I’m not counting on having a job after the next six months. If I do, great, if I don’t, well, I’ll have to move on to something else.
The point is, this is the way things are in the real world. Most other academic libraries have faced painful and debilitating reductions in headcount and service for many years. The news coming out of Harvard just seems to me to show that it is finally, slowly, facing some of the same pressures as everyone else.