The Business Library: What it is and what it does

by Louise B. Krause

General Principles of Organization

The essential principles in organizing a successful business library can be briefly stated as follows:

1. Centralization of material within the business organization.

2. Coordination of the business library with the facilities of the public and special libraries of the city in which the business library is located.

1. Centralization of Library Material

The first step in establishing a library in a business organization is the centralization of all the printed material available in its different offices or departments. This is exactly what is not done in a large number of business houses. Books, pamphlets and other valuable information are scattered among the various members of the organization, who treat them as personal property and preserve them in their private desks as carefully as a squirrel hides his store of good nuts. In many business organizations the policy of the employes in regard to information seems to be, to hold on to everything of value for one's personal use, regardless of how much value the information might be to another member of the organization, and also regardless of the fact that the material has been paid for out of the company's funds.

It should be said, however, in defense of the practice of not putting information into a central library, that it is not always based upon thoughtless or selfish habits, but upon lack of confidence; there is a fear that if information passes out of the hands of the man into a central library, that when he wishes to use it again, in a hurry, that he may not be able to locate it promptly. This feeling is not without reasonable foundation, as it is based on the irritating experience which some business men have had in using central correspondence files which, in many offices, are poorly administered and cannot produce desired information promptly. The business library, when administered by a qualified librarian, not only can produce all filed material promptly, but in one large corporation, known to the writer, has so successfully handled material that the officers and employes send their information to the library, as a safer and more reliable place to keep it for quick reference, than the drawers of their own desks.

Centralization of library material gives all the departments the benefit of everything the company has collected on a special subject, and often makes it unnecessary to duplicate information for the use of several departments. Centralization makes it possible also to have in one place a complete record of all library material owned by the company which can be loaned as small working collections to any department.

The fact that a central library department has on record what material is temporarily or permanently kept in all the departments, makes it possible also for it to act as a clearing house between all departments in locating desired information. This principle does not apply of course to corporations of such magnitude that their activities comprise several distinct lines of business; in such a case each department would require a specialized collection of information, which would become the library of that particular branch of the industry.

It should be kept clearly in mind that the business library has a distinct province from correspondence files, which primarily take care of the letters accumulated in the transaction of business. The business library is in no wise concerned with such records. Its function is not to take care of the records which are created by the activities of the company, but to collect and bring into the company all possible knowledge and information of value from a large variety of outside sources.

The business library also has a distinct province of activity apart from the statistical department of an organization. The function of the latter is to correlate and interpret data which are created either by the activities of the organization or obtained from outside sources, because of value in relation to the various projects of the organization. The function of the library in relation to the statistical department is to supply the printed information which that department needs in its work of correlating and interpreting data.

Many statistical departments have made the mistake of endeavoring to collect and preserve material for their work, which particularly belongs in the business library, with the result that they have cumbersome files of heterogeneous information, badly classified and cataloged, and which do not yield, either quickly or accurately, information when desired. The files of the statistical department should cover only the data which are the result of the particular activities of the company, together with valuable original records which are neither correspondence nor library material.

2. Coordination of the Business Library with Public Libraries

After the resources for information which exist within the business organization have been adequately centralized the next important step is to coordinate these resources with all other existing library facilities of the city in which the business firm is located. There should be a thorough survey of these libraries in order to ascertain as far as possible the content and availability of their resources. This is an important factor in the creation of a business library, when one considers the problem of shelving much material, within the more or less limited space occupied by a business organization. Floor space in skyscrapers is too valuable to be used as a mere storehouse for printed material used only on rare occasions, and there is also the added expense of a staff of workers to care for a large collection. The business library must, therefore, be considered solely as a working laboratory, and care taken not to include in it material which will be seldom used, particularly in cities where business organizations congregate and where are located large public libraries having excellent resources which can be used to supplement the "working laboratory" collection of the business organization.

This principle will not apply, however, to those business libraries which are maintained at the headquarters of national associations. Such libraries must collect everything on their subjects, and be prepared to be a central bureau of information on their specialties, for their membership throughout the United States. For example, the libraries of the National Safety Council and the Portland Cement Association, located in Chicago.

This policy of coordination was expressed in the following words, by a large corporation several years ago when it organized its library: "We will keep our library down as far as possible to a small working collection, and our librarian shall be a go-between us and the other libraries of the city when we want information not available in our own collection." Thus the busy man of affairs is able to keep in touch, through his librarian, as proxy, with many avenues of helpfulness, which would be closed to him were it not for the fact that he had been far-sighted enough to employ a librarian to act for him in these matters of detail.

Public library facilities, while they supplement can never be a substitute for a library within a business organization, for different groups of business people who are vitally interested in one particular subject, or more often in only one phase of a subject, will naturally collect and know more about that subject than a general library serving a thousand and one interests can be expected to do.

The business librarian who is given the confidence of the officers of his organization, gets saturated with a knowledge of the business of the organization and is able to sense in advance what information will be needed, and will be prepared as far as possible for the emergency when it comes.

All librarians of public libraries will undoubtedly agree to the statement that they are not in a position to act as confidential library adviser to rival business corporations. The Public Library must deal impartially with all inquirers and cannot give precedence to any inquirer simply because he is in a hurry. Every man must wait his turn because the needs of other inquirers are equally important with his.

If the Utopian state should ever arrive when our public libraries have all the money necessary to meet the every information need of the community, the argument that the public library should serve the interests of business men, who are tax payers, in such a manner that it would not be necessary for them to have libraries within their business organizations, can be answered by a parallel suggesting that the public library should so serve all the interests of the public that no one need have a library in his own home. A business organization desires to make its own selection of material, on the basis of its needs and tastes; it wishes to have this material close at hand without any borrowing restrictions, so that it can be used quickly, without loss of time, and without the limitations which would be imposed if it were the property of some one else, and required particular care to keep it intact, for the business man often wishes to clip or give away the printed information in his possession.

The business library is, however, not antagonistic to the public library at any point. On the contrary, the business library must coordinate its resources with those of the public library and work in harmony with it.

The large business organization which can afford to employ a librarian, and the small business firm which cannot, will find a wealth of helpful material in the public libraries of their vicinity.

Many of the smaller public libraries which are not large enough to maintain special business departments are giving most excellent service to business men. A number of the large public libraries of the country are making a specialty of serving business needs through departments organized particularly to serve business men. Some of these are the Division of Economics and Documents of the New York Public Library, the Business Men's Branch of the Free Public Library of Newark, New Jersey, the Technology Department of Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, and the Industrial Department of the Los Angeles Public Library. The John Crerar Library of Chicago is a free reference library covering sociology and natural and applied science, which cannot be excelled by any other library collection in the United States in the facilities which it offers to business men. Every business organization should get acquainted with the public library of its city and ascertain what that library is able to do for it.