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The Future of Reference Services Papers

Point-of-Need Reference Service: No Longer an Afterthought

"The best way to predict the future is to invent it." --Alan Kay

If the truth be known, as a place to get help in finding information, the reference desk was never a good idea. A reference librarian standing behind a desk waiting for someone to say, "I can't find what I'm looking for; can you help?" might be justifiable if, as is the case with other service professionals, that librarian was the reason the person came to the building to begin with. But reference librarians have not served so central a function. They have stood ready to help "just in case"-just in case navigating the building isn't clear, just in case the catalog doesn't produce wanted results, just in case the collections seem not to contain the desired material or information. In short, reference service-in particular point-of-need reference service-has been an afterthought, something to be considered after the building's signage or the finding aids or the collections fail the user.

The external appearances have led us to believe the service works fine: there is enough traffic at the desk to keep us busy most of the time, and our clients express their sincere gratitude for the personalized assistance they received. Not wanting to disturb a good thing, we have been silent in our knowledge that people wander throughout the library needing help but never get to the reference desk. We've done little more than shake our heads, bemoaning the laziness of users who sit at an Internet-connected computer 20 feet from the reference desk but ask their questions of a commercial online reference service, where they get faulty answers.

It has taken the rise of commercial Web-based reference services to make public the news that people by the tens of thousands a minute have questions appropriate for a library reference desk, and not one of those questions is "how do I renew this book?" Analyses of what is really happening at the desk exposes systematic misplaced energies and wasted time. Except for a few regulars who understand the value and role of the reference librarian, it can be shown that the numbers who do ask "a real reference question" at the desk are tiny compared to the potential that would ask if the circumstances were right.

The passive posture is compatible with our traditional emphasis on "user independence." Indeed, libraries rightly take pride in providing user-friendly finding tools and browsable arrangements of materials so users don't have to ask for help. But today users are farther away than ever from being independent, which is why we put so much effort into teaching information literacy skills, but even there we are sloppy in our approach to instruction.(1) Too often, our sense of what we can accomplish in our instructional programs is overblown. Perhaps we think that once taught, they'll be fine on their own, which in turn justifies the just-in-case ready-reference desk. On the other hand, we know that the information landscape is constantly and rapidly changing, and since keeping current is our job, we would hope information seekers will touch base with us when they next need to research a topic, despite what we taught them in the past.

The Physical Desk Exudes Contradictions²

We say: "Come to the desk, where you'll be helped by professionals--experts in finding information."

But we also say: "Well-trained paraprofessionals do a fine job at the reference desk. You won't be able to tell the difference between us.

And we wonder why users ask reference questions of the circulation desk staff.

We say: "We're here to answer your questions."

But ask a library user, "Have you used the reference service? and you'll hear, "Oh no, I don't want to bother them." or even "Reference? What's that?"

We say: We're as busy as ever at the desk!

But statistics say: You're answering fewer questions at the desk.

We say: We are experts in helping you find information on the Internet.

But our profession doesn't require certification that our skills are updated, so it can't be a surprise when a service is uneven.

We say: Our users don't understand what we do.

And a veteran library user who gets help at the reference desk says: I didn't know you provided this wonderful service!

Inventing Our Future

1. the MLS makes a difference
2. we have updated our definition of what constitutes professional work
3. we keep up with changes in the information industry
4. we provide equivalent service to people who don't (or won't or can't) come into the library
5. we are responsible for the design of structures and content of our information services, but we are not necessarily the ones to be the front-line providers
6. our instructional programs are effective

At the risk of omitting some critical factors that will surely affect the future of reference, let me sketch out the future I hope we will invent.

Looking Backward

Whereas "information specialist" had always been synonymous with "librarian," in the late 1990s, for the first time, others, including machines, seemed able to take the place of librarians and libraries. Search engines, for example, had become quite clever at coming up with good answers in response to questions in the form of just a few key words, and commercial information services staffed round the clock by hobbyists and retired specialists were doing a fair job of answering thousands of questions a day, free of charge, on any subject. Observing that the numbers of questions asked at library reference desks were steadily declining, library administrators questioned the need for professionally staffed reference desks. In addition, though children's services in public libraries continued to thrive, as libraries' traditional adult constituencies increased their use of the Internet through connections at home or work, or as they used any of the library-supplied Internet stations located in public areas throughout their city or campus, and they borrowed fewer non-fiction print materials. In many universities this prompted faculty in several disciplines to covet the library's space. "Do we really need a library at all?" asked business, medical and public health schools as well as schools of engineering and agricultural studies. "Our students can get everything they need for their assignments and research on the Internet."

Librarians knew that libraries, with their superior collections, their subscriptions to high-priced electronic resources, and their professional reference staffs were more needed than ever: despite easy access to information on any subject in all formats and to question-answering people and software, users were frustrated at the avalanche of unevaluated, often irrelevant information they were getting. But the human tendency to be satisficed(4) (to accept "good enough" that is convenient) prevailed over their desire for better. So reference librarians realized that they themselves would have to move onto the Internet. How they accomplished this feat was impressive.

Building on their strong alliances forged over many generations, in 2007 the librarians of the world formed The Global Library, an umbrella organization to present a single library face to the world. Its well-known Web address, mylibrary.info, is now the universal threshold between the information seeker and the library. Under the auspices of the nearly century-old IFLA (International Federation of Library Associations), each country's national library (including the United States's de facto national library, The Library of Congress) organized its country's reference services to share the load of the world's questions in their primary languages.

IFLA's system was based on the pioneering reference projects that were launched at the turn of the century: The Library of Congress led the way with its founding of the Collaborative Digital Reference Service (CDRS), which evolved into QuestionPoint--a digital reference project staffed by a global consortium of multi-typed libraries. It began as an e-mail-based service among many English-speaking countries of the world and soon added real-time interactive service. Other fledgling virtual reference service consortia, such as the California-based public library systems' "Q and A Café" and "24/7 Reference" and the Illinois Academic Alliance Library System's "Ready for Reference" constituted important building blocks that gave a boost to the growth of the global organization. Historians of this development observe that local communities changed their view of their library from it being an independent resource to being a node in a vast worldwide network of libraries that was available to them wherever they happened to be when they needed information.

For the record, here, briefly, is how the library help service works today.

In the library building
You are greeted at the door by a START HERE help desk staffed by high-level paraprofessional staff well trained in question-handling techniques, finding specific resources and making referrals; and equipped with computers that access the library's finding aids, including the Internet. The message of the desk, by its impossible-to-miss placement at the library entryway is "We expect that you have questions, so ask away!"(5) When your question is beyond the scope of the START HERE desk, you may be referred to the in-house or virtual librarian on call, or if it is felt that you need more than twenty minutes of assistance, you will be encouraged to make an appointment with the appropriate library specialist (in-house or virtual). If at any time during your visit to the library you need help, you can use a handy query station--a phone line or a computer--that gets you directly to the help desk.

In the virtual environment
From an Internet connection wherever you are in the world, at any time of the day or night, go to mylibrary.info.(6) Click on the name or flag of your country and choose among text or voice or voice-with-video communication.(7) Printed and/or spoken words appear in the primary language of that country, but you have the option of choosing a different language for communicating. On the uncluttered screen, sign in (say or type your zip code or other agreed-upon identifier, and specify whether you are a school-aged child[8]) and either click on "Transport me to my library" (which takes you to your local library's homepage) or ask a question. Click on GO. On the mylibrary page is a display from the GREAT BOOK OF KNOWLEDGE (a vast knowledgebase of reliable information)(9) of a few possible answers to your question. If none of the retrievals satisfies you and you still wish assistance, click on the "Enter the Librarian's Office" button. When live service is chosen, you are greeted by a staff member of your home library if that service is open; otherwise, by someone on duty, a generalist who may be at a public, academic, or research library anywhere in the world at that moment. For example, questions asked at 2 a.m. in the United States may be answered by librarians in Europe, Australia, or New Zealand, and likewise, their midnight questions are answered during the workday in the United States and Canada.

A second tier of experts at special libraries (such as art, music, science, medicine, and law) stands ready to receive referrals from the generalists when special collections and advanced knowledge are required to answer the question.

A third tier of researchers provides a fee service to people who want to pay for a professional to research their topic.

Software intervenes at many points, for example:

• To keep traffic manageable, before the question is sent to either the email or interactive service, a search engine runs the user's question-whether written in a chat box, or converted from voice to text-through THE GREAT BOOK OF KNOWLEDGE, a huge reservoir of informational databases and FAQs developed from library files and constantly updated and monitored for currency. If the user finds a satisfactory answer among the retrievals (10 maximum), the transaction is ended. If not, the user clicks on either email or interactive service options.
• The question is assigned to a librarian on duty according to a computer program that distributes the load fairly.
• Good management reports are automatically produced periodically or compiled on the fly, including data used by individual libraries to track usage of the global system by their own constituencies.
• Transaction logs, including translations of oral conversation to text, are maintained and reviewed to ensure quality of service, pinpoint training needs, and identify issues that when properly addressed would eliminate or reduce the frequency of categories of questions needing a live service.

Paradoxically, as soon as virtual reference service became popular with the public, libraries everywhere attracted more adult walk-in users than ever. Today, old clientele have returned, and new people, who hadn't known the treasures of their library, have become frequent visitors. Together they constitute a rich base of community support for local libraries.

Endnotes

1. It would take another paper to urge a more analytical approach to instruction. What do we really know about the effect of our instructional programs? Do we know when it is appropriate to teach a lot, vs. a little, vs. not at all? Can we articulate the circumstances under which the different choices should be provided? What do we know about how much instruction can a user take? It is a step in the right direction to offer, point-of-need instruction, as in helping a classroom of students prepare for a term paper. But we need to do more of what ACRL has begun with its outstanding guidance in how to promote life-long learners. See ACRL's complementary documents on information literacy competency standards and objectives for instruction at www.ala.org/acrl/ilcomstan.html and www.ala.org/acrl/guides/objinfolit.html [ return to text ]
   
2. These contradictory messages conveyed by the reference desk are adapted from the original, which will appear in my forthcoming book, The Virtual Reference Librarian's Handbook, Neal-Schuman Publishers, due November 2002. [ return to text ]
   
3. You can track the progress of this fledgling development at www.questionpoint.org [ return to text ]
   
4. See Roy Tennant's discussion of the satisficing syndrome in his Digital Libraries column in Library Journal, December 15, 2001. Also accessible at http://libraryjournal.reviewsnews.com/ and click on Digital Libraries (left column), and then on "The Convenience Catastrophe." [ return to text ]
   
5. In olden days, help desks gave a different message. Because they were out-of-the-way or were called by a name that wasn't well understood (such as Reference Desk), clients too often asked their questions of the "Circulation Desk" staff or anyone else who was handy. (This desk was where people checked out borrowed materials, a process that today is entirely automated.) The message conveyed by this arrangement was: We expect you to be able to figure the library out on your own, but if you have a question, there's a desk staffed by people who will help-if you can find it. [ return to text ]
   
6. MyLibrary.info is a link on the homepages of the major organizations of the world. In fact, as of a few years ago this link comes packaged with most desktop and hand-held computers. (The multi-billionaire owner of the persistently popular Microsoft corporation saw the wisdom of -and paid libraries handsomely for-bundling this professional information service with other basic services that come with his computers. [ return to text ]
   
7. For several years chat technology remained an option, but as software such as CUseeMe and NetMeeting became more reliable and even voice conversations were able to be captured in text, in most libraries, chat faded away. Clients who preferred writing their question used asynchronous Web forms and email services. [ return to text ]
   
8. In fact, two parallel services operate simultaneously: one for pre-school and school-age children and one for everyone else. [ return to text ]
   
9. Until about a decade ago, the search engines that searched the GREAT BOOK OF KNOWLEDGE were not very effective, so, rather than risk frustrating the client, when the client clicked on the SEND button, the retrievals went first to the librarian on duty, who would share only the relevant ones with the client. Over time, the librarians analyzed poor retrievals and worked with the technologists to revise the search algorithms and reduce the frequency of irrelevant yields. Since 2010, all retrieval sets are a maximum of 10 references, errors within the sets are few enough, and the relevancy ranking is good enough so as to provide the client with what they were looking for a significant amount of time. [ return to text ]