Procrastinating and Pareto's Principle

We all do it.  I'm doing it right now.  You see, I have an assignment to do - the final assignment for my current course.  It - a journal on a one-day placement at the State Library of South Australia - was going along quite nicely.  Because during my one-day placement, I noticed that the types of enquiries received at the enquiry desk divided very neatly into an 80/20 split - 80% directional queries and 20% reference queries.

Some of you will have seen immediately the same thing I did, that this is an example of Pareto's Principle.  So since my one-day placement, that was what I had been thinking about - the implications of Pareto's Principle for the funding and staffing of libraries.  And that's what I had planned to write about in my assignment.

Then a clarification about the assignment was posted and I realised that I had to throw out what I had done and rethink the entire assignment.  That was last Thursday.  I am still rethinking my assignment, hence the procrastinating.

But back to Pareto.  One immediate implication for libraries is this - funding bodies will look at the statistics and think, well, why staff the enquiry desk with highly-qualified expensive librarians if 80% of the enquires are directional queries (such as "Where do I book a PC?" "How do I use the catalogue?"  "Where're the photocopiers?" etc)?  Why not staff them with less well-qualified, cheaper customer service staff instead?  And when someone comes along with a question that needs a librarian to answer it, then the librarian can come out and answer it.

It's a reasonable question - and the staffing of enquiry desks in public libraries with customer service staff instead of librarians is already happening.  For example, earlier this year, I saw a recruitment ad from the City of Port Adelaide Enfield for five trainee positions - one for each of its libraries.  But although the trainees would be sponsored by the council to go to TAFE and study, it would not for library studies - it would be for a Certificate in Business Studies.

However, I think that fails to take into account customer expectations.  I know that when I go into a library and have a question, which might be directional and might not, I expect that the person I speak to will be able to deal with any question I raise.  That is simply good customer service.  If I have a question that needs a librarian, I don't want to have to wait whilst the librarian is fetched from the back office.  If only for time management reasons, I don't want to have to wait around.  Each day when I go out, I have a plan for my day and a timetable to stick to (and yes, I do allow time for queuing in supermarkets, etc).  If my question is not dealt with reasonably quickly, then I will have to go.  And as David, one of my fellow students, points out: if someone has to "come back later", generally speaking, they won't.  They'll find another, easier, way to get what they need/want.

But, by the same token, it does free up librarians for the more "library" aspects of their work.

What do you think?

Cheers!

Catherine