Evidence-based librarianship #lianza11 #keynote7

Andrew Booth
Evidence based library and information practice: harnessing professional passions to the power of research

Passion
Wants to talk about a passion for continually monitoring, evaluating and improving our practice.

Four-square of:
Research   | Practice-based research
Practice     | Research-based practice

Need to be using research and researching our own service. Not just research that gets into journals, but local data.

Myths:

  • EBLIP has a bit of a “cold fish” reputation. Wants to get away from this idea. Really initiative and enthusiasm is vital.
  • The Librarian knows best (aka the Divine Right of Librarians). Our passion may colour our view of what’s best for users. Have to be cautious about thinking we know what our users want – doesn’t always match up. See also cognitive biases (eg primacy effects, recency effects, stereotypes, perseverance of belief, selective perception). “And we all suffer from Question Framing Bias, don’t we?” Librarians keep assuming there’s a right way of searching, rather than showing users how to harness the skills they have – eg “the dreaded Google Search typically displays a PubMed Abstract on page one”.

Can harness evidence-based practice and passion together. Quotes an informant from Partridge (2007) saying they’re passionate about things so wanted to have things to “back up my passion”.

Profession
We need to be evidence-based. Difference between barber (just the same inventory of skills as ever) and surgeon (body of knowledge continually built on) – also talks about the “Oops” factor: how do they behave when things go wrong? Note that abuse of evidence-based practice can be as dangerous as cutting off the wrong leg.

Using research = best practice + best use of resources. Lets professionals add value to work practices. Need to evaluate both ourselves and our professional practice. At the professional level it can inform practice, help see where we’re going, raise profile of librarianship, and improve status of library.

If we’re not practicing EBLIP we might be deferring to (Isaacs & Fitzgerald, 1999): eminence-based LIP, vehemence-based LIP, eloquence-based LIP, providence-based LIP; diffidence-based LIP; nervousness-based LIP, confidence-based LIP; propaganda-based LIP.

Must align evidence, profession and passion.

Role of evidence-based library and info practice
“Difference between research and using evidence-based practice to make workplace decisions”. Quotes someone saying there’s nothing wrong with reinventing the wheel – it’s reinventing the flat tyre you want to avoid.

Not just about research. About integrating user-reported, practitioner-observed, and research-derived evidence. Not undervaluing what staff say, but restoring balance to value users too.

Four-square:
Start starting            | Start stopping
(innovation)             | (discontinuing
                                 | ineffective practice)
—————————————————–
Stop starting            | Stop stopping
(not introducing       | (continuing
ineffective practice) | effective practice)

The 5 As:
Ask a focused question
Acquire the evidence
Appraise the studies
Apply the findings
Assess the impact

Reflection for, before, in, on action and Re-action.

EBLIP comes from medicine and is suitable for healthcare but less so for other systems.  So must adapt the model, not adopt it uncritically.

Eg doctors are often autonomous; librarians work together.

So rewriting 5 As:
Articulating the problem
Assembling the evidence base
Assessing the evidence
Agreeing the actions
Adapting the implementation

Questions
Q: Your last slide is about ultimate goal of EBLIP to create a toolbox we can dip into, and thus to write itself out of existence – that was the last slide six years ago so how long will it take?
A: Did think about it! There’s been progress.  Still people see EBLIP as a project to stop and start, not to sustain.

Q: Can you give examples?
A: One workshop he does is called “Walking the Walk”. Some great examples around developing webpages – many poorly designed – Cancer Library in the UK came up with webdesign guidelines backed up by evidence. Much has been done esp in Canada around evidence-based collection development.

4 thoughts on “Evidence-based librarianship #lianza11 #keynote7

  1. Amanda Curnow

    this seems like a no-brainer to me. librarians should be implementing services, assessing them based on use etc and making decisions about whether to continue, improve or discontinue. Shouldn’t this be a regular part of our jobs?
    BTW: am really enjoying your posts on the lianza conference. not sure how you’re doing it so fast and eloquently, but thanks! :o)

    Reply
  2. Kim Salamonson

    I agree Amanda, Deborah has captured the essence of each speaker and session so well and has blogged it so timely. A joy to read. Great for those of us unable to attend this years conference. Thanks 🙂

    Reply
  3. Deborah Fitchett

    You’re both most welcome!

    Amanda, I agree it *should* be part of our jobs – but so often we get busy and satisfice in just the way we sometimes complain about our users doing: make decisions based on ‘common sense’ or anecdata or something we read somewhere, because we think we don’t have time to investigate fully.

    –And there are things where investigating fully before doing anything would actually be more costly than just trying the thing out, but then we forget to take the time to assess how well it’s working because we’re busy with the next crisis and decisions to be made.

    Reply
  4. Lynne

    Thanks for putting up these conference articles and thoughts so quickly. I am really enjoying them too. I am sure my guys at conference will bring their ideas back for me to consider they always do 🙂
    keep up the good work

    Reply

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