Empowering future libraries : the role of talent management in library development

Abstract

To maintain the high standard of public as well as academic libraries’ services and to be able to develop them further and lead them into the future, new challenges must be overcome. These are for example the War for Talents, diversity, skills of older and younger employees, the advancing digitization, integration issues, sustainability, fake news etc. One approach to address these challenges involves implementing talent management, utilizing its methods to both retain current employees and identify well-trained new staff, effectively deploying them as needed.This paper presents results from a quantitative study titled “The Library needs Talents! An Empirical Study on the Use of Talent Management Methods for Staff Recruitment and Staff Development in Libraries” with findings about the status of this topic in German libraries and the possibility of implementing talent management. The study consists of a survey conducted in May 2019 with 143 participants, of whom 113 completed the questionnaire and a workshop held in June 2019 with ten librarians of academic and public libraries in which the questions “How can talents be found for and in a library?” and "How do you keep these talents in the library?" were discussed.The results show that interest in talent management exists in German libraries, but a lack of expertise on the subject has hindered its implementation in libraries thus far. Further key findings indicate that career opportunities and development prospects still have room for improvement. Particularly in smaller institutions with only a few employees, career advancement can be challenging. All in all, the size of the institution plays a minor role. While complete talent management may not be feasible in smaller institutions, individual aspects can still be addressed and implemented. For example, relevant competencies that talents should possess could be identified in advance and reflected in job advertisements.This paper introduces a novel perspective on addressing challenges faced by public and academic libraries. It is shedding light on the status of talent management and its potential implementation. The value of this paper extends to library professionals seeking ways to attract and retain talent, irrespective of the institution's size, presenting actionable insights for competency-based recruitment practices.