ChapterNews
IN THIS ISSUE Message from the President
Message from the President
Agnes Mattis.. ............................1
Message from the
Director of Publications .............2
Hot or Not? ....................................5
The Effect of Outsourcing and
Offshoring on the Information
Profession ..................................6
Outsourcing and Offshoring
of Information Services ............10
Chapter Announcements:
Lucy Lettis Speaks ..................12
Increase in Hiring Librarians ....12
Scholarship Award...................12
New Assistant Editor................12
Welcome New Members .........12
Holiday Party 2003 ......................13
Legislative Alert:
Database Protection Bill Intro-
duced in the House..................14
Knowledge Services:
Strategic Learning:...................16
Meet the Board
and the Advisory Council.........18
MS Bike Tour ...............................23
Report from IFLA .........................24
Special Section:
Professional Development
SLA Virutal Seminars ...............27
ADVERTISERS
Dialog ............................................4
Clare Castle Partners..................13
Donna Conti Career Resources .10
EBSCO ........................................11
EOS International..........................3
Gatta Design & Co. .....................24
Info-Current...................................8
Pro Libra........................................9
Wontawk .......................................7
ChapterNews
Volume 75, #4 Winter 2003-2004
Happy Holidays!
Agnes Mattis, President
he holiday season is upon us and it seems there is more to do than ever.
T
My cards are written and most of my shopping is finished — thanks to a
husband who is very efficient and likes to shop! How rare is that? No,
you cannot rent him. The calendar is filling up with holiday parties and
events that we will attend. I am delving through all my cookbooks to put together
menus for the events when friends and family will gather at our home. I am sure
you are busy with similar activities in addition to actually doing your job! The
Chapter’s Board of Directors has an additional task ahead. We are in the process
of preparing our budget for 2004.
Because of the way the Chapter is structured, half the members of the Board of
Directors are new each year. So the budget process is new to half the Board each
year. At our preliminary meeting this year, there were many questions from the
Advisory Council as well as from Board members about the budget. My repeated
comments that we have to be very careful with our finances were met with blank
stares and comments along the line of “but the Chapter has lots of money.”
Someone suggested that a financial discussion would be of interest to all of our
members. A further suggestion was made that, as your President, I should write
it in ChapterNews. You won’t need your green eye shades — I am going to keep
this as simple as possible.
The Chapter has two accounts: a Project/Reserve Fund and an Operating Fund.
The Project/Reserve Fund is in the Pooled Fund at SLA Headquarters. This means
our funds are put together with the funds from other Chapters and Divisions and
invested in SLA- (and IRS-) approved areas. The principle is guaranteed. We receive
quarterly interest and we can withdraw funds as needed. When we first joined the
Pooled Fund, we had about $115,000 in the fund. I can hear you saying “see we
are rich!” But the fund has diminished over the last few years so we now have a
balance of about $75,000. The rule of thumb for a reserve fund is that you should
maintain one year’s worth of operating expenses in case of emergency. Guess
how much it costs to run the NY Chapter? You guessed it! It costs more than
$75,000 a year to run the Chapter. (I’ll get to how we spend it in the section on
the Operating Fund.)
Where did we get this large amount of money to contribute to the Pooled Fund?
The Chapter used to produce two publications, a Union List of Serials and a Chapter
Directory. These publications brought in revenue over the years. The first Chapter
Directory was published in 1940! The profits from the sale of these publications
went to the Project Fund and were used as seed money for the next editions. In
the early 1990’s, the Board recognized that the books were diminishing in value
and took so long to produce that they were terribly out of date by the time they
were printed. With the boom in electronic publishing, few of us spend the day
(Continues on page 3)
1 Vol. 75, #4 Winter 2003-2004
ChapterNews Message from the
New York Chapter Director of Publications:
Special Libraries Association Season’s Greetings
Winter Vol. 75, No. 4
learly, the events of 9/11 reshaped the lives of all
PUBLICATION SCHEDULE
ChapterNews, the bulletin of the New York Chapter of the
Special Libraries Association, is published four times a year.
C of us, not only here in the U.S. but throughout the
world. One of the more profound effects of the
brutal attack was the havoc it played on the world eco-
nomic stage. Hopefully, we are seeing signs of recovery,
but we will have to wait until the first or second quarter
Deadlines for submitting materials: of 2004 to know if we are really out of the woods.
Fall issue ....................September 24 Last year at this time, we were reeling from the Enron
Winter issue...............December 15 scandal that brought down Arthur Andersen. Much to
Spring issue................March 15 our chagrin, Adelphia, Tyco and Sam Waksal became
fixtures of the evening news further emphasizing that
Summer issue.............May 14
corporate America needed to clean house.
Government is usually slow to act, but when it does, it can
Submit all material to: result in far-reaching legislation. During the Carter years,
Jennifer Kellerman government regulations on business were severe, while
ChapterNews Editor the Reagan years gave business a much freer hand.
E-mail: jkellerman@paulweiss.com In this issue of ChapterNews, you will find a comprehensive
review of the regulations and legislation that have been
Submissions: Articles on topics of general interest to infor- enacted and proposed post-9/11. If we ever had any
mation professionals and the New York Chapter are welcome. thoughts that “Big Brother” was watching, we now know
Authors can send submissions via e-mail as text file or MS that to be true. Whatever our political beliefs may be,
Word for Windows attachments, or with article in the body of it is important to be aware of this legislation and how it
the e-mail. Please use single-line spacing, Courier font, with can affect our personal lives and the great impact it can
minimal use of boldface and italics. Include a byline with your have on our libraries.
full name and place of work.
On a lighter note, Jennifer, Shirley, Nancy and I would
like to wish everyone a happy and healthy holiday season
ADVERTISING inquiries should be addressed to: and look forward to a prosperous 2004.
Nancy Bowles
235 East 22nd Street, Apt 9L Mike Gruenberg
New York, NY 10010 Michael Gruenberg is the Strategic Accounts Manager
Telephone: (212) 679-7088 or at OneSource Information Services. He can be reached at
E-mail: nancy.bowles@verizon.net Michael_Gruenberg@onesource.com or 212-836-4161.

Special Libraries Association assumes no responsibility for the

statements and opinions advanced by contributors to the Associa-
tion’s publications. Editorial views do not necessarily represent the
official position of Special Libraries Association. Acceptance of
an advertisement does not imply endorsement of the product by
Special Libraries Association.

CHAPTERNEWS STAFF
Director of Publications Mike Gruenberg
ChapterNews Editor Jennifer Kellerman
Advertising Manager Nancy Bowles
Webmaster Shirley Loh
Assistant Editor Brenda Ling

ChapterNews 2 Vol. 75, #4 Winter 2003-2004

 (Continued from page 1)
calling other libraries to borrow periodicals. The Chapter
got out of the publishing business. There have been no
additions to the Project/Reserve Fund since. The Chapter
has been regularly withdrawing funds to use in the
Operating Fund.
The Operating Fund is the Chapter’s checkbook. We
pay for all Chapter activities out of this fund. The only
income the Chapter receives is advertising income for
ChapterNews, an annual allotment from SLA in the
amount of $12.00 per member (in 2003 we received
$14,556) and sponsorship income from our vendor com-
munity. Since the NY Chapter does not charge members
to attend meetings, we have to raise money from the
vendor community to cover the costs of the meetings.
Our vendors have been impacted by the economy and do
not support Chapter activities as much as in the past.
The cost of meeting space, refreshments and the other
costs associated with our meetings is rising. As an exam-
ple, the expenses for our Fall meeting with Janice
Lachance totaled $3,506. (We had a contribution from
Factiva of $3,000.) Meeting space in NY is expensive and
often difficult to find. If any of you work for an organiza-
ChapterNews
tion that would rent meeting space, please find out the
details on the cost and send them to me (amattis@skad-
den.com). We would like to put together a comprehensive
list of meeting spaces that are available to us. We typically
need seating for a maximum of 200 and an area for a
one-hour reception.
Other expense the Chapter incurs include the very success-
ful Career Day program. Career Day runs each Spring
and costs almost $4,000 more than the sponsorship
income. We are very proud of this program and will con-
tinue it in the future. We also offer scholarships totaling
$4,000. The Virtual Seminars are free to members but
cost the Chapter $4,000 a year. I don’t put these numbers
in here to alarm anyone but merely to illustrate that the
Chapter is expensive to run. We are getting less income
from our vendor community and we’ve had to transfer
monies from the Project Fund to the Operating Fund.
President-Elect Tom Pellizzi and I have begun some pre-
liminary discussions on how we might raise funds for the
Chapter to support our activities. (We are not thinking
bake sales here!) If you have an idea for something that
worked in another organization you belong to send the
idea to me (amattis@skadden.com). Tom and I want to
insure the financial health and continued success of the
Chapter and we want your help. It’s your Chapter as well.
In January, Tom and I will head to Albuquerque, NM for
the SLA Winter Meeting. We will meet with other
Chapter and Division leaders for two days of leadership
activities and will see the SLA Board of Directors in
action. We will report on this meeting in the next issue.
At the end of January you will receive your ballot for the
2004 SLA elections. Our very own Pam Rollo is running
for President Elect of the Association. It’s been too long
since a New Yorker ran the Association. Now, I am not
telling you how to vote, I am merely suggesting you
check the box with Pam’s name and return your ballot
by the deadline.
In closing I wish you a joyous holiday season and a Happy
and Peaceful New Year. As you make those New Year’s
resolutions this year think about the Chapter, resolve to
attend a Chapter Meeting, resolve to read and return
your ballot, resolve to volunteer for Career Day, resolve
to attend a Virtual Seminar. Hey, this is easier than losing
25 pounds or running 5 times a week, and your chance
of success is much higher!
Agnes Mattis
Agnes K. Mattis is head of the Corporate Library at Skadden,
Arps, Slate, Meagher and Flom LLC. She can be reached at
amattis@skadden.com.
3 Vol. 75, #4 Winter 2003-2004
ChapterNews 4 Vol. 75, #4 Winter 2003-2004
Corporate Librarian
Profession: Hot or Not?
by Thomas D. Sullivan
n past months, CareerJournal (http://www.career-
E
journal.com/sa laryhiring/industries/librari-
ans/20031022-capell.html) and CNNMoney
(http://money.cnn.com/2003/08/28/pf/saving/hotjob-
snow/index.htm) have suggested that corporate librarian-
ship is a growth profession. Is it?
It is — “for information professionals who have the abili-
ty and courage to break out of the traditional mold and
mindset,” says Lucy Lettis, Senior Vice President &
Director of Business & Competitive Intelligence at
Marsh USA Inc.
Joanne Lustig, Director & Lead Analyst at Outsell, Inc.,
puts it differently. “What’s hot is a skill set,” including
“developing taxonomies, knowledge management, creating
and managing portals.”
“Traditional librarian is certainly not,” Ms. Lustig says,
“a hot job.”
CareerJournal noted “many openings for corporate
librarian no longer have the word ‘librarian’ in their
titles.” About the terms that corporate librarian now
goes under Suzan Lee of UBS says, “The umbrella has
gotten bigger.”
Beth McCleary, who now works at Marsh, runs down her
previous job titles: “information specialist” at Tillinghast,
“researcher” at PriceWaterhouseCoopers, and “reference
librarian” at Credit Suisse First Boston.
Ms. McCleary’s Marsh colleague Shirley Loh, Assistant
Vice President and Project Manager, points out that what
was previously simply called “research” is now often termed
“competitive intelligence” or “business intelligence.”
There’s opportunity in this, according to Eric Reichert,
Post-Closing Coordinator at LandAmerica Financial
Services. “Librarian skills,” he says, that can lead to various
roles — data mining, online searching, creating websites
— that don’t fall under conventional librarian categories.
As he sees it, corporate librarian is truly a hot job for librar-
ians who have also had a few years of expertise in a particu-
lar field now in demand, for example, pharmaceuticals.
Qualifications
First, the most important personality trait that will pro-
pel you in corporate library work is “curiosity about a lot
of different things,” Ms. McCleary says.
ChapterNews
An MLS or MLIS degree is almost absolutely essential
requirement for anyone going into the field now. Ms. Lee
says corporations are “looking for the credential.” Ms.
Lettis says “the degree helps a lot,” and not having it is
the exception, not the rule.
The education in library school “instills a certain way of
approaching research problems,” Ms. Lettis says, which
is very valuable.
To prepare themselves for the corporate sector, library
school students need to put in a lot of effort in addition to
their coursework, according to Ms. Lee, SLANY’s Library
School Liaison. To take the most critical example, they
should participate in “as many free database workshops”
through SLA as they can possibly manage, she said.
“I work very closely with students,” Ms. Lee says, and
she sees that the students who land jobs in corporate
library work are those who have taken advantage of
internships and other student programs offered by
SLANY. Conversely, students who have trouble finding
jobs, she says, are those who haven’t done internships.
A number of corporate librarians hoped that library
schools would do more to teach students how to think as
people in business do. Karen Krugman who runs research
at CAPCO, a consulting firm for the financial sector,
wishes she had had an opportunity to learn “business
school stuff” — how to manage a budget, how to get the
most out of a contract with a vendor.
“It wouldn’t hurt,” Ms. Lustig says, if library schools
taught “a little bit of selling, a little bit of marketing,”
as well as “how to sell a new idea.”
When It Works
Ms. Krugman, who runs a one-woman area at CAPCO,
and Tzofit Butler, Director of the Information Center/
Archives at HarperCollins Publishers, are both happy
in their roles.
The similarities in their situations are illuminating: both
have access to top levels of management in their firms.
Ms. Butler reports to a manager, “a great boss,” who in
turn reports to the CEO. Ms. Krugman says that she is
“able to work with people at all levels” in her small,
“non-hierarchical” firm. Ms. Krugman works closely
with the president to help him prepare presentations
for clients and colleagues.
Ms. Butler and her colleagues consistently impress her
managers with the value of her area’s work. Executives
are “shocked and amazed” by the quality of the research,
which gains her and her staff “a lot of respect.” Critically
important, her managers “realize our value.” She adds
that she “tries to be pro-active.”
(Continues on page 6)
5 Vol. 75, #4 Winter 2003-2004
 (Continued from page 5)
When Ms. Krugman first started out, she was “very reac-
tive,” but as she gained a fuller understanding of her firm
and its business, she was invited to participate in a wider
range CAPCO’s work. “It’s great,” she says, to help bring
in revenue and have input on the direction of her firm.
She credits her opportunity to a congenial corporate cul-
ture, and her arrival early in the life of the firm, which
allowed her to carve out a role for herself.
Formula for Success
Corporate librarians need, as Ms. Lustig puts it, “skills
for speaking the language outside ‘libraryville.’ Interpret
the value of what you do.”
Ms. Loh concurs, citing terms such as “reference interview”
that mean little or nothing to non-librarians. That term
simply means, “trying to understand what customers
need,” she says
Ms. Lustig argues that corporate librarians need to “under-
stand not just the information industry, but the industry
that their organization is in, to understand the business.”
This is what Ms. Lustig calls “content in context.” She
offers an example: a colleague asks a corporate librarian
for some information. Corporate librarians need to think:
“What’s that person’s function? What’s the context for
asking for this?”
The most critical context is: the business and its aims.
Ms. Lettis urges a “strategic rather than tactical” attitude.
Corporate librarians need to be “always in tune with the
directions the organization is going in.” They need to be
“thinking always with an eye toward top management
pain points and goals.”
“In the corporate world,” Ms. Lettis says, “everyone is
easily expendable unless you constantly find creative and
new ways to prove your value to top management.”
In practical terms, corporate librarians need to focus on
“how to add value to research” through “packaging and
analysis,” – “doing more than just synthesizing research”
but also “distilling it and summarizing it.”
The future of corporate librarians, Ms. Lettis says,
“Depends on how we position ourselves as professionals.”
As for the question about a hot job, Ms. Lustig offers
this: the “key hot thing” is for corporate librarians to be
“business analysts, students of their organizations, who
understand what the business processes are and connect
this understanding to their knowledge of content.”
She offers a metaphor: “Technology is the pipe. Content
is the water. Information professionals are the engineers
who direct the flow.”
Thomas D. Sullivan is a freelance writer and a member of
the SLA New York Chapter.
ChapterNews
The Effect of Outsourcing
and Offshoring on the
Information Profession
By Christopher Fatherley
Author’s Note: The following article is based on the author’s
personal notes from the SLA-NY panel discussion, Outsourcing
and Offshoring of Information Services (November 20, 2003), and
readings. Although no specific panel speaker has been quoted,
the related sources listed throughout the article address many
of the same issues as presented during the discussion. It must
be noted that several of these sources were new to the author at
the time of the event. Gratitude and appreciation are expressed to
the speakers for their comprehensive treatment of this “hot topic.”
his article is a modified version of a research propos-
T al submitted as a Graduate level course assignment
for Research Methods in Library and Information
Science at the Palmer School, Long Island University.
Offshoring: The new “buzzword” for outsourcing.
Outsourcing is an arrangement in which one company
provides services for another company that could also be
or usually have been provided in-house (SearchCIO.com,
2003). Offshore simply means any other country than
one’s own (SearchCIO.com, 2003).
The recent increase in popularity of offshore services is a
result of a globalized economic downturn, corporate budgets
requiring doing more with less, addressing post-September
11th terrorist concerns by decentralizing core business
functions, and new legislation dictating the separation
between investment banking and in-house analyst
research (New York State Attorney General Elliot Spitzer’s
global settlement in April of 2003 and the regulations set
forth by the Sarbanes-Oxley Act in May of 2003).
Additionally, globalization is opening up new markets
providing lower cost manufacturing and services. The
recent trade tensions between the United States, Europe,
and China illustrate the degree to which we all live in a
global economy. The Indian service industry (in addition
to China’s robust manufacturing capabilities) has become
a dynamic economy well positioned for success in the
twenty-first century. American labor opposition has been
gaining strength especially with the “jobless recovery and
the imminent American Presidential election. This resis-
tance has traditionally been from the unionized blue-collar
manufacturing industries. Through the forecasted large-
scale displacement of white-collar jobs, offshoring
represents a new and potentially significant chapter in
American economic history.
(Continues on page 7)
6 Vol. 75, #4 Winter 2003-2004
 (Continued from page 6)
To combat the growing offshoring trend and lessen the
chance of being subject to downsizing in challenging
economic climates, corporate business librarians must
strategically embed themselves in the company’s core
mission. In addition to being top-notch information
service providers, they must address the same issues of
efficiency, capital management, and long-term viability
as their partners in the executive (i.e. decision making)
tier of the company. The library must function as a well
organized profit center; a borderless microcosm mirror-
ing the whole. Librarians must be fluent in both the
language and practices of finance. High visibility must
be maintained through strategic partnerships with library
advocates who see it as imperative to the company’s success.
An identifiable brand must be created and promoted
throughout the company.
1. Think like a CFO (Bates, 1997). Since every organiza-
tion has a financial bottom line, it’s critical that library
managers understand the organization’s financial drivers
(Bates, 1997). Know your worth in dollars and cents
and in the added value of being the in-house experts
(Bates, 1997).
2. And although the bear market may be over, the Indian
analyst boom is a sure sign that the junior research
analysts who were laid off in droves aren’t likely to get
their jobs back-ever (Sargent, 2003). We can build the
model, but we are not going to make the assumptions
that go into the model. We’re just one-quarter of the
brain. Three-quarters of the brain stays on site (Sar-
gent quoting Sigelman, 2003).
▲ Joint Venture: A foreign company forms a partner-
3. Momentum has built rapidly within the industry, how-
ship with a company in the host country. Operations
ever, and we estimate that nearly three-of-four major
are conducted in the host country but oversight (con-
financial institutions will be offshore within two years
trol) is maintained from the foreign company’s head-
(Gentle, 2003). We estimate that $356 billion of cost
quarters generally in another overseas location.
for the global financial-services industry will be relocat-
ed offshore within the next five years (Gentle, 2003). ▲ Contract Outsourcing: Project to project based
We calculate that this will translate into a bottom-line transactions. No proprietary relationships exist
annual cost savings of $138 billion (or $1.4 billion each) between information seeker and the vendor.
for the world’s top 100 financial services companies by Vendor services include creation of PIBs (Public Company
2008 (Gentle, 2003). This translates into the potential Information Book), database searching, basic financial
movement of up to two million jobs (Gentle, 2003). modeling, quantitative analysis, competitive intelligence,
4. Vendor product is designed to be cost effective, conve- customized newsletters, patent mining, statistical analy-
nient (available 24/7), secure, and law-abiding (i.e. fol- sis, information management platforms, conference calls,
lowing American regulatory standards). The outsourcing presentations, back office support, web site creation and
hierarchy is as follows: maintenance, etc. Services can be delivered on-demand or
continuously (Evalueserve, 2003). Many vendor execu-
▲ Captive: A foreign company (in this case, American)
tives have graduated from U.S. business schools and
wholly owns and operates a remote office in another
possess hands on experience by working on Wall Street
country (in this case, India). A majority of the staff is
and in corporate America. Outsourcing/offshoring can
from the host country’s regional population.
(Continues on page 8)

ChapterNews 7 Vol. 75, #4 Winter 2003-2004

 (Continued from page 7)
reduce costs by 60+%, and make costs variable (smartana-
lyst, inc., 2003). India has made substantial infrastructure YOUR SOURCE FOR SKILLED INFORMATION NAVIGATORS
investments supporting the enhancement of their fiber-
• The premier source for
optic telecommunications network. The technically high-caliber library &
skilled vendor staff is encouraged to be fluent in English information management
professionals
and maintain efficient time management skills.
• Executive search & direct hire
This article is not meant to advocate isolationist/xeno- placements nationwide
phobic sentiments, nor is India meant to be singled out.
• Temporary & temp-to-hire
In fact, as the word suggests, globalization touches every- assignments
one. In the future, we anticipate that offshore activity • Competitive candidate benefits &
will spread around the Indian Ocean Rim-from South training programs
Africa, through the Indian sub-continent, to China,
Malaysia and to Australia (Gentle, 2003). The hub market
will be India, potentially accounting for as many as one A Part of TeleSec CORESTAFF

million new positions from offshored financial services

(Gentle, 2003). Ideas, information, and the intangibles
of personal capital are the growth industries of the future.
In order to remain competitive in the world’s market
place, the United States must continue to adapt to cul-
tural change and nurture domestic talent through quality
education and training. Additionally, studies concerning
the outsourcing of Information Technology (IT) and
Information Systems (IS) are generally available. In con-
trast, the offshoring of equity research by investment
banks is a relatively new phenomenon with considerably
less coverage (for what seems to be the most comprehen-
sive research to date (see: The Cusp of a Revolution:
How Offshoring Will Transform the Financial Services
Industry by Chris Gentle). This will certainly change as
more companies are forced to sign on to this exploding
trend. Currently, the cost savings are simply too great to
ignore. Successes and failures must be analyzed over an
extended period of time in order to appropriately judge
whether offshoring is simply a quick fix or a complete
global shift in economic/cultural reality.
Questions for further consideration are:
▲ How many American MLS programs actually
offer business information curricula?
▲ In order to remain professionally competitive, will
corporate business librarians need to have a MBA
in addition to their MLS?
▲ Will this additional degree have an effect on
their salaries?
▲ If the additional degree becomes the norm, are
librarians essentially functioning as analysts?
▲ If not, what will be the difference be?
New York City Metro area
nylibrary@infocurrent.com
212-642-4321
Washington, DC Metro area
dclibrary@infocurrent.com
202-775-1890
www.infocurrent.com
Bibliography
▲ Bates, M. E. “Avoiding the Ax: How to keep
from being downsized or outsourced.” Information
Outlook. October 1997. <http://www.sla.org/
content/SLA/professional/businesscase/octeng/
bates.cfm>
▲ Downes, J., and J. E. Goodman. Dictionary
of Finance and Investment Terms,
6th ed. Hauppauge, NY: Barron’s, 2003.
▲ Evaluserve. “EVS delivery modes.” November 26, 2003.
<http://evalueserve.com/Service/Services
WeProvide.asp>
▲ Gentle, C. “The cusp of a revolution: How offshoring
will transform the financial services industry.” (3),
p. 1. July 2003. <http://www.deloitte.com/dtt/arti-
cle/0,2297,cid=15316&pv=Y,00.html>
▲ National Association of Securities Dealers. NASD
Regulation- Rule Filing 2002-21. New York, NY:
NASD, 2003. <http://www.nasdr.com/filings/
rf02_21.asp>
▲ Sargent, C. “The offshore voice.” Investment Dealers
Digest, November 2003, p 24.
▲ “Offshore outsourcing.” SearchCIO.com Definitions,
2003. <http://searchcio.techtarget.com/sDefinition/
0,,sid19_gci924479,00.html>
(Continues on page 9)

ChapterNews 8 Vol. 75, #4 Winter 2003-2004

 (Continued from page 8)
▲ “Business overview.” smartanalyst.com, 2003,
<http://www.smartanalyst.com/SA_business%
20overview.htm>
▲ Tomer, J.F. (2003). “Personal capital and emotional
intelligence: an increasingly important source of eco-
nomic growth.” Eastern Economic Journal, 29(3), 456.

Recommended Readings
▲ Basu, S. C., Chen, and L., Palvia. (2003). “Business
Process Management.” The Encyclopedia of Library
and Information Science, Vol.1, p. 409-416. New York,
NY: Marcel Dekker, Inc.
▲ Bryce, D. J. and M. Useem. “The impact of corporate
outsourcing on company value.” European Manage-
ment Journal, 6(6), 1998: 635-643.
▲ Globerman, S. and A. Vining. “A conceptual frame-
work for understanding the outsourcing decision.”
European Management Journal, 7(6), 1999: 645-654.
▲ Kiker, B. F. (1966). “The historical roots of the concept
of human capital.” The Journal of Political Economy,
47(5), 1996: 481-499.
▲ Lavin, D., A. Saxena and S. Tyagi. “Leaping into off-
▲ Aeppel, T. “With foreign rivals making the cut, tool-
shore: What directors must know.” Directorship. 2003.
makers dwindle.” Wall Street Journal, November 21,
<http://www.inductis.com/images/directorship_arti-
2003, p. A1.
cle.pdf>
▲ King, N., Jr. “U.S. trade tack alarms Greenspan.”
▲ Pepe, R., ed. Securities Industry Yearbook 2003-2004.
Wall Street Journal, November 21, 2003, p. A2.
New York, NY: Securities Industry Association, 2003.
▲ McCarthy, J. C. “3.3 million U.S. service jobs to
▲ Keavney, J. “Wall Street to bolster research with over-
go offshore.” TechStrategy. November 21, 2003.
seas teams.” Reuters News, May 1, 2003, p 17.
<http://www.forrester.com/ER/Research/Brief/
▲ Grant, J., Ed. “Faith-based currency.” Grant’s interest Excerpt/0,1317,15900,FF.html>
rate observer, 21(14), July 2003: 1-9.
▲ “A tiger, falling behind a dragon.” The Economist,
▲ Ray, A. “BPO and new protectionism.” The Hindu June 21-27, 2003, p. 367.
Business Line, July 4, 2003.
▲ “Two systems, one grand rivalry.” The Economist,
▲ Pucik, V., and K. Xin. “Trouble in paradise.” Harvard June 21-27, 2003, p. 367.
Business Review,Special issue on globalization and
leadership, August 2003.
Christopher Fatherley is a member of the Engraving Services
▲ “Raising the barricades.” The Economist, September Department at Tiffany & Co. He is pursuing an MLS degree at
18, 2003. the Palmer School/Long Island University (Manhattan campus)
▲ Elstein, A. “Analyze this: Jobs go abroad; Wall St. with a Concentration in Business Information. He can be
reached at christopher@fatherley.com.
turns to India for research; outsourcing agencies gain
business.” Crain’s New York Business, September 19,
2003: p. 19.
▲ Slater, J. “Outsourcing: India’s Nifty Number-Crunchers.”
Far Eastern Economic Review, October 2, 2003: p. 3.
▲ Alden, E., and M. Dickie. “U.S. import curbs come
under fire from China.” Financial Times. November
20, 2003, p. 1.

ChapterNews 9 Vol. 75, #4 Winter 2003-2004

Outsourcing
and Offshoring of
Information Services Career Resources, Inc.
Meeting a Success DC On-Line, Inc.
By Rita Schaffer

here was great interest, as indicated by an audience

T of over 150 people, in the New York SLA Chapter’s

November 20, 2003 program on the topic of out-
sourcing information support functions by companies,
especially financial services firms. The cogent speakers
were Steve Medley and Mary Kay Walsh of Bear Stearns’
Business Information Group, which has been using out-
sourced staff for over a year, and Tom Fearon of Lehman
Brothers Inc, which is currently evaluating a pilot project
in information support outsourcing.
Steve Medley explained the difference between outsourc-
ing, where work is contracted out to workers who are
not employees of the firm, and offshoring, in which work
is done in a company-owned facility in another country.
In both cases, this is done to take advantage of cheaper
overseas labor. Mr. Medley then reviewed how these
trends started in manufacturing, have become wide-
spread in the IT support area, and are now taking hold into effect last year, and they have actually added person-
in the business process support sector, including infor- nel. Outsourcing some of the department’s more routine
mation research. requests is allowing the permanent staff in New York to
Much of this business process outsourcing is being done develop new competencies.
in India, which has a large well-educated English-speak- After Mr. Medley presented the theoretical framework
ing workforce. The spread of the Internet, low-cost for outsourcing, Mary Kay Walsh went over some of the
telecom connections, and more secure networks have more practical day-to-day issues of how Bear Stearns
allowed widespread outsourcing to become a viable went about implementing the outsourcing process. First
option for information-hungry financial service firms. she stated that the information professionals at Bear
Of course the first question everyone asks is what has been Stearns act as consultants and trainers to their con-
the effect of outsourcing on staff jobs. Mr. Medley noted stituents, who are the bankers. Removing the informa-
that, at Bear Stearns, the outsourcing decision was part tion gathering function from the analysts has also given
of an overall strategic review of operations. The role of more responsibility to the information professionals.
the investment banking analysts, whose duties had includ- Since they now interact more with senior bankers, the
ed a significant amount of information gathering, was of members of the New York staff receive enhanced finan-
special concern. One result of Bear Stearns’ push into cial training.
(Continues on page 11)
outsourcing was to allow these junior bankers to spend
more time doing financial analysis, as well as reducing
costs by removing expensive information products from
their desktop. No jobs have been lost in the Business
Information Group since the outsourcing project went

ChapterNews 10 Vol. 75, #4 Winter 2003-2004

 (Continued from page 10)
Working with the outsourced staff in India was both a
challenge and an opportunity for the staff in New York. your life
Bear Stearns went to seven day a week staffing, and addi-
tional temp staff was hired to work the late shift and
weekends. As the outsourcing project became more active,
members of the New York staff became mentors to the
Simplify by using
EBSCO.
Place all your serials
staff in India. Training was done in two steps. Mr. Medley orders through one
went to India, training the staff there in basic investment company and receive
one itemized invoice.
banking databases such as Factiva and Investext. At that
No more dealing
point they started to do shadow research projects which with multiple pub-
were reviewed for six months by the New York staff. In lishers, invoices or
a second trip to India, Ms. Walsh and another staff mem- payments. EBSCO
ber instructed the Indian researchers in the more difficult has been successfully
financial databases such as Factset and Securities Data. serving the library
community for almost
They also identified one person in India to be their liai- 60 years.
son. The program is considered to be a success.
Let EBSCO put its
Tom Fearon reviewed Lehman’s experience with the experience and
process of evaluating an outsourcing initiative. First Mr. resources to work to
Fearon went over the major vendor companies which simplify your serials
provide outsourcing services in India. He then described management tasks.
some of the issues which needed to be resolved. Vendor
data and technology licenses had to be negotiated. IT
security issues had to be determined. Quality measures www.ebsco.com
had to be prepared. Outsourced vendor researchers had 205.991.6600 CUSTOMERFOCUSED CONTENTDRIVEN
to be integrated with the New York staff. Cost savings
had to be measured.
Lehman started the applied part of the project this sum-
mer with 250 representative requests assigned to the
outsourced staff in India. The outsourcing vendor per-
formed well, and the next step was to integrate the Indian
researchers with the New York staff. While Lehman has
not yet made a final decision as to the scope of their com-
mitment to outsourcing, Mr. Fearon is convinced a low-
cost offshore research model is here to stay. He concluded
by noting that almost all the Wall Street firms are looking
at outsourcing various functions at some level, to reduce
costs. It is necessary for information professionals to be
in the forefront of analyzing and implementing outsourc-
ing relationships, since research, content, training and
licensing skills are essential in establishing a successful
outsourcing operation.

Rita Schaffer is the principal of her own company, Morning-

side Information Consultants, which specializes in providing
business research services to small companies. Before that she
had worked as a researcher and administrator in the financial
services industry for over twenty years. She can be reached
at rschaffer@morningsideic.com

ChapterNews 11 Vol. 75, #4 Winter 2003-2004

 CHAPTER ANNOUNCEMENTS
CHAPTER ANNOUNCEMENTS
SLA-NY Student Scholarship
Winner Announced
Lucy Lettis Speaks Margaret A. Smith, a library student at Pratt University, is the
Lucy Lettis, SVP and Director of Business Intelligence at recipient of the Fall 2003 SLA-NY Student Scholarship. Margaret
Marsh Inc., was the keynote speaker at the “Information Profes- won a $1,500 scholarship based on an essay, a letter from her fac-
sional Congress” held in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, October 2, ulty advisor and her GPA.
2003. The congress is sponsored annually by the Dutch magazine, Margaret is the Research Director at D.F. King & Co., a proxy
Informatie Professional. This year’s conference theme was “Steering solicitation firm. She has been employed there for 24 years. Mar-
a Course in Stormy Weathers,” with a focus on how strategic utiliza- garet is mid-way through her MLS degree and hopes to graduate
tion of business and competitive intelligence can help organizations in June 2005.
successfully combat challenges of operating in a down economy.
A student member of SLA, Margaret notes, “SLA has been an
Ms. Lettis’s presentation was entitled “Moving Up the Value Chain.”
amazing boon to me in my pursuit of growth and learning. Last
Conference attendees included research and knowledge directors
year, thanks to the SLA listserv, I was able to take my son and go
from global professional services firms, financial institutions, law firms,
on a teaching assignment to Southwest China – all expenses and a
the European Parliament, government ministries and academia.
stipend were paid. One of the most amazing vacations I have ever
taken.”
Congratulations and best of luck to Margaret!
Increase in Hiring of Corporate The Student Scholarship is awarded twice a year: at Career Day in
Librarians/Sarah Warner Quoted the spring and at the Professional/Student Mixer in the fall. For
New York Chapter member Sarah Warner of Wontawk was more information, please go to the SLA-NY website
quoted recently in an article titled, “The Hiring Tide Turns for (www.sla.org/chapter/cny) and click on “Students.”
Corporate Librarians,” by Perri Capell (http://www.careerjour-
nal.com/salaryhiring/industries/librarians/20031022-capell.html).
The article notes that demand for corporate librarians is on an
upswing, according to recruiters. Sarah Warner acknowledges that
Welcome New Members
hiring is up, particularly in pharmaceutical, medical and law By Sarah Warner - Membership Chair
libraries. Other industries seeing increased activity include the
executive search industry. Again, we are very pleased to welcome all of you as new or return-
Making the job search a little more challenging for librarians is the ing members to the New York Chapter. We look forward to
fact that position titles may not have the word “librarian” in them. meeting you personally at the various Chapter events such as the
More positions are often found under “information specialist” or Virtual Seminars and Chapter meetings during the year. Please
“knowledge manager,” says Rachel Singer Gordon, webmaster of contact any of the Board or Advisory Council with any questions
LISjobs.com. or if you would like to volunteer to assist with Chapter activities.
The Chapter Career Day is taking place in the Spring and volun-
According to Sarah, salaries in the corporate librarian profession
teers are needed.
remained the same in 2003 and the news isn’t promising regarding
bonuses this year. Anna Arzrumtsyan Amanda Hollister- Joanna Samperi
Janice Lachance, the executive director of the Special Libraries Henry Baker Patricia Humphreys Anne Schlitt
Association, was quoted in the same article, noting “there’s defi- Edward Kirtz Gayle Snible
Melissa Camp
nitely a change in the climate for the employment of corporate Natalya Kovalenko Ann Spahitz
Diana Carey
librarians.” Ann Kyrkostas Suzette Spencer
Jocelyn Castillo
For more information, go to www.careerjournal.com. Anne Marie Clift Rachel James Walther
Emily Crowell Mathieu-Leo Kathleen Wilko

Kevin De Vorsey Jennifer Nadeau Yuxin Yang

Jennifer Yao
Ling Named Assistant Editor Vija Doks Jean Ogrinz
Annmarie Zell
Brenda Ling has volunteered to be the Assistant Editor for Chap- Janice Easton-Epner Lynn Parliman
terNews. In that capacity, she provides valuable support editing Hinda Greenberg John Peverley
articles submitted for publication. Inna Routgauzer
Brenda has been a member of SLA for over ten years. She most
recently worked at JPMorgan Chase and is currently chair of her
condominium’s Internet committee.

ChapterNews 12 Vol. 75, #4 Winter 2003-2004

SLA-NY
Holiday Party Has It All
By Sharon Mosenkis

e descended the grand, curving staircase. We

W partied. We ooh-ed and aah-ed over the dramatic

displays of exquisite crafts. We listened to live
jazz and seasonal music. We renewed old acquaintances
and networked with new colleagues. All in all, the New York
Chapter’s annual holiday party, held December 10, 2003
at the Museum of Arts and Design, was better than ever.
The Museum, at 40 West 53rd Street, was a beautiful
and central location for the annual party. Apparently a
lot of our members thought so as well. Tom Pellizzi,
Chapter President-Elect and Program Chair, reported that
RSVPs for this year’s party were up 50% over last year.
Tom also reported that, due to his “friend in high places,”
(Holly Hotchner, Director of the Museum), our organi-
zation was given an unusually generous discount on the
rate for using the Museum’s meeting room. The room,
by the way, also contained selections from the Museum’s
collection on its walls. In addition to sponsoring the event, NetScribes gave out
Many thanks are due to Tom and his program committee: several generous raffle gifts. They also said they would
David Man, Leigh Hallingby and Vicki Dawson. David give ten free hours of research to any SLA member who
took on the duties of RSVP coordination and name tag requests it. To take NetScribes up on this offer, contact
production. We know there are many more details that Sayan at the U.S. headquarters in Bethesda: 301-469-8410
they attended to so that we could just relax and enjoy the or at his cell phone number: 240-350-3116. He can also
smoked salmon, the gingerbread men and catching up be reached at sayan@netscribes.com.
with our colleagues. Again many thanks to all involved in creating a warm
The holiday spirit of SLA-NY members showed in the and joyous holiday event for us all.
generosity of giving to the Global Outreach raffle. Rita
Ormsby announced that this project, which supports
Sharon L. Mosenkis is a Consultant in the Healthcare and
libraries in developing countries, raised $262 at the party.
Pharmaceuticals practice at Find/SVP, Inc. She specializes in
Chapter President Agnes Mattis reminded attendees that advising executives on healthcare industry trends and new
Chapter member Pam Rollo is running for the SLA pres- product development in the pharmaceutical industry. Prior to
idency, another reason to be proud of the caliber and joining FIND/SVP, she was Manager of Information Services for
commitment of our members. GE Capital’s Financial Guaranty Insurance Co. She also man-
aged business and competitive research at American Cyanamid
The event was sponsored by NetScribes, a research and
Company (now Wyeth). Sharon holds an MLS from Rutgers
information outsourcing organization. Representing University and BA from the University of Wisconsin.
NetScribes at the party were CEO Sourav Mukherjee,
who had traveled from Mumbai, India to attend, and
Vice President Sayan Bhattacharjee, who is based in
Bethesda, MD. Both gentlemen enjoyed the evening.
They are firmly committed to being part of the informa-
tion community and are in the information services busi-
ness for the long haul. The New York area is presently
their largest market.

ChapterNews 13 Vol. 75, #4 Winter 2003-2004

Legislative Alert
he government has reacted to the corporate scandals
T that have plagued us all by enacting legislation to
protect our interests. Within the library community,
some of that legislation, both enacted and proposed, may
have serious implications for libraries. Below is a brief
summary of that legislation and how it is affecting the
daily activities being carried out in our nations’ libraries.
We would like to thank Jim Smith, Vice President and
Director of Corporate & Special Libraries at EBSCO
Information Services, who called attention to the following
updates on legislation affecting libraries and information
professionals:
Database Protection Bill
Introduced in the House
On October 8, Representative Howard Coble (R-NC)
introduced HR 3261, the “Database and Collections of
Information Misappropriation Act.” On October 16, the
bill was approved by the House Judiciary Committee
Subcommittee on Courts, the Internet, and Intellectual
Property. According to an October 17 Chronicle of
Higher Education article, “the legislation is expected to
pass the full Judiciary committee next week, but could
encounter considerably more opposition from members
of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce.”
The bill establishes conditions under which a person
is prohibited from taking a “quantitatively substantial”
part of the information in a database and making it
commercially available. The library community and
other opponents believe that the bill could allow database
producers to maintain perpetual ownership rights in a
wide variety of data.
The bill does allow educational institutions to make sub-
stantial parts of databases available as long as the use is
for nonprofit educational purposes. A draft version of the
bill would have allowed the courts to decide if this use
was “reasonable under the circumstances.” The new ver-
sion of the bill states that “no liability shall be imposed
under this act” on higher-education and research institutions
or their employees.
ALA and other opponents of the bill maintain that exist-
ing laws are sufficient to protect the interest of
database producers. The bill fails to address fair use, to
include the “first sale” doctrine, to allow for the transfor-
mative use of the information, or to provide any safeguards
for monopolistic pricing.
ChapterNews
The Chronicle of Higher Education article stated that
LEGISLATIVE ALERT
Representative Rick Boucher (D-VA), “an outspoken
critic of this bill, offered four amendments to the mea-
sure that were defeated. One of them would have
expanded the liability exemption to include libraries.”
Action Needed:
Ask members of the House Judiciary Committee to
defeat HR 3261. Call the U.S. Capitol switchboard at
(202) 224-3121.
For a list of committee members, please visit
http://www.house.gov/judiciary/members.htm.
For more information about database protection legisla-
tion, please visit http://www.ala.org/Content/Naviga-
tionMenu/Our_Association/Offices/ALA_Washington/Is
sues2/Copyright1/Database_Protection_Legislation/Dat
abase_Protection_Legislation.htm.
SAFE Act Introduced
Senators Larry Craig (R-ID) and Richard Durbin
(D-IL) introduced S 1709, “The Security and Freedom
Ensured (SAFE) Act of 2003.” This bill would curb the
broad powers allowed to law enforcement by the Patriot
Act.—The bill, which has bipartisan support, would
amend the Patriot Act in the following ways:
▲ restore privacy protections for library records;
▲ exempt libraries from national security letters, which
are nonjudicial subpoenas issued internally in the FBI;
▲ add oversight provisions to the Justice Department’s
request for records from libraries and bookstores;
▲ extend the sunset provisions of the Patriot Act; and
▲ provide other civil liberties protections.
Action Needed:
Please make an effort to contact your senators to ask for
their support of this bill. It is especially important to
continue to gather the support of Republican senators.
The Capitol Switchboard number is (202) 224-3121.
For more information about the Patriot Act, please visit
http://www.ala.org/patriotfix.
(Alert continues on page 15)
14 Vol. 75, #4 Winter 2003-2004
 (Continued from page 16)
President Signs Reauthorization Act; Survey Reveals

Action Still Needed
On September 25, President George W. Bush signed into
law HR 13, the “Museum and Library Services Act of
2003.” This law, which is now Public Law 108-81, funds
library programs, including the Library Services and
Technology Act (LSTA).
Conferees have been appointed for the FY 2004 Labor,
Health and Human Services, and Education Appropriations
bills. It is expected that these conferees will meet in
the next few weeks to determine the final numbers for
programs in the bill, which affects library funding.
Action Needed:
Please contact the conferees and ask them to:
▲ fund library programs (LSTA) in the Museum and
Library Services Act at the newly authorized level of
$232 million; and
▲ fund the Improving Literacy Through School
Libraries program at the House level of $27.5 million.
Conferees on the FY2004,
Labor HHS Education Appropriations bills are:
Senate:
Arlen Specter (R-PA); Thad Cochran (R-MS);
Jud Gregg (R-NH); Larry Craig (R-ID);
Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX); Ted Stevens (R-AK);
Mike DeWine (R-OH); Richard Shelby (R-AL);
Pete Domenici (R-NM); Tom Harkin (D-IA);
Ernest Hollings (D-SC); Daniel Inouye (D-HI);
Harry Reid (D-NV); Herb Kohl (D-WI);
Patty Murray (D-WA); Mary Landrieu (D-LA);
and Robert Byrd (D-WV).
LEGISLATIVE ALERT
FBI Visited Libraries in California
▲ A statewide survey conducted this summer by the
California Library Association (CLA) reveals that
since September 11, 2001, FBI agents have formally
contacted 14 libraries with requests for patron-record
information. This information was released after the
Department of Justice (DOJ) released a memo stating
that Section 215 of the Patriot Act has never been
invoked to access records of patrons’ library use.
▲ It is possible that the FBI visits were not covered by
Section 215 of the Patriot Act. Because it is a felony to
reveal the location of a Section 215 contact, the survey
did not ask for that information from the respondents.
▲ Although some in the library community and some
legislators have questioned the assertions of the DOJ
memo, a DOJ spokesperson dismissed as “laughable”
the idea that Attorney General John Ashcroft had
falsified reports.
For more information on the CLA survey, please visit
http://www.ala.org/Content/NavigationMenu/Products_and_Pu
blications/Periodicals/American_Libraries/Current_news/News_
archive/2003/September_2003/California_Survey_Reveals_FBI_
Visited_16_Libraries.htm.

House:
Ralph Regula (R-OH); Ernest Istook (R-OK);
Roger Wicker (R-MS); Anne Northup (R-KY);
Randy Cunningham (R-CA); Kay Granger (R-TX);
John Peterson (R-PA); Don Sherwood (R-PA);
Dave Weldon (R-FL); Mike Simpson (R-ID);
C.W. Bill Young (R-FLA); David Obey (D-WI);
Steny Hoyer (D-MD); Nita Lowey (D-NY);
Rosa DeLauro (D-CT); Jesse Jackson Jr. (D-IL);
Patrick Kennedy (D-RI); and Lucille Roybal-Allard (CA).

ChapterNews 15 Vol. 75, #4 Winter 2003-2004

Knowledge Services:
Strategic (Performance-Centered)
Learning: A Double Opportunity
for Specialist Librarians
by Guy St. Clair
nowledge Services is the new profession evolving
K from the convergence of information management,
knowledge management, and strategic (perfor-
mance-centered) learning. As I’ve stated before in these
columns, it’s a profession made up of many knowledge
workers, from many different professions, disciplines,
and types of work. In my opinion, though, it is specialist
librarians who are best qualified for leading knowledge
services in their organizations. These knowledge workers
are the ones who are most directly committed to Knowl-
edge Development/Knowledge Sharing (KD/KS) in
the workplace. KD/KS is the defining characteristic of
knowledge services, and it’s the specific professional
expertise that specialist librarians bring to their work.
For many of us, the hardest element of knowledge ser-
vices, the one we have the most difficulty “getting our
arms around,” as some would put it, is strategic (perfor-
mance-centered) learning. Unlike the folks who come
from backgrounds that are not information- or library-
focused, we specialist librarians practice strategic learning
all the time. It, too, is part of our professional expertise
(although generally unacknowledged as such, as we don’t
necessarily think of ourselves as being affiliated with the
educational community, or as teachers, per se). For the
people who come from general management back-
grounds, or from a subject specialization, it’s the knowl-
edge management “piece” of knowledge services that is
the major challenge. Not so for specialist librarians. As
with information management, we’ve been comfortably
providing knowledge management for our clients for
many decades, although we didn’t call it that.
Strategic (performance-centered) learning is a little dif-
ferent. First of all, the definition of strategic learning (or
training, or development, or whatever it’s called in the
company or organization where you work) requires that
such learning be application-based, and relate directly to
how it will be used. That requirement is built into the
definition that I generally use when I speak about strate-
gic (performance-centered) learning: the successful
achievement of skills, competencies, knowledge behav-
iors, and/or other outcomes required for excellence in
workplace performance.
ChapterNews
As it turns out, that attention to learning has relevance in
the specialized libraries community, although most of us
who work as specialist librarians don’t think of ourselves as
teachers. Most knowledge workers employed in special-
ized libraries find that they are required to provide the
information itself, not provide direction in how to find
the information, or instruction in how to use the tools
that lead to the information.
Yet this is not always the case, not in every situation in
which a specialist librarian is approached. On those occa-
sions when we are invited to give our clients assistance with
using a particular tool or information source, or when it is
the role of the specialized library to provide such direction,
the first opportunity for strategic learning comes into play.
There are a variety of such situations, and each and every
one of us has a large repertory of techniques and activi-
ties that enable us to provide strategic (performance-cen-
tered) learning. They can be as simple and easy to organize
as our profession’s famous “brown-bag” lunches, those
informal and usually pretty delightful occasions when we
invite our clients to come to the information center to
have a demonstration and/or participate in a discussion of a
new tool or search technique, or to hear us enthuse about
some new concept or idea we want them to know about.
On the other hand, our strategic learning offerings can be
(and often are) more formal, such as the training sessions
we put together, either on our own or with the coopera-
tion of our vendors and suppliers. Larger specialized
libraries, in fact, are now frequently committing consid-
erable resources to the support of dedicated staff (some-
times part-time, sometimes substantially more) hired
specifically to organize, manage, and implement strategic
learning programs as part of the library or information
center’s established service offerings.
Such activities are usually designed to help our customers
get up to speed in the utilization of a particular database,
or to provide hands-on (and, preferably, project-related)
instruction in using particular tools provided through
the library or information center. In some cases, though,
these more formal training activities can be as broad-based
as providing user education relating to the differences
between a specialized research library and the types of
libraries the customers may have been accustomed to in
their past research work. Or they can be as simple as pro-
viding users with information about their responsibilities
with respect to such subjects as ILL/document delivery
(including such things as addressing user expectations
with respect to turnaround time, etc.), or the role of the
service level agreement and its relationship to research
success. Finally, in the grander scheme of things, man-
agers of specialized research libraries — particularly in
the humanities and social sciences — often find them
(Continues on page 17)
16 Vol. 75, #4 Winter 2003-2004
 (Continued from page 16)
selves responsible for very formally organized programs,
such things as lecture series, authors’ or experts’ visits,
and the like. All of these activities, in one way or another,
relate to our role as a learning provider.
Yet the new knowledge services profession also provides
specialist librarians with another opportunity for strategic
learning, and it is one we still haven’t quite taken advantage
of, not to the extent that we could. This opportunity is
found in the “connection-collaboration-constructive
cooperation” idea written about in a previous column,
when the role of the specialized library as the organiza-
tional knowledge nexus was discussed. In the larger orga-
nization with which the specialized library or information
center is affiliated, learning is going on all the time. This
learning (all of it, safe to say, being strategic by definition)
provides a wonderful opportunity for the people who best
understand the role of learning in the organization — the
specialist librarians — to take on a leadership role. The
opportunity is there, and we should take advantage of it.
Of course it can’t happen overnight. To be an active partner
in the organization’s larger training and development
effort requires managers in the information center to have
a desire to go this route, to have an understanding of what
their department can contribute to the larger organiza-
tional learning effort. These managers must also under-
stand the culture of the organization and understand it
clearly and without sentiment, or romanticizing the role
of the library in the organization. When these two basic
requirements are met, and if there is indeed a desire to
move in this direction and to establish a “learning” rela-
tionship between the specialized library and the larger
organization, there are several initial steps to be taken:
▲ Identify the organizational structure for strategic
(performance-centered) learning. Is there a central
training and development unit (in larger organizations,
this is often connected with the Human Resources
Department)? Or is learning and training ad hoc,
conducted on an “as-needed” basis?
▲ Know who’s in charge of strategic learning. If the
function is centralized, identify the manager with
strategic learning responsibility and establish a relation-
ship. Go slowly and gently, and listen to what’s being
done (as well as – when the time is right – sharing your
own thoughts and ideas). Be prepared to support your
assertion that the specialized library or information
center has a viable role as an organizational “knowledge
services” center. For the moment forget about the
benefits to the library. Think about what’s in it for the
larger organization. Or what’s in it for the unit that
currently has training and development responsibility.
ChapterNews
▲ If it’s an ad hoc situation, identify two or three units in
the organization where there are distinct and identified
needs for better strategic learning. Perhaps you’ve
heard one of the other managers commenting about
some performance weakness in his or her staff. Perhaps
some managers are complaining about how much money
is required for training and development. Listen to what’s
being discussed, with respect to strategic (performance-
centered) learning. As the organization’s expert in the
field, you can make suggestions and — if you’re so
inclined — use your department to work cooperatively
in solving particular problems in other units.
There are, obviously, distinct advantages for the special-
ized library or information center, and because we spe-
cialist librarians already have a good understanding of
the advantages of strategic learning in the organization,
these don’t need to be detailed at this point. You know
you’ll get higher visibility in the organization, that your
department’s reputation for providing solutions will be
better recognized, and, best of all, you and your staff will
be able to expand your service sphere. What more could
you want, as a conscientious specialized librarian and
enterprise leader in the larger organization? It’s a classic
“win-win” situation.
Guy St. Clair is Consulting Specialist, Knowledge Management
and Learning, SMR International, New York, NY. He is the author
of Beyond Degrees: Professional Learning for Knowledge Services,
published by K.G. Saur. A past president of the Special Libraries
Association and of the New York Chapter, St. Clair actively
solicits readers’ responses to this column. He can be reached
at GuyStClair@cs.com.
17 Vol. 75, #4 Winter 2003-2004
 SLA NY BOARD MEMBERS
Meet the Board and the PRESIDENT-ELECT – Thomas Pellizzi
Thomas Pellizzi is a founding partner of InfoSpace
Advisory Council Consultants, which he established in 1987 to provide
design consultation and project management services
for specialized libraries and information centers.
He also consults on document management issues.
Tom has designed specialized libraries and information
ccasionally, one will read a bold-faced name in

O ChapterNews or receive an email announcement from

a board/advisory council member and wonder, “Who
IS this person and what exactly does s/he do in SLA?”
centers for a prestigious group of clients within the NY
Chapter and elsewhere. He has an outstanding reputation
for designing functionally effective and space-efficient
libraries.
We thought this would be a good time to introduce our-
Tom has also been active in the NY Chapter for several
selves and tell you a little bit about what we do in SLA
years, first as Mid-town lunch (and breakfast) co-Chair,
and outside the library.
followed by Director of Publications (and interim
ChapterNews Editor). Currently he is President Elect of
Board Members the NY Chapter, and responsible for organizing Chapter
programs. Tom was also co-Chair of Programs for the
PRESIDENT – Agnes Mattis
Leadership and Management Division at the Annual
Agnes K. Mattis is the Head of the Corporate Library at Conference in New York City this year.
the international law firm of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher
Tom has a B.A. in Economics from Rutgers College,
& Flom LLP in New York, NY (1998-). Prior to joining
New Brunswick, New Jersey.
Skadden, Arps, Agnes was the library manager at San-
tander Investment Securities (1996-1998); head librarian SECRETARY – Andrew Gazzale
at Brown Brothers Harriman & Co. (1982-1995); and a
Andrew Gazzale is the head librarian for the New York
reference librarian at Ernst & Whinney (1980-1982) and
Investment Banking Library at Jefferies & Company, Inc.
Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette: (1977-1980).
Prior to Jefferies, Andrew was director of the Business
Agnes has an M.L.S from Pratt Institute (1978) and Information Center at Arthur Andersen. Andrew received
a B.A. from York College (1975). his MLS from Pratt Institute and is currently serving as
She has been an extremely active SLA member since 1979: Secretary of the New York Chapter.
SLA Chapter Activities: New York Chapter: past presi-
dent (1994-1995); president (2002-2004), (1992-1994); TREASURER – Susan Gormley
secretary (1991-1992); treasurer (1997-1999) Ways & Susan Gormley is a Manager of the Business Information
Means committee chair (1999-2000); employment com- Center at The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., and is the
mittee chair (1995-1996); nominating committee chair current Treasurer of SLA-NY. Susan has been active for
(1996-1997); membership committee chair (1990-1991); several years with SLA-NY in various positions, includ-
Northeast Regional Conference Steering Committee ing Membership, Downtown and Midtown Luncheons,
member (1992-1994); Northeast Regional Conference and Chapter Secretary. She’s also a current member of
Fundraising committee chair (1992-1994). The Conference Board’s Information Services Advisory
SLA Division Activities: Business and Finance Division: Council.
Seattle Conference chair and program planner (1996-1997); Susan earned an M.S. in Library Service from Columbia
chair-elect (1995-1996); awards committee chair University. Her hobbies include theatre, and inline skating.
(1997-1998); nominating committee chair (1998-1999). (Board list continues on page 19)
Legal; Library Management; and Museum, Arts and
Humanities Division: member.
SLA Association-level Activities: Finance committee
member (1996-1999); Conference Committee Chair
(New York Conference) 2001-2003)conference planning
committee member (Boston Conference) (1994-1996).
In 1995 and again in 2003, Agnes was awarded the
New York Chapter Distinguished Service award.
Agnes lives in Cranford, NJ with her husband of 20
years, Rick. They enjoy travelling and entertaining.
ChapterNews 18 Vol. 75, #4 Winter 2003-2004
 (Continued from page 18)
DIRECTOR OF FINANCE – Lilleth Newby
Lilleth Newby is Library Director at the Public Health
Library of the New York City Department of Health &
Mental Hygiene. She started eight years ago at what was
then the HIV Resource Library which was expanded to the
Public Health library in 2002. Lilleth has been a librarian
for thirty-nine years. After graduating from the Universi-
ty of the West Indies with a B.A. in Library Studies, she
started working with the Jamaica Library Service. In 1993
she received her M.L.S. from St. John’s University.
Lilleth has been very active in the SLA New York Chapter
since the early 1990s and has worked in various capacities
such as Library School Liaison for two terms during
which she developed the first brochures geared toward
library school students in the NY metro area. She has
also worked on such committees as Outreach and Diversity
Leadership. In 2000 she was awarded a Certificate of
Recognition form the Chapter as well as an SLA Diversity
Leadership Development Award from the Association.
Lilleth is presently in her second year on the Chapter’s
Board as Director of Finance responsible for compiling
the budget.
DIRECTOR OF PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT
– Steven Johnson
Steve Johnson manages the Bronx Zoo Library of the
Wildlife Conservation Society, where he has worked
since 1979. He is a graduate of the library school of the
University of Wisconsin-Madison. He also earned an
M.A. in American history at Wisconsin. In 2002,
ChapterNews published his article “Growing an ejournal
collection at the Bronx Zoo Library” 74(3):11-14.
In 2003, he spoke on zoo archives at the mid-west
regional workshop of the American Zoo and Aquarium
Association. From time to time, he posts writings on a
personal website, www.westnet.com/~sjohnson/toc.htm
Steve is convener of SLA’s Natural History Caucus and a
member of the advisory council of NYLINK, the New York
State regional affiliate of the OCLC library network.
He lives in Yonkers with his wife, Allegra Hamer, and an
Airedale terrier and two cats. Bicycling is his main hobby.
ChapterNews
SLA NY BOARD MEMBERS
DIRECTOR OF PUBLICATIONS – Michael Gruenberg
I have been selling information products to libraries for
almost 25 years. In that time, I have called on Corporate,
Legal, University and Public Libraries. My career began
with a job selling microfiche copies of SEC documents
for a company called Disclosure. I had the great pleasure
to be there for 20 years. After leaving Disclosure, I worked
for a UK-based company selling analysis of country risk.
For the last three years, I have been with OneSource
Information Services. I am in the Financial Services ver-
tical where my responsibility is to represent the company
to the major Investment Banks.
Throughout my years at Disclosure, we strongly supported
the efforts of SLA. When I was asked to be Director of
Publications for ChapterNews of the New York chapter,
I accepted the position for two reasons. 1. It gave me the
opportunity to give something back to SLA which has
been so good to me over the years. 2. It also gave me the
opportunity to work with two of my friends, Agnes Mattis
and Andrew Gazzale, who I have known for many years.
Not surprisingly, the other Board members are just as
delightful as Agnes and Andrew.
As Director of Publications, I coordinate the efforts of
the staff that tirelessly produce ChapterNews. Jennifer,
Shirley, Kevin, Nancy and I continually strive to give the
membership the best possible publication. Whether it’s a
discussion on obtaining ads from vendors, getting a
member to write an article or simply critiquing a design
idea, we all try to be available and helpful to one another.
What’s interesting to me is that we have set no rules or
regulations as to how we will accomplish our tasks and
yet we have produced three issues of ChapterNews with a
minimum of difficulty and a maximum of efficiency.
Our commitment is to provide the membership with
content that is both helpful and informative. Remember,
this is YOUR publication and we welcome your ideas
and comments.
(Continues on page 20)
19 Vol. 75, #4 Winter 2003-2004
 (Continued from page 19)
Advisory Council:
ARCHIVES – Ellen Miller
Ellen Miller has been a member of the New York Chapter
for over 30 years and has held almost every major office
in the Chapter during that time. She has twice served
as President of the Chapter and, most recently, was the
Chair of the Local Arrangements Committee for this
year’s annual conference. She spent her career managing
a variety of investment banking and consulting libraries,
most recently at J.P.Morgan, from which she retired in
1999. Since then she has worked part-time as a library
consultant and begun to learn the joys of gardening since
moving to the suburbs.
ARRANGEMENTS – Leigh Hallingby
Leigh Hallingby, Arrangements Chair, holds a BA in
political science from Wellesley College, a Master’s in
Social Work (MSW) from the University of Pennsylvania,
and an MS in Library Service from Columbia University.
She has been working as a special librarian since 1979,
setting up and managing new libraries for the following
five non-profit organizations: Sexuality Information and
Education Council of the U.S. (SIECUS), National Center
for Children in Poverty at Columbia University’s School
of Public Health, National Center on Addiction and
Substance Abuse at Columbia University (CASA), Drug
Policy Alliance, and Soros Foundations/Open Society
Institute. Leigh also served as the Psychology Librarian
at Columbia University for two years. Leigh has been
active with the Association of Population/Family Planning
Libraries and Information Centers (APLIC), Substance
Abuse Librarians and Information Specialists (SALIS),
and Special Libraries Association (SLA). Outside work,
Leigh has been active for many years with the National
Organization for Women (NOW) and Shelter Our Sisters
(local domestic violence services agency in Bergen County,
NJ). She enjoys collecting porcelain in the Indian Tree
pattern, soaking up NYC cultural activities, and traveling.
AWARDS – Andrew Berner
Andrew Berner is Library Director and Curator of
Collections at The University Club, where he as been on
the Library staff since 1982. He administers not only the
world’s largest private club library (with a sizable rare
book collection), but also a significant art collection
including numerous paintings, sculptures and prints.
Andrew has served the New York Chapter in many
capacities, including a stint as Chapter President (1995-96).
He is currently serving as Awards Chair. Andrew is honored
that this past June, at the New York Conference, he was
named a Fellow of the Special Libraries Association.
Last year he wrote the entry on “Rare Book Collections”
ChapterNews
SLA NY ADVISORY COUNCIL
for the 2nd edition of the Encyclopedia of Library and
Information Science. (New York: Marcel Dekker, Inc.
2002). Andrew loves to travel, some of which he gets to
do as part of his job, while the remainder is purely
recreational. He loves New York (and is a native) and
likes few things better than showing it off to visiting friends.
BUSINESS AND FINANCE GROUP CHAIR
– Richard Riccomini
Rick Riccomini is a vice president of Business Information
Services at Lehman Brothers.
He has a BS from Binghamton University School of
Management and an MSLS from Long Island University,
Palmer School. He is currently managing Lehman
Brothers Financial Data Services (FDS) and Business
Information Systems Groups.
Rick is married with two children.
CAREER DAY – Robin Sanders
Robin Sanders is the new Cybrary Manager at TIAA-
CREF. As the 2004 Chair for SLA-NY Career Day, she
is responsible for organizing the annual career day event.
When not working, she enjoys spending time with her
family, friends, and her dog Miranda.
CHAPTERNEWS EDITOR – Jennifer Kellerman
Jennifer is a Corporate Reference Librarian at Paul Weiss
Rifkind Wharton & Garrison. This is her first year as
ChapterNews editor. She’s responsible for soliciting, edit-
ing, and sometimes writing, pieces for ChapterNews. She
also serves as co-chairperson for the Global Outreach
Committee.
Jennifer has an MSLS from the University of
North Carolina-Chapel Hill and a BA from
New School University.
CHAPTERNEWS ADVERTISING MANAGER
– Nancy Bowles
Nancy Bowles has two roles on the New York Chapter
Advisory Council: Ways and Means Chairperson and
Advertising Manager for Chapter News. Currently, she
is a Consultant. From 1997-2002, she was a Director and
Head of Information Services in the Americas for UBS
A. G. Prior to that, she spent many years at Dillon, Read
& Co. Inc. where she was Vice President and Head of
the Library. While at Dillon Read, she also arranged for
the publication of a history of the firm: The Life and
Times of Dillon Read, by Robert Sobel. Nancy can be
reached at: 235 East 22nd Street, New York, N. Y. 10010;
tel.: 212 679 7088; e-mail: nancy.bowles@verizon.net.
(Council list continues on page 21)
20 Vol. 75, #4 Winter 2003-2004
 (Continued from page 20)
DISCUSSION LIST MANAGER – Michael Rivas
Michael’s face may be unfamiliar to some, but his email
address (mrivas@gis.net) is recognizable chapter-wide.
As the New York Chapter’s Discussion List Manager,
Michael Rivas keeps members aware of upcoming meetings,
special events, and important issues that affect them as
SLA librarians. This is his second year on the Advisory
Board as List Manager. Having spent much of his career
in electronic information management, he is now with
H.W. Wilson as a Subject Analyst helping to build their
authority file/thesaurus. When he’s not busy organizing
information, you may find him enjoying long nature
hikes upstate or reading 20th century European classics.
DIVERSITY - Vandana Ranjan
Vandana is an excellent researcher and trainer, well- known
for her quality work and fast service. She was the Knowl-
edge Management Specialist at Bates WorldWide until
October 2003. Prior to that she worked at the Brooklyn
Public Library’s fast-paced Telephone Reference Center.
Vandy has several years of experience in reference and
library management. She worked as a solo librarian in
India and built, from the ground up, two successful
libraries — one academic library and one special library.
She came to the United States in pursuit of online informa-
tion retrieval skills and received her second Master’s in
Library Science from Clarion University of Pennsylvania.
In her spare time she enjoys nature-gazing, biking,
photography and classical music.
This year she is wearing two hats, one as the Chair of
SLA-NY Diversity Leadership Development Committee
and the Co-Chair of SLA-LMD Program Planning
Committee. In the past years, Vandy has chaired the
SLA-Innovations in Technology Award Committee,
co-ordinated the SLA-NY Web Committee, and
managed the SLA-NY Discussion List and the
SLA-ITE Discussion List.
GLOBAL OUTREACH Co-Chairpersons
– Jennifer Kellerman (see ChapterNews)
and Rita Ormsby
Rita Ormsby is a co-chair of the SLA-NY Global
Outreach Committee this year.
By day, she is an information services librarian at The
William and Anita Newman Library of Baruch College,
The City Univeristy of New York. Her main responsibilities
are reference and instruction and serving as the library
liaison to the accountancy and tax faculty. When she is
not working, she enjoys going to museums, and enjoying
other benefits of living in New York, traveling, getting
together with friends and family, and doing some volunteer
work. She thinks about going to the gym more often
than she actually does. Since she is now on the tenure
ChapterNews
SLA NY ADVISORY COUNCIL
track at Baruch, she has to worry about doing research
and publishing. So she spends a lot of time in libraries.
(She has discovered she can’t work at home.) A goal for
the coming year is to have a neater office and a neater home.
GOVERNANCE – Donna Abbaticchio
I am the Associate Chief of the Donnell Library Center at
The New York Public Library. I’ve had many different
roles in the Chapter; currently, I am the Governance
Chair. In the early nineties, I was President of the Chap-
ter. Although my current position is very public library-
oriented, I enjoy still being involved with the chapter
and the friends I have made through the years.
LIBRARY SCHOOL LIAISON – Suzan Lee
Suzan Lee, a Senior Research Librarian with UBS
Securities LLC, is the Library School Liaison for the
NY Chapter of SLA. She runs programs for the student
members of the NY Chapter. Some of the programs
offered include the Professional/Student Mixer, a
resume workshop and review, Student-to-Student
Meetups, the Internship Program, various database
workshops, Speakers Bureau and scholarship programs.
In addition to SLA, she is an Adjunct Professor at
LIU-Palmer School.
MEMBERSHIP – Sarah Warner
Sarah Warner is Director of all Operations at Wontawk,
providing specialized recruitment for librarians and other
information professionals. She is responsible for seeing
that all placements are an optimum match for the
Wontawk clients’ specialized needs.
Previously, bitten by the dot.com bug, Sarah was the
content licensing manager at Amulet, whose InfoWizard
innovative service provided an automated research service.
For over 10 years at high-tech Wang Laboratories in
Massachusetts, she managed and grew the corporate
library operations and researched, wrote and published
competitive analysis reports. Earlier at Parsons Brinckerhoff
Quade and Douglas, an international engineering firm,
Sarah was manager of the information center. Her library
career began as a serials cataloger and a reference librarian
at the Engineering Societies Library here in New York City.
She received her MLIS from Pratt Institute and has been
an active member of Special Libraries Association for
many years, including president of the Boston Chapter
and NY Chapter Treasurer and is currently the Membership
Chair of the New York Chapter.
(Council list continues on page 22)
21 Vol. 75, #4 Winter 2003-2004
 (Continued from page 21)
NOMINATIONS – Martin Cullen
Marty Cullen is a Vice President with Lehman Brothers
managing the Firms’ Patriot Act compliance. In 1993, he
founded Legal Research Services (LRS), Lehman Brothers’
virtual legal library and the Due Diligence Research
Group which has become a model for Wall Street. From
1996-2003 Marty managed Reference Services, Lehman
Brothers global research support group.
He has authored numerous articles and made presentations
on the electronic law library and the management of
information centers. Marty has made presentations to
the Information Innovators Institute, Practising Law
Institute, and SLA.
Marty has served as President of the New York Chapter
of SLA and the Chair of Business & Finance Division of
SLA. He has appeared on the cover of Library Journal
and has been nominated to the Top 100 on Wall Street
for the Irish America magazine for 2004.
Marty has over twenty years experience as an information
manager. He holds an M.L.S. from Pratt Institute and a
B.S. from Bradley University, which he attended on an
athletic scholarship.
ChapterNews
SLA NY ADVISORY COUNCIL
PROGRAMS – Bert Schacter
I have been a library director for more than 25 years,
most recently at Scholastic and earlier in advertising.
I have been an active member in SLA at both division
and local levels, serving on many chapter committees.
This year I am helping with program planning - my role
is to come up with opportunities that will allow subject
groups to continue networking and meeting together on
meaningful issues. I can be reached at 212-242-4459 and
bschachter@earthlink.net and welcome contact with
all my SLA buddies.
WAYS AND MEANS – Nancy Bowles
See ChapterNews Advertising Manager
WEBMASTER – Shirley Loh
Shirley is an Assistant Vice President at Marsh Inc. She
is the Project Manager for the Business Intelligence Unit,
specializing in competitive intelligence research. Shirley
has eight years’ experience doing corporate research.
Shirley took over the SLA-NY webmaster position in
September 2003 and is responsible for the maintenance
and upkeep of the Chapter’s website. She has plenty of
experience in this department as she helped design the
intranet site for Arthur Andersen’s Business Information
Center. Her original exposure to web design was hand-
coding HTML at Rutgers as a graduate student.
When she’s not busy with work or website maintenance,
Shirley likes to travel.
22 Vol. 75, #4 Winter 2003-2004
Librarians good cause and my husband’s good nature would carry
me along.
Making A Difference: Along the way we experienced a great deal of water, mud,
dirt and assorted detritus that flies up toward your face as
MS Bike Tour Provides Personal you ride on a wet surface. We bumped along wet cobble-
Challenge and Raises Funds stones in Harlem, crossed the Borough and started down
by Jessica Frankel the West Side Highway, also closed to traffic. There is a
new perspective riding a bicycle in New York City and
you get to see, smell and taste the city in a whole new way.
The next highlight was traveling through the Lincoln
Tunnel. It’s a bizarre experience to pedal downhill into
redit Suisse First Boston (CSFB), a leading global the tunnel as cyclists are screaming at the top of their

C investment banking and financial services firm, has

recently created an internal initiative for all staff,
referred to as “Building the Franchise.” The program
lungs just for the fun of listening to the echo. Onward,
we rode through New Jersey and north through the Palisades
where the trip became interesting. The flat roads disappeared
and were replaced by rolling hills — lots of them. And a
includes mentoring, volunteerism and service in industry
associations as well as internal committees. The Firm few large hills, I might add. By now the sun started peeking
believes that such participation enhances its ability to through the clouds and we started to sizzle and sweat in
attract and retain talented people and makes CSFB a the heat! Because we were soaking wet, I do believe
better firm in the process. steam rose off our bodies. After 32.5 miles and a soggy
peanut butter and jelly sandwich, the group turned around
The CSFB Libraries have enthusiastically participated at
and, despite one more deluge pelting our bodies, it was
all levels in Firm-sponsored events, sharing experiences
literally all downhill from there. We crossed the George
with their Library colleagues as well as other CSFB staff.
Washington Bridge, a beautiful spot to see the city, and
Recently, a group of New York Library staff members joined
finished at West 14th Street on Pier 54.
others from IT, Product Control and Operations to spend a
Saturday hanging sheetrock as part of a Habitat for Humanity Bob and I each pedaled 65 miles that day and met a great
project in which the Firm participates year round. A few new group of CSFB staff members. The CSFB team
weeks ago our London Library staff baked cakes and surpassed its $20,000 fund-raising goal, making our team
muffins as a contribution to the “World’s Largest Coffee one of the largest contributing teams for the event. It
Morning,” a national event of Macmillan Cancer Relief, was a personal challenge for me (and a personal best)
held in the Library and in various locations around CSFB’s that really boosted my spirits by the end.
Canary Wharf location. CSFB’s catering supplier, I urge everyone to get out there, find a cause, become
Restaurant Associates, donated the coffee and people involved. Others will benefit from your expertise, and
were asked to make donations to the Sargent/ Macmillan I guarantee you will be enriched by the experience.
CSFB London’s 2003 joint charity of the year. The
Library site raised over $500.
Jessica Frankel is the Director and Global Head of Library and
On September 14, 2003, the Firm sponsored a 35 member Information Services at Credit Suisse First Boston. She can be
team (almost exclusively from CSFB) for the MS Bike Tour, reached at jessica.a.frankel@csfb.com.
an annual New York cycling event that raises money for
the National Multiple Sclerosis Society. That morning,
my husband, Bob, and I started the journey from our
home at 5:45 a.m. in a steady rain. We carried our bicycles
up and down two flights of stairs to the #2 train and
joined other intrepid riders heading down to Battery Park.
The ride started at 7:30 a.m. in a foggy mist and we pedaled
north onto an FDR Drive that was closed to traffic.
Bob and I spent six days cycling in Italy this summer, in
the foothills of the Dolomites, but I had only done one
day trip of over 45 miles. On this Sunday, I was committed
to the 60+ mile ride, hoping that my knees/back and/or
my bicycle would not give out in the process. It was a
personal challenge I made for myself, hoping that the

ChapterNews 23 Vol. 75, #4 Winter 2003-2004

Report from IFLA 2003
by Leigh Hallingby
n August 2003, I went to Berlin, Germany, to attend
I IFLA’s 69th (and my first) World Library and Infor-
mation Congress. I was drawn, in part, to see the
famous/infamous city of Berlin, and also to learn more
about The International Federation of Library Associations
and Institutions. Founded in Edinburgh, Scotland, in 1927,
IFLA, according to its website, “is the global voice of the
library and information profession.” IFLA’s mission also
includes promoting high standards of provision and delivery
of library and information services, and encouraging wide-
spread understanding of the value of good library and
information services.
There were in attendance about 4,500 participants from
133 countries, of whom only about 10% were Americans.
The venue for IFLA 2003 was Berlin’s International
Conference Center, which, typical of such edifices, is
long on modernity and efficiency but short on coziness.
The theme of the conference was “Bibliothek als Portal,”
rendered into English somewhat wordily as “Access Point
Libraries — Media, Information, Culture.” Berlin’s sig-
nature Brandenburg Gate, now the symbol of German
reunification, was the conference’s appropriate logo.
There was a plenary opening session at the end of the
first day including addresses by the Mayor of Berlin,
the retiring IFLA President, Christine Deschamps of
France, and keynote speaker Klaus Gerhard Saur of
K.G. Saur Publishing. Generally, the IFLA conference
revolves minimally around huge plenary sessions with
well-known speakers and maximally around many simul-
taneous smaller sessions extending throughout the four
main days. These sessions are divided into themes related
to kinds of libraries, library functions, or geographic areas.
There were also many opportunities to attend conference
activities offsite. I made a point of doing this as often as
possible, as I consider access to wonderful old European
libraries a major attraction of going to a library conference
in Europe. I also took advantage of two other offerings
covered in the registration fee of all conference participants:
a half-day bus tour of Berlin and a visit to one library
I could select from a list of tantalizing possibilities.
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For the latter, I went to the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy
of Sciences and Humanities, which was established in the
18th century and now includes 850,000 volumes and 1,300
journals, plus 150,000 manuscripts of the members of the
Academy. It was fascinating to see samplings from this
unique collection on the period of the Enlightenment and
the history of science, including, for instance, a notebook
in the hand of Albert Einstein.
Since I was actually at IFLA as a private citizen, rather
than under the sponsorship of my employer, I was free
to attend sessions that did not relate to my job running
the library at a foundation dealing with human rights.
So I enjoyed sitting in on the Art Librarians session and
learning about Elsa Buffington, who, as a youthful librarian
at the turn of the 20th century, set up the original library
at the Rhode Island School of Design; about a collection
of photographs of public art taken by a librarian in
Los Angeles (who did the presentation); and about recent
(Continues on page 25)
24 Vol. 75, #4 Winter 2003-2004
 (Continued from page 24)
developments in museum libraries in France. A session
I attended on the theme of reading focused on the positive
impact of the Internet on reading in China, Iran, and
Mexico. In honor of the conference city and of my past
experience running a library on human sexuality, I also
attended a Government Libraries session which included
a presentation on the pioneering Institute for Sexual Science
Library, founded in 1919 in Berlin by the leftist and
early homosexual rights advocate Magnus Hirschfeld.
Its 10,000 books were destroyed by the Nazis in the
1930s. The presentations that I attended varied, as they
usually do at any conference, from crisp and effective,
to excruciatingly detailed and ineffective.
The crème de la crème, by far, of the sessions I attended
was an all-day rare books workshop on “Music collections
in Berlin,” held in the State Library of Berlin/Prussian
Cultural Center. My thinking that Berlin would be an
outstanding venue for a workshop of this type was, not
surprisingly, on target. For instance, in honor of IFLA,
there was a special exhibition of musical scores of many
of the greatest composers such as Bach, Beethoven,
Mendelson, and Mozart. There were speakers on the
holdings in the State Library’s collection, on restoration
and digitization of music manuscripts, and, most fasci-
nating of all, on papersplitting. We saw a film of this
astonishing, heart-stopping process in which one page
of thin, brittle paper, after being chemically treated, can
literally be neatly split into two pages by hand or by
machine. This works because the fiber links in the paper
are weaker (due to acid content, etc.) than the links pro-
duced between the paper and the “carriers” attached to it
in this process with a specially formulated adhesive. The
two halves, after getting a strengthening insert, are then
reattached, dried, and rebound. One huge advantage of
this process is that the front and the back of the page,
where the text is, remain unchanged, but become much
stronger. A stack of pages treated in this manner amaz-
ingly gains so little thickness in the process that it can
usually be put back into its original binding.
ChapterNews
In the afternoon, as part of the same workshop, we were
bussed to the Deutsches Musikarchiv Berlin (German
Music Archive Berlin), located in an old mansion in the
outer reaches of Berlin. It is, among other things, a
depository library, receiving annually one copy of each
of the 20,000 musical recordings (in all formats) released
in Germany. There was a fascinating display for our ben-
efit of all the forms that recorded music has taken, from
vinyl disks to tapes to laser disks to video, etc., culminat-
ing, of course, in the current CD. One could not help
but think that the CD will not be the end of the line
either and will eventually take its place as a stop along
the way to newer technologies. The Archive also buys
special collections from private collectors and perform-
ers. Unfortunately, the Archive’s catalog records do not
go into OCLC.
Berlin Travelogue
Of course, I managed to be in Berlin for the much-publicized
2003 European heatwave and to return to New York for
the much-publicized 2003 blackout. Berlin was mercifully
far from the heatwave’s epicenter, but was plenty toasty
with temps every day in the 80’s or 90’s. However, the
experience was unlike any that I have ever had during a
Northeast U.S. heatwave. The European air was quite
dry (probably 40-50% humidity), which meant that
although the days were seriously hot, the evenings and
mornings were seriously pleasant. The dry air also meant
unfortunately that there would be no rain, an extremely
disturbing situation given the great need for rain in Europe
for growing crops and for quelling fires. Although both
the conference center and my hotel were mercifully air
conditioned, air conditioning remains a relative rarity in
Europe. Generally, libraries, museums, and universities
are not air conditioned, so I couldn’t help but ponder the
fate of books and manuscripts, as well as of people and
crops, in the searing heat.
Berlin is financially broke (due in part to a scandal).
In spite of this, the public transit buses and subways
(none with air conditioning) ran frequently, even though
they were far from full. One wonderful perk of being a
conference attendee was that our badges were also in
effect free Metrocards, giving us full access to the user-
friendly Berlin public transportation system. This local
equivalent of the MTA operates on the honor system in
terms of payment, a great curiosity to a New York rider
like me who cannot fathom such a system here.
(Continues on page 26)
25 Vol. 75, #4 Winter 2003-2004
 (Continued from page 25)
Another curiosity in Berlin, given the lack of money, is
the impressive amount of construction around the city.
One interesting explanation for this is heavy use of black
market laborers from Eastern Europe who are willing to
work for significantly lower wages than the unionized
Germans would demand. Apparently there is considerable
concern in Berlin about how the employment/unemploy-
ment situation will play out when nearby Poland, where
the workers are used to much lower wages than the
Germans, enters the European Union.
Although Berlin is not known as a “river city” – the way
Budapest, London, and Paris are — it turns out that it is
indeed home to the Spree River, which with its accompa-
nying canals, actually takes half a day to navigate on the
equivalent of the Berlin Circle Line tour. This is an
excellent way to see the sprawling city, as the Spree, like
the major city streets, runs East/West right through the
middle of Berlin.
Berlin is a terrific museum town, and I especially appre-
ciated the fact that many of the museums are specialized,
thereby helping the tourist to avoid walking into the
equivalent of the Metropolitan Museum of Art and won-
dering where to even begin. There’s the Pergamon which
has a world class collection of antiquities from Greece,
Rome, and the Muslim world. The Egyptian Museum
rivals the best in that category and is especially famed for
the head of Nefertiti which appeared in Time magazine
the week that I returned. There is the Brohan specializing
in Art Nouveau and Art Deco and the Berggruen across
the street with an impressive collection of Picasso, Matisse,
and Klee. And of course, the newest addition to Berlin’s
museum landscape is the architecturally angular and
exciting Jewish Museum, designed by Daniel Libeskind,
the World Trade Center site designer.
ChapterNews
Conclusion
It is not easy to draw generalizations from a conference
that literally spanned the globe. Freedom and equality of
access to information, as well as freedom of expression,
were pervasive sub-themes throughout. Unfortunately,
there is significant reason for pessimism in these areas.
IFLA just published a report showing that 48 % of
library associations around the world support Internet
filtering – and not just to protect children from unwitting
exposure to pornography. Lively debates also took place
on the impact of the anti-terrorism legislation being
introduced around the world, which often impedes free
access to information. The IFLA Congress approved a
resolution deploring the introduction of legislation that
violates fundamental human rights to privacy and
unhampered access to information in the name of
national security. The resolution calls for the repeal or
amendment of all such legislation in order to protect
these rights. Reporting on a recent visit to Iraq, Jean-Marie
Arnoult, France’s Inspector General of Libraries and the
only librarian on the summer 2003 UNESCO Expert
Mission, showed distressing images of libraries and
archives damaged and destroyed during the war.
But if there are reasons for serious concern, there are
also causes for optimism. The presentations from speakers
at the Reading session indicated that the Internet is making
more information and reading material available to people
in developing countries, especially young people. And if
regime change such as that in Iraq can devastate libraries,
political change in other countries can lead to the develop-
ment of libraries and archives, as has happened in Mali
since the Traoré dictatorship was ousted in 1991.
IFLA will be in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in 2004 and in
Oslo, Norway, in 2005. Attending an IFLA conference is
certainly a highly recommended way to get a global view
of the library and information profession and to see a
world class city in the process. Much more information
about the organization and its conferences can be found
at: www.ifla.org
Leigh Hallingby is Head Librarian at the Soros Foundations/
Open Society Institute in New York City. She can be reached
at lhallingby@sorosny.org
26 Vol. 75, #4 Winter 2003-2004
SLA Virtual Seminars:
New Opportunity for Learning
By Steve Johnson
n 2002, SLA began a series of web-enabled Virtual
I Seminars in order to extend continuing education for
SLA members and other interested parties. The seminar
speaker communicates with the virtual audience via tele-
phone — an 800 number is provided to registrants —
and with PowerPoint slides provided via secure web site.
Audience members can receive the program from any
location with a telephone line permitting 800 calls and
an internet connection.
During the program’s first year, SLA offered eight seminars,
two of them in conjunction with the SLA Annual Conference.
Using a rented conference room at the New York Public
Library’s Science, Industry and Business Library, the
New York Chapter of SLA offered free access to six of
the seminars. The New York Chapter paid registration
fees for each seminar and room rental.
By the end of 2003, SLA will have offered fourteen
programs in the second year of virtual seminars. The
New York Chapter made ten of the programs available to
members, again without charge. As in the previous year,
two of the seminars were held in conjunction with the
SLA annual conference.
For 2004, SLA has announced plans for sixteen seminars.
As I write, your Executive Board is determining how
many seminars to include in the budget for professional
development for calendar 2004.
In the first two years, seminar speakers have included
Guy St. Clair, Rachel Singer Gordon, Jane Dysart, and
Rebecca Jones. Other speakers have come from a
variety of allied fields. A list of past speakers and topics
appears at the end of this column. Speakers already
announced for 2004 include Gary Price, Rebecca Jones,
Mary Lee Kennedy, Donna Scheeder, and Stephen Abram.
ChapterNews
The virtual seminar format makes it possible for SLA
SLA VIRTUAL SEMINARS
to plan and announce new seminars on relatively short
notice. The New York Chapter did not offer Barbara
Quint’s May 2002 seminar because it was a late addition
to the schedule and too close to the annual conference.
The chapter also decided not to offer the Virtual Association
seminars held during the 2002 and 2003 SLA annual
conferences. In these cases, the regular audience for the
seminars would be attending the conferences in person.
Thanks to M.E. Greene-Cohen, Susan Gormley, Anne
Lehman, Vandana Ranjan, Harriet Schick, and Sarah
Warner for helping with the Virtual Seminar series.
Web Seminar Service
and Technology Vendors
SLA’s Virtual Seminars are disseminated by KRM Informa-
tion Services, using the Placeware system for web enabled
telephone seminars. In 2003, Microsoft purchased Place-
ware and rebranded the product as “Microsoft Office
LiveMeeting, a Placeware Service.”
KRM’s conferencing services are described at www.krm.com.
For Placeware, see http://main.placeware.com/.
KRM has great customer service. The service reps saved
the day for me on more than one occasion.
In my experience, the SLA Virtual Seminars are compa-
rable in quality to presentations at the SLA conference.
The use of PowerPoint for presentations is certainly a
common format whether the speaker is in the room or
remote. In the virtual seminar, the lack of eye contact
obviously makes a difference in presentation for both
the speaker and the audience. In a recent seminar, Jane
Dysart and Rebecca Jones commented on the absence of
the visual feedback from the audience, to which they are
accustomed.
Audience members may communicate with the seminar
speaker, using either the computer keyboard or the
speaker phone. Access to the keyboard or telephone is
obviously limited by the number of individuals in the
audience at a given site. For a seminar of crucial interest,
one might want to register one’s own site to ensure the
ability to communicate with the speaker by telephone.
The speaker phone is probably the weakest link of the
virtual seminar room experience. Anyone who has attended
several of the seminars in New York can probably recall an
instance of the audio being dropped briefly or an unsuc-
cessful attempt to talk to the speaker during the “Q&A”
session. In retrospect, these glitches seem minor.
One of the characteristics of the virtual seminar format is
that SLA also sells the program in “v-paks” consisting of
audio recordings of the session and printouts of the
PowerPoint presentations. The price of the v-pak is
(Continues on page 28)
27 Vol. 75, #4 Winter 2003-2004
 (Continued from page 27)
lower than the price for in-person attendance. SLA continues
to sell v-paks for all past virtual seminars. Although some
material may become dated, the v-pak format provides a
way for a person to obtain the substance of a seminar they
could not attend in real time.
Bringing an SLA Vir tual Seminar
to Your Home or Workplace
To bring an SLA Virtual Seminar to your home or work-
place, or learn more about past and forthcoming virtual
seminars, visit SLA virtual association pages, as follows:
Virtual Learning Series
http://www.sla.org/
content/events/distance/virtsem2004/index.cfm
http://www.sla.org/
content/Events/distance/virtsem2003/index.cfm
http://www.sla.org/
content/events/distance/virtsem2002/index.cfm
Career Development Series
http://www.sla.org/
content/learn/careerdevelopment/index.cfm
Virtual seminar registration fees are based on site, rather
than by number of persons at the site. Registration for a
ten person site costs no more than a one person site. For
2004 series seminars, registration costs $190 per site for
members, $240 for non-members.
Members may purchase past seminars in V-Pak format
for $95. The non-member price is $145. V-pak prices for
future seminars are increasing to $105 for members, $155
for non-members. The V-pak consists of an audio recording
in cassette format, a printout of the presentation slide,
and instructions for accessing the presentation on the web.
KRM Information Services handles credit card and other
billing for SLA.
Audience Seating
Audiences at the SLA-hosted virtual seminars have
ranged from a low of 14 to a high of more than 50,
in a room which normally seats 48. Typically, audience
members show up just in time for the program and
disperse almost immediately afterward, minimizing the
social interaction so common at SLA events of all types.
SLA has suggested that individual chapters host discussions
at the conclusion of the seminars.
Some SLA chapters charge a fee to their members for
admission to sites hosting the Virtual Seminar series.
At the New York Chapter, president Agnes Mattis has
affirmed the tradition of free admission to meetings and
educational events.
ChapterNews
I hope you will consider participating in a Virtual Seminar
SLA VIRTUAL SEMINARS
in calendar 2004. Seats are available at almost all seminars,
which are announced via e-mail to SLA-NY chapter mem-
bers and via the Chapter website, http://www.sla.org/
chapter/cny/.
If you don’t receive e-mail announcements for the
seminars, you should make sure your e-mail address is
in your Who’s Who record at SLA. This is the source
of the SLANY-ANNOUNCE mailing list.
I welcome your comments and questions about the
Virtual Seminar series and other professional develop-
ment activities. My email address is sjohnson@westnet.com.
I can usually be reached by phone at 718 220-6719.
Conference Room 018,
Where Virtual Seminars Happen
The New York Chapter holds the Virtual Seminar series
in the Conference Room 018 at New York Public Library’s
Science, Industry and Business Library,188 Madison
Avenue. Conference Room 018 is located off Healy Hall
on the lower level of the library, down one level from the
library entrance. The conference room is on the same
floor as the Electronic Information Center and the
McGraw Information Services Center.
The Virtual Seminar series is not a public program of
the New York Public Library.
SLA Virtual Seminars, 2002-2003.
Note: Seminars marked with an asterisk (*) were not hosted
locally by the New York Chapter of SLA.
2002
February 27 Ulla de Sticker, Is consulting for you?
April 24 Chris Olson, Grooming Passionate
Library Evangelists.
June 10* Jan Sykes, Return on Information Investment:
Quantifying Your Value in the Organization.
June 12* Sue Henczel, Planning an Information Audit.
June 26 Guy St. Clair, Knowledge Services:
Specialist Librarians in the New Profession.
September 25 Debra M. Amidon, Knowledge Innovation -
the True Competitive Intelligence.
October 30 Alison J. Head, Beyond the Firewall:
New Research About the Usability of Corporate
Research Intranets.
December 4 Tina Byrne, Marketing Your Special Library:
Create Desire for Your Services.
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28 Vol. 75, #4 Winter 2003-2004
 (Continued from page 28)
2003

SLA VIRTUAL SEMINARS

January 24th Jay Van Eman, Taxonomies for Indexing.
February 26th John Deveney, Crisis Communications.
April 30th Randy Englund, An Organic Approach to
Project Management.
May 21* Barbara Quint,
Information Research Strategists.
June 9* Roy Tennant, XML in a Nutshell.
June 20* Amy Affelt, Nancy Carlson, Jill Konieczko,
The Value of the Information Professional.
June 23* Jay Van Eman, Taxonomies for Indexing -
Advanced Seminar.
September 24 Chris Olson, Branding Master Class.
October 8 Rachel Singer Gordon, Job Hunting Online.
October 29 Michael Kull, Knowledge Management:
the Role of Story Telling.
November 5* Kerry Patterson, Crucial Conservations.
November 19 Judy Siess, The Visible Librarian: Asserting
Your Value through Marketing and Advocacy.
December 3 Jane Dysart and Rebecca Jones, Business Planning:
Building the Plan and the Buy-In.
December 17 Cindy Hill and Terry Huwe, Competencies for
Info Pros: the Critical Balance.

Steve Johnson is the Director of Professional Development for

the New York Chapter of SLA. He is also Manager of the Bronx
Zoo Library, Wildlife Conservation Society. He can be reached
at sjohnson@wcs.org.

ChapterNews 29 Vol. 75, #4 Winter 2003-2004