Quality Management Applied to Libraries and Information Services : Conception and Specificity

To be applied to libraries and information services, quality management must be integrated into the particularities of these organizations. After placing these management procedures in relation to other managerial approaches which are more or less developed, we propose to identify the strong points to take into account for a true adaptation : the immateriality and immediacy of the service given, the unavoidable participation of the user, the central importance of a perceived benefit for the user, etc. The quality is also to be found at the heart of compromises between the imperative of public service, and the high and sometimes divergent expectations of the « clients/users ». It is through a pragmatic, progressive, transversal and participatory approach that the introduction of quality management can be made to operate in libraries.
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