Librarians and information technologists: more alike than different? Interviews with CIOs
| Pages | 114-120 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/07378839910267280 |
| Published date | 01 March 1999 |
| Date | 01 March 1999 |
| Author | Merri Beth Lavagnino |
| Subject Matter | Information & knowledge management,Library & information science |
114
For this second column in the IT I-V series, we
interview academic chief information officers.
The CIO role, unlike the Library Director role,
is not a well-defined one. Some campuses will
assign CIOs with responsibility over all informa-
tion technology areas including academic com-
puting, administrative computing, telecommu-
nications, learning technologies, media services,
and the library. Others will assign their CIOs
responsibility for some portions of these infor-
mation technology areas, often not including the
library. Many campuses do not have a person
with the title “Chief information officer,” but
may have a person acting in this role with a
variation on the title. The CIOs interviewed for
this column use a wide range of titles, and half of
them oversee libraries as part of their duties. We
interviewed them to find out what challenges
they believe libraries are experiencing that could
be assisted by technology, and how they believe
libraries and information technologists should
be working together on those challenges.
The six chief information officers interviewed
are:
(1) Morell Boone, Dean, Learning Resources
and Technologies, Eastern Michigan
University (library reports to him, as well as
academic computing).
(2) Don Gardner, Chief Information Officer,
Weber State University (Utah) (library does
not report to him).
(3) Sharon Hogan, University Librarian,
University of Illinois at Chicago (academic
computing and telecommunications also
report to her).
(4) Jack McCredie, Associate Vice Chancellor,
Information Systems and Technology,
University of California, Berkeley (library
does not report to him).
(5) Susan Perry, College Librarian and Direc-
tor of Library, Information, and Technolo-
gy Services, Mount Holyoke College
(Massachusetts).
(6) Don Riley, Associate Vice President and
Chief Information Officer, University of
Maryland (library does not report to him).
These chief information officers were asked
questions such as:
• “What challenges do you see academic
libraries experiencing now and in the near
future that could be assisted by information
technology?”
• “What are some library challenges for which
technology will not help?
Merri Beth Lavagnino
The author
Merri Beth Lavagnino is Director for Information
Technology, Committee on Institutional Cooperation,
Champaign, Illinois, USA.
E-mail: mbl@cic.uiuc.edu
Keywords
Academic libraries, Chief information officers, Technology
Abstract
For this second column in the IT I-V (information technology
interview) series, we interview academic chief information
officers. The CIOs interviewed for this column use a wide
range of titles, and half of them oversee libraries as part of
their duties. We interviewed them to find out what challenges
they believe libraries are experiencing that could be assisted
by technology, and how they believe libraries and informa-
tion technologists should be working together on those
challenges. Some of the questions were: “What challenges
do you see academic libraries experiencing now and in the
near future that could be assisted by information technolo-
gy?,” “What are some library challenges for which technolo-
gy will not help?,” and “What do you see as the ideal rela-
tionship between information technology offices and the
library on an academic campus?”
Library Hi Tech
Volume 17 · Number 1 · 1999 · pp. 114–120
© MCB University Press · ISSN 0737-8831
IT I-V: a column for
information technology
interviews
Librarians and
information
technologists: more
alike than different?
Interviews with CIOs
To continue reading
Request your trial