Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore how academic and public libraries support entrepreneurial researchers and, in doing so, demonstrate impact and share best practices. Design/methodology/approach – The authors discuss their own experiences as academic and public business librarians who support entrepreneurs. They do so by revealing the main services they provide to this unique user group and presenting examples from their own institutions. They also present what is done at other libraries by way of a literature review and an informal survey. Findings – After navigating the landscape of business librarian support of entrepreneurs, many commonalities were found among the types of support offered. Most libraries in this study collaborate with a business incubator, center for entrepreneurship, office of economic development or small business development center in some fashion. Numerous outreach and networking efforts were found that had positive effects on the local and national economies. Although public and academic libraries have different base user groups, both types of libraries serve current and potential entrepreneurs, as well as students, who are looking for similar data in the same kinds of resources. Originality/value – Although specific examples can be found in the literature, little has been published that provides an overview of the entrepreneurial services and resources provided at numerous libraries of different types as well as resulting impact. This paper fills this gap and should provide new ideas to librarians of all kinds wishing to reach entrepreneurs.
Businesses want workers who are critical thinking problemsolvers, who know how to find, evaluate, and use information to address work-related issues, and communicate effectively regarding those issues, 1 much like the information literacy (IL) or media and information literacy (MIL) efforts worldwide recently described in this column.2 In businesses at all levels and in the workplace, IL/MIL is not a familiar phrase. Undaunted, however, librarians in many types of libraries try to help their users with these very issues. Those librarians face challenges, including constant and rapid change in directions and needs, little or no grasp of the availability of data (or lack thereof), especially on emerging topics, and the need to address and communicate work-related issues speedily, yet with valid evidence. The challenge for librarians in all types of libraries is how to support each other through sharing materials and approaches, perhaps in a new repository for workplace-related IL. The discussions that follow take a first step in that direction. Next steps could include analyzing the contents of such a repository and developing sequential supportive curricula and materials for librarians and for their users to extend and expand their business and workplace IL.-Esther Grassian,
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