Winning resources Available to Purchase

This paper explores the question of how librarians can win financial resources from their parent organisations. It maintains that securing funding is essential at a time of change and goes on to advocate practical techniques for improving the acquisition and management of financial resources. The paper examines the financial environment of many libraries, covering financial cuts, organisational changes, contracting out, service level agreements and income generation. The importance of the integration of libraries and information units within their parent bodies is considered. The paper stresses the importance of political skills in winning resources and explores what this means in practice for public, academic and special librarians. Finally, the paper looks at some aspects of austerity management.