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Information Management and Librarianship

View the employability skills

A graduate in information management and librarianship typically will have the ability to:

  • understand how the discipline interacts with its technological, social, political, professional and economic environments and understand the professions embraced by the discipline
  • understand the flow of information within and across communities, and of methods of managing organisational knowledge
  • be aware of local, regional, national and international information policies, organisations and issues, and of professional, legal and ethical concerns
  • identify, analyse and evaluate the information needs of different groups and make informed decisions to satisfy them
  • know legal and regulatory issues and statutory requirements such that information can be managed appropriately within the statutory and regulatory framework
  • identify and use relevant information sources in an appropriate range of media and formats
  • select and acquire materials appropriate to the needs of users and make informed decisions about what should be retained and what can be safely discarded
  • understand different ways of providing access to materials via resource-sharing, shared acquisition programmes, document delivery and web access, and make balanced decisions from the range of alternatives available
  • preserve information and materials to ensure their future availability
  • understand the demands of proprietary information and the responsibility for its creation, authentication and security
  • undertake independent research and to evaluate the work carried out by others
  • communicate and negotiate in a clear, systematic and concise way for a range of different purposes and audiences in the language of study
  • write fluently and effectively and interact effectively and impartially with others
  • use ICT effectively as applicable to a wide range of professional tasks
  • understand and apply, subject to having had experience of work and professional practice, the basic principles of the planning and management of services, including interpersonal skills, performance indicators, budgeting, purchasing, marketing of services, quality and liability issues and staff management and training.

Information management and librarianship encompasses the study of information, from its generation to its exploitation, so as to enable the recording, accumulation, storage, organisation, retrieval and transmission of information, ideas and works of imagination.

Historically identified with the organisation of recorded knowledge, articulated through librarianship, computing, information science, archives administration and records management, the subject area has expanded to cover the theory and practice of librarianship and information management in a broad range of environments. A process of continuous evolution has brought the discipline into proximity with other cognate subject areas such as knowledge management, publishing and communications.

Students following the wide range of degree programmes available undertake courses that develop skills relating to identifying, creating, acquiring, organising, retrieving, preserving and disseminating information. This spectrum is reflected in a variety of degrees some of which are cross-departmental. Professional and vocational relevance is an important aspect as is compliance with relevant professional bodies for those programmes seeking professional accreditation. Degree programmes are supplemented by in-service job-specific training.

Graduates are equipped for professional posts in information management, library or record office management and cognate fields. Continuing Professional Development is expected throughout their careers through reflective practice. Employers in this sector cover a diverse community of practice and their needs and the professional profile they require are widely varied.

To check the growing range of resources produced by the Subject Centre to support employability and the use of this profile (including the Skills and Attributes map) go to www.ics.heacademy.ac.uk.

This profile, produced in 2006, is based on the QAA benchmark to be found at www.qaa.ac.uk/academicinfrastructure/benchmark/honours/default.asp.


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