Connecting Faculty Candidates with the Library: Lessons Learned from the Literature and the Field

This paper illustrates how liaison librarians can pursue influential relationships with faculty candidates in their liaison departments during the interview process. Although these interactions tend to be meet and greets, the impression that they leave may assist a potentially new faculty member when evaluating the campus environment and climate. This essay explores the relationship that academic librarians can develop during the hiring process for faculty candidates in their liaison departments, and the continued collaboration post-hire for the successful candidate. Literature for librarian outreach has been synthesized to present suggestions for strategies to engage with faculty candidates during the interview process and to further develop these relationships post-hire.     

Serving Community Faculty Through a Dedicated Liaison

Community-based medical schools rely heavily on volunteer faculty to provide medical education. Volunteer faculty consist of health care professionals, primarily physicians, who commit to educating medical students and residents. While these volunteer faculty are typically unpaid, many medical schools provide some benefits to them for volunteering their time. One such benefit, although rarely noted in library or medical education literature, is access to academic medical library resources and services. This article highlights a library services liaison model dedicated to the support of volunteer faculty at a community-based medical school.     

Using Multiple Data Sources to Develop a Liaison Agenda

Subject librarians at many college and university libraries have a wide variety of job responsibilities. Yet they often lack guidance on goal setting and prioritization. At the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV) Libraries, the liaison program currently lacks a formal agenda setting process. This study explores using multiple sources of data for liaison goal setting and goal prioritization. Data from the LibQUAL+ survey, faculty surveys and focus groups, and usage statistics were examined for the disciplines of art, architecture, business, and hotel administration, and then applied to the development of liaison agendas. The results show that data can enrich and inform liaison perceptions of the behavior and priorities of their constituents and assist liaisons with establishing annual goals.