Change Management in Information Services (2nd ed.)

Citation

Calvert, P. (2007), "Change Management in Information Services (2nd ed.)", The Electronic Library, Vol. 25 No. 3, pp. 373-374. https://doi.org/10.1108/02640470710754878

There can be little doubt that the pace of change in information management has increased and will continue to increase. New information and communication technologies drive not only new products and services, but they drive major changes in organisations, too. Of all the subjects we teach under the broad heading of management, the management of change must be one of the most significant, with possibly only team and project management coming close. That is why it is perhaps a little strange that there are so few good books on change management in information management. The first edition of this title by Pugh (2000), Penfold's (1999) Change Management for Information Services and Curzon's (2006) simpler Managing Change: A How‐to‐Do‐It Manual for Librarians remain the only books published on this subject in the last decade, until this new edition appeared. Am I right in thinking that there are no American books on this topic?

We should be grateful to Pugh for undertaking a massive overhaul of the previous edition. Indeed, this is so little like the first edition they are almost different books, and, given the limited field, it means that the first edition remains a useful reference. The problem of writing about change management as a separate subject is that it is really a sub‐set of wider management theory and almost all the topics that would be studied in management are also pertinent to change management. That is why Pugh has had to write about strategic directions, organisational structures, teams, leadership, motivation, and so on, in almost a mini‐text on management itself. That is why I thought chapter 2 on “Change theories” would be central, but this chapter covers general management theory, and leave specific change management theories to be dealt with in later chapters.

Pugh seems to have shifted his views since writing the first edition, in which he argued that new technologies would inevitably change information management, but not so much that it would become unrecognisable from what it was. In this edition he argues that technology is forcing radical change in the profession, and that as a result change management needs to be designed for a much more unstable and dynamic environment than was the situation only a few years ago. Those managing technology or trying to introduce technology will need to read this book for ideas on how to cope with the increasing pace of change. On a final note, I like the spirit of openness advocated by Pugh and have found by experience that even if this does not come naturally, it is still the best policy.