I recently bitched about not getting keychain cards for our patrons, which is, in reality, just one of the many ways our library ignores "customer service."

In this instance, though, my main bitch is that this decision was made, pretty much unilaterally, by one person - and that person is not a professional librarian (or a librarian at all, really). Now, in "fairness," we have been without a director for 8 months, and we have had no one really making any decisions for the good of the library - or our patrons. We've been in limbo. But we do have four librarians on staff, and not one of them was consulted about this - and I think that's a mistake.

So, my question for discussion is, "Do you think that at least one professional librarian should be consulted when it comes to decisions dealing with patron satisfaction?"

I know that it sounds - and perhaps is - obnoxious to pull the "MLIS card," and that paraprofessional staff often feel like they are not respected for the work they do, but isn't there a reason we went to library school and at the very least went through the rigmarole (and expense) of getting a professional degree? Shouldn't matters of collection development, equipment purchase, computer configuration, and yes, patron SERVICE at least have input from the librarians on staff (and especially when there is no director to oversee things)?

What do you think? Does stuff like this happen where you work? Do you have a "system" for decision making?

Oh, BTW - you can now subscribe to the comments on this blog - since comments are what this blog is all about!