Page 48 - JOURNAL OF LIBRARY SCIENCE IN CHINA 2015 Vol. 41

Wugang JIN / A study on construction and accomplishment for the county level central-branch library system in China 047

Department of the CPC Central Committee along with other ministries and commissions issued
Several opinions on strengthening the construction of culture publicity teams at the county
level and in urban and rural areas (The Central Propaganda Department, 2010), which called
on the relevant primary-level culture authorities to improve the capacity of public culture
service personnel in response to the needs of enhancing the primary-level work under the new
circumstances, and further strengthen the creativity, cohesion and motivation of the primary-level
culture publicity teams.
Within the framework of the central-branch library system, highly specialized operations
are usually completed at central libraries, while the subsequent execution of those specialized
decisions are done at branch libraries or service outlets. In this sense, employees working at branch
libraries or service outlets should not necessarily be professional librarians. However, further
professional training for the primary-level employees is indispensable to improving and ensuring
their service quality and requires a full package of measures to ensure such training. 1) In the
light of The guidelines for the national basic public culture services (2015-2020) (Xinhua News
Agency, 2015), primary-level service staff should receive at least five days’ intensive training
per year. 2) High-quality trainers should be invited through all possible channels to form a strong
coaching team, taking the training content into account. 3) Unified training materials should be
designed and the trainees should be provided with standardized training sessions and a distance
learning platform. 4) In improving the evaluation of training results, tests of practical operations
could be added to the regular written tests, which may closely combine the evaluation with actual
work conditions. 5) The pre-employment licensing system should be established progressively,
which integrates the training records in specific databases and will give reference if needed for
purposes of employment, promotion or awards. It will increase the motivation of primary-level
employees to take up professional training and help to optimize the training-based employment
system.

4.3 Introducing specialized social organizations to library operation and management

It is suggested to have in place a mechanism to attract and encourage social organizations to
participate in the promotion of county-level central-branch library system. In those counties with
appropriate conditions and resources, specialized social organizations might be involved in the
library operation and management by means of delegation or biding invitation, so as to explore the
social operation piloting experiences of central libraries, branch libraries or service outlets, and
even the complete central-branch library system.
There have been a few successful cases where specialized social organizations participated in
the operation and management of public libraries in China, such as the Wuxi New District Library
(county-level library) (Sun, 2014a, 2014b), the Library in Chaowai Sub-district of Chaoyang