Page 44 - Journal of Library Science in China 2020 Vol.46

SHAO Bo, SHAN Zhen & WANG Yi / Construction of smart libraries with new generation service platforms: 043
Business reengineering and data management

emotional communication will become the key responsibilities of smart librarians. There are three
ways to re-engineer library staff: 1) improve their professional skills through training; 2) change
the entire crew and recruit personnel with professional capabilities; 3) reorganize the departments
and agencies, optimize staffing, remove redundancy and save human resources.
The cloud services provided by the new generation library platforms and web-based processes
and parameters have reduced the pressure on librarians (JIA, S. N. LI, & WU, 2016). The work
of librarians has changed from traditional book loans to subject-based advisory and intellectual
services. In addition to the traditional management of information resources, the training of
librarians’ professional capabilities and skills should also focus on their literacy in information
technologies and data analysis. Librarians shall have comprehensive skills, and some of them
should be able to directly participate in the development of the platform and plan their own
workflow with the help of the platform to achieve innovation. In terms of data management
services, librarians need to develop their abilities to analyze and manage data, rediscover
information resources, and develop and publish ancient books and original resources—the
last ability is rarely seen in the library. To sum up, the capabilities required of librarians can
be categorized as competency, i.e. various qualities and abilities required to successfully and
excellently complete the work and achieve the goals for ideal performance. That competency is
indispensable in the context of the new generation platforms.

3 Digital management and services of the library

3.1 The new function of library data management

At the beginning of the construction of smart libraries, there were three purposes: interconnection,
efficiency and convenience (S. W. WANG, 2012). In the new technological environment, due to
the unlimited potential of scientific and technological development in the data society, people’s
awareness of data is greatly increased, and users’ demand for data sources and preservation is more
and more sophisticated. The library is no doubt the largest owner of the authoritative academic
data, which includes the resource data purchased internally and the business data generated
by itself. In addition, the library has always been the leader in data management and services
(Pinfield, Cox, & Smith, 2014). In the future, library services shall be oriented to knowledge
service, linking the entire services to the early data processing stage through knowledge service
and data service (SHI & X. W. LIU, 2011). Considering the interests and demands of different
participants in scientific data management, the library shall also position itself as an embedded
scientific data management institution, process-based scientific data monitoring institution, and
data literacy education institution (FAN, 2014).
Foreign university libraries started data management at an early stage, and mature platforms
such as the data management service platform of Stanford University and the data management