Building the competitive edge: A handbook for starting a corporate information facility

This project produced a manual entitled Building the Competitive Edge: A Handbook for Starting a Corporate Library. The handbook is designed to assist the librarian in the planning, organization, and implementation of a corporate information facility. It discusses the fundamental tasks required in establishing a library, including assessing current assets, utilizing space effectively, determining user needs, developing a collection development policy, defining the "ideal" collection, preparing a budget, selecting a vendor, determining a catalog or organizational system, cataloging, proving user services, connecting outside the library walls, marketing, and ongoing library management.; Current literature is very thin in the area of library creation. The majority of the research available centers on expanding existing collections. As such, the first-time founding librarian may be unable to locate a concise source for information. The handbook produced by this project meets those needs by addressing each area of library formulation.