For law firm library directors, the problems are by now familiar. Chief among them: how to recover the costs of online research; how to handle the surge in, and difficulties of, mobile devices; and how to provide effective service when purse strings continue to be tight. Yet as in years past, respondents to The American Lawyer’s 13th annual Law Librarian Survey continue to be upbeat. Ninety-one percent agreed or mostly agreed that they were satisfied with their job (compared with 87 percent last year). Seventy-six percent agreed or mostly agreed that they were satisfied with their firm’s business direction for the library (in 2013, the figure was 74 percent).
In previous surveys, those satisfaction levels could be explained, at least in part, by the resilience and perseverance of library staffs. They were able to trim the fat and negotiate better deals with vendors. While that’s still the case, this year’s survey finds something else at work, too: Increasingly, the challenges that libraries face are being tackled in new, often innovative ways.
