Certainly some food for thought there, and some commercial realities
that we need to take on board. But there is one crucial difference
between the two-professions in that estate agency is commission-driven.
And it is commission-driven businesses that lead people to cut corners
at their clients' expense.
-----Original Message-----
From: Chartered Library and Information Professionals
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Luke Evans
Sent: Tuesday, March 28, 2006 23:40
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: "Estate agents should emulate librarians" ?!
> Someone was saying that perhaps there is a connection between
> librarians/librarianship and estate agency? Preposterous, of course.
> It is well known that estate agents, even the honest ones, do not
> pretend to have a professional code of conduct.
>
..whereas Librarians on the other hand are so wedded to their
professional code of conduct that they fail to grasp opportunities and
cannot 'sell'
their services, their institution or themselves to others. As a result
they are undervalued, underpaid and often the first services to undergo
cutbacks.
Please forgive the slightly flippant response but I think we can learn
from estate agents as much as they can learn from us.
Perhaps if we were able to offer the fast, efficient and friendly
customer service that the best estate agents offer we would be valued
more. Foxtons grew into the dominant property company within the London
market by staying open to 9, offering Sunday viewings and continually
improving their services and innovating not by getting caught up in
obscure discussions about the correct procedures and the minutiae of
working life.
In a way we already are estate agents - we match up buyers with sellers
only in our case the property is the intellectual .property of the
library/ information service.
Estate agents have to continually offer a good service to survive -
people could fairly easily buy and sell houses themselves without the
involvement of estate agents but choose to employ estate agents for the
value that they perceive is added by them. Similarly we need to sell our
services like estate agents so that our customers recognise the value
that we as information professionals add. That way they will choose and
value us rather than using google or other information sources.
Luke
----- Original Message -----
From: "Frank Daniels" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Tuesday, March 28, 2006 2:54 PM
Subject: Re: "Estate agents should emulate librarians" ?!
> Someone was saying that perhaps there is a connection between
> librarians/librarianship and estate agency? Preposterous, of course.
It is
> well known that estate agents, even the honest ones, do not pretend to
> have
> a professional code of conduct.
>
> Frank Daniels
> Nottingham
>
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