College and Research Libraries Job Responsibilities and Job Satisfaction at the University of California Libraries Patricia A. Kreitz and Annegret Ogden The authors compare the roles and responsibilities of academic librarians and support staff at the nine-campus library system of the University of California. By surveying the frequency with which certain tasks were performed, areas of overlap between professionals and parapro- fessionals were identified. Discrepancies in satisfaction with specific job attributes are exam- ined. A wide gap in satisfaction levels between the two groups was found, particularly in the areas of promotion, job development, and influence. While calling for equity in compensation for library assistants, the paper identifies the responsibilities of professional librarians in set- ting realistic expectations for library staff. ccording to a 1988 Personnel Journal survey of 100 corporate personnel officers ''job satisfac- tion is ranked over job secur~ty by a 2-to-1 margin as the number one worker concern today. ''1 Margaret Mag- nus, editor/associate publisher of Person- nel Journal, speculated that this change in worker concern may be driven by ''the ap- pearance of a new class of knowledge workers who are being paid for what they know, not just what they do." 2 These knowledge workers expect more from their jobs. This change may require em- ployers to develop new concepts of lead- ership, compensation, and managerial control. If job satisfaction is important for Ameri- can workers in the profit sector, it may be even more significant in knowledge in- dustries such as academic libraries. One of the traditional assumptions about careers in an academic setting is that such work offers a high level of satisfaction. Librari- ans and library assistants expect their jobs to satisfy not only their financial needs but also their intellectual and psychological needs. Moreover, they expect to receive both monetary and nonmonetary com- pensation commensurate with their edu- cation. But are these expectations realistic in the present employment structure of university libraries? And, in addition, do the rewards match the responsibilities and the qualifications? In Understanding Job Satisfaction, Grune- berg suggests that occupations that de- pend heavily on cooperation among fel- low workers and whose product is a service function directed toward a non- paying public (in contrast to a sales- oriented or manufacturing function) would be adversely affected by a high level of dissatisfaction among employees. 3 Service industries operating in the non- profit sector are particularly dependent on intangible rewards to influence job perfor- mance since they traditionally have lower wages and benefits and since relatively low pressure is put on employees through administrative supervision. 4 As nonprofit service industries fill with ''knowledge Patricia A . Kreitz is Manager of Library Services at the Superconducting Super Collider Laboratory Library, 2550 Beckleymeade Avenue, Dallas, Texas 75237. At the time of authoring the article, Kreitz was Head of General Reference for the University of California at Berkeley. Annegret Ogden is at the Bancroft Library, the University of California at Berkeley, 94720. 297 298 College & Research Libraries workers,'' libraries should be affected by the close connection perceived between a high level of job satisfaction and a high quality of library service. There are, how- ever, some interesting indications in the literature that, although a high level of sat- isfaction exists in libraries, it is not experi- enced equally by all library workers. In theory, but as our study will show not so much in practice, academic librarians are in charge of library policies and opera- tions. In accordance with their special background and higher education (a mas- ter's degree in library science is a prerequi- site) they serve as consultants to faculty and students and perform those tasks that require familiarity with academic subject matters and bibliographic skills. They ad- minister, analyze, and organize the ser- vices. To a large extent, performing these services devolves to the library assistants who function in a separate employment structure, designed to relieve librarians of the routine aspects of their work. In his article entitled "Continuity or Discontinuity-a Persistent Personnel Is- sue in Academic Librarianship, '' Allen Veaner asserts that library assistants are highly dissatisfied with their job duties and rewards because librarians have not been able to maintain a clear distinction in job duties and responsibilities between the professional and the nonprofessional levels. 5 In the University of California sys- tem, library assistant is a specific classifi- cation that denotes library staff who are not hired into positions requiring an M.L.S. but who do support-level library tasks. Synonyms for these positions are: library clerks, library technical assistants, and paraprofessionals. Veaner argues that there is a "widespread perception that two categories of employees (librarians and library assistants) are performing widely overlapping functions, seemingly at the same level, but in different em- ployee series with different pay scales and different prerequisites.''6 This blurring of responsibilities-and the dissatisfaction it engenders-is not limited to American li- braries. Norman J. Russell, surveying nonprofessional staff in a selection of pub- lic and academic libraries in England and Northern Ireland, discovered a ''deep re- July 1990 sentment'' by paraprofessionals of the professional staff's treatment of them. 7 These paraprofessionals also reported a considerable overlap in the duties of pro- fessional and paraprofessional staff, an overlap that they did not feel was ade- quately compensated in the salaries paid to paraprofessional staff. Russell con- cludes that "It is difficult to escape the conclusion that relationships between professional and nonprofessional are not what they should be. ''8 Since librarians and library assistants in- teract with each other on a daily-often hourly-basis, common sense suggests that the dissatisfaction and/ or ambiguity experienced would have an effect on the relationship between the two groups and, to some extent, on the quality of service they provide library users. Are Veaner's assertions accurate that the blurring of roles is widespread and that this causes a high level of dissatisfaction for library sup- port staff? If so, is this condition caused by a real or a perceived overlap of the work each group performs? Library folklore, and the ad hoc experiences of these two researchers, suggest that Veaner's asser- tions are correct. However, we found no comprehensive study that tested his as- sumptions and decided to explore this is- sue within the context of the University of California libraries by comparing the job satisfaction experienced by academic li- brarians and paraprofessional library as- sistants with their self-reported tasks and responsibilities. The University of Califor- nia system of libraries offers an excellent environment for a job satisfaction study comparing professional and paraprofes- sional workers. In 1983 when this study was conducted, there were 599 librarians and 1,573 library assistants working in over sixty libraries at nine campuses across the state of California. A master's in library science is a prereq- uisite for employment in the librarian se- ries that follows the faculty model of three ranks: assistant librarian, associate librar- ian, and librarian, with a provision that ca- reer status (a variant of tenure) be achieved within six years after the initial employment or the individual is not re- tained. Movement through the three ranks is by means of steps within rank and then promotions from rank to rank. Li- brarians lack detailed job descriptions; in- stead their performance and thus their movement through steps and ranks is based on an assessment of their overall achievement. The career path of librarians at the higher ranks is to a large degree in- dependent of their primary job responsi- bilities because as they advance in rank, they are expected to spend an increasing percentage of time on professional, schol- arly, or university service and/or on re- search. In contrast to librarians, library assis- tants are judged on their performance in specific jobs that have formal, detailed job descriptions. At the time of our study, there were four ranks of library assistants within the U.C. system. A particular job is classified at level one, two, three, or four based upon the duties and responsibilities involved. An individual is hired into a par- ticular job and can receive recommended merit increases that advance the employee through a fixed number of steps, usually five. However, once a library assistant has reached the top of the pay scale for that level, no more advancement is possible unless individuals are hired into a differ- ent job or have a significant number of higher-level duties reassigned to them. While merit increases within a level are based on an individual's performance, movement between steps within the li- brary assistant series-in contrast to the li- brarian series-is dependent upon the for- mal structure and content of the job. Top-ranking assistants generally super- vise the work of other assistants and man- age entire work units or departments, but always within the restraints of their sup- portive, functional relationship to the aca- demic librarians who set the guidelines and evaluate their work. Through our experience as librarians in technical and public service, we became aware of a gradual shifting in roles that seems to be undermining the traditional distinction between professional and sup- port staff. Pressures caused by changes in technology and by budget restrictions seem to be resulting in deprofessionaliza- tion of staff. Librarians who felt over bur- Job Responsibilities 299 dened by clerical duties saw themselves prevented from participating in activities that encouraged professional growth. Li- brary assistants who took on additional re- sponsibilities felt the lack of adequate . compensation and recognition. In order to test whether these perceptions of depro- fessionalization and discontent were true, we decided to study the job satisfaction and job duties of these two groups to de- termine whether there was significant blurring between professional and para- professional roles. LITERATURE REVIEW Some recent job satisfaction studies have pointed out how difficult it is to iso- late contentment in the work place from an individual's general state of mental health. 9 The question of what frame of ref- erence a person uses in assessing a job, the work environment, and work relation- ships is problematic because of a complex interaction of childhood predispositions, attitudes about work, and changing worker needs and perceptions over time. However, a counterpoint to this individu- alistic approach to job satisfaction is the ar- gument that all people have certain needs, even if they prioritize those needs differ- ently at different times, and that problems in an organization or in job structure within a work force can be identified through the sheer weight of consistent re- sponses that seem to violate or meet sig- nificant human needs. 10 The vast amount of published literature on job satisfaction testifies to the per- ceived importance satisfaction has in the work place. A number of those studies have examined job satisfaction experi- enced by library employees. However, few studies have specifically compared the job satisfaction of professional and paraprofessional staff within libraries. Beverly P. Lynch and JoAnn Verdin stud- ied full-time staff in three academic li- braries.11 Staff were in departments per- forming either book selection, acquisitions, cataloging, circulation, or reference. The nature of the functions cho- sen would limit the majority of respon- dents to either the professional or para- professional categories. They were able to 300 College & Research Libraries verify only one of their seven hypotheses tested, that there is no significant differ- ence between men and women library em- ployees' job satisfaction. Our findings matched theirs. Their further discovery that librarians reported higher levels of satisfaction than paraprofessionals again matched our findings and supports Veaner' s assertion of a division in level of job satisfaction along structural lines. Other studies, which focused solely on professional job satisfaction, support Lynch and Verdin's finding that profes- sional staff are, on the whole, relatively happy with their work and find it intrinsi- cally satisfying. 12 William J. Vaughn and J.D. Dunn compared job satisfaction among six university libraries and, within one librar~, by six departmental sub- groupings. 3 While data was collected on the respondents' occupational levels, the study's primary focus was on comparing organizational and structural differences; thus, no data on the relationship of satis- faction to occupational level was reported. We became aware of a gradual shift- ing in roles that seems to be under- mining the traditional distinction be- tween professional and support staff. Two studies have reported library pro- fessional staff as having a lower satisfac- tion rating than other library workers. Lawrence D. Prybil investigated whether job satisfaction could be correlated to per- formance or occupational level for three groups within one academic library: li- brarians, all clerical and nonprofessional staff, and maintenance/custodial work- ers. 14 Comparison with our study is not possible since he did not distinguish among the various "nonprofessional" staff. Unlike Lynch and Verdin and our own findings, his results indicated that the middle group (clerical/paraprofes- sional staff) were more satisfied, but this was not proven to be statistically signifi- cant. He was unable to establish a strong relationship between occupational level and satisfaction. Peter F. McNally com- July 1990 pared the job motivation and satisfaction of reference staff in ten Ontario public li- braries, investigating the hypothesis that professional reference librarians would rank higher on both aspects than would reference technicians or other groups do- ing reference work. Although both groups were at a reasonably high level of satisfac- tion, his findings contrasted with most other studies in that the professionals were ''at least as dissatisfied and unmoti- vated, if not more so, than other groups. " 15 This dissatisfaction may have been related to the organizational envi- ronment, but further study would be needed to determine the exact causes. Aside from the few comparative studies noted above, most of the research or litera- ture focusing on library paraprofessionals discusses job design, task assignment, or training. A notable exception is Russell's questionnaire, mentioned before, which was sent to paraprofessional library staff in a sample of academic and public li- braries in Great Britain. 16 His findings of a strong dissatisfaction among paraprofes- sionals with their status with the scope of their duties and responsibilities, and with the opportunities for promotion, supports our results. METHODOLOGY AND LIMITATIONS This study, funded through a grant awarded by the Librarians Association of the University of California, was designed to compare both satisfaction and self- reported frequency of job activities across a broad spectrum of librarians and library assistants in the University of California li- braries. A three-part questionnaire was designed based on the Minnesota Satis- faction Questionnaire used by S.S. Chwe in his 1976 dissertation that compared the job satisfaction of catalogers and reference librarians in academic libraries. 17 A modifi- cation of his questionnaire was pretested on a random sample of five librarians and five library assistants at all nine University of California campuses, then revised, and in 1983 a total of 889 questionnaires were returned bX 326 librarians and 563 library assistants. 8 The response from a staff of 599 librarians and 1,573 library assistants is considered high for university question- naires. Sixty-three percent of the respon- dents were library assistants and 37 per- cent were librarians. Although the top three levels of administrators-university librarians, associate and assistant univer- sity librarians-were included in the mail- ing, their number was so small that, for reasons of confidentiality, they have been excluded from the report. The process of data gathering, analysis, and paper writ- ing has been lengthy. The questionnaire was organized into three parts. Part one asked respondents to assign frequency levels to a wide range of library activities. These activities were chosen either to reflect the traditional dis- tinctions made between "professional" and ''nonprofessional'' responsibilities (e.g., commercial database searching ver- sus checking out library materials), or to highlight the most hotly debated areas of overlap (e.g., providing reference assis- tance or performing original cataloging)". To clarify the role of librarians in contrast to library assistants, we asked a series of questions regarding access to continuing education and channels of influence rang- ing from involvement with training and supervision to policy and budget deci- sions for a single department or the library as a whole. Part two of the questionnaire asked respondents about the level of satis- faction they experienced. The first ques- tion in this section asked them to rate their overall satisfaction. The remainder of the questions focused on specific aspects of the work environment. Here were placed questions about promotion criteria and staff development as well as specific satis- faction needs defined by Maslow's catego- ries of ''lower order'' (physiological and social) and "higher order" (esteem and self-actualization). Part two concluded with three open-ended questions asking respondents to use their own words to de- scribe what they liked least and most about their jobs and what they would most like to change if they were able. The final section covered the sociodemo- graphic and job-related characteristics of the respondents. Statistical evidence such as this relies heavily on contrasting large groups of re- spondents, i.e. the entire population of li- Job Responsibilities 301 brary assistants with the entire population of librarians. Since we were especially in- terested in variations and similarities be- tween lower and higher steps of staff within specific kinds of library depart- ments, some of our data is derived from a small number of respondents and so does not prove validity under standard statisti- cal tests. For our purposes, these re- sponses were extremely relevant since they were indicators of what may be sig- nificant future shifts in responsibility and blurring of professional and paraprofes- sional roles. In order not to prejudice our response, we did not ask specific ques- tions in the survey about the blurring of roles . Although our survey results show evidence of overlapping responsibilities, only the essay section elicited responses that directly addressed role ambiguity. We faced the problems of how to suf- ficiently describe the library tasks we included so that they could be la- belled "professional" or "parapro- fessional.'' In developing part one of the question- naire, we faced the problem of how to de- scribe the library tasks we included suffi- ciently so that they could be labelled ''professional'' or ''paraprofessional.'' In fact, the difficulty we had in doing this parallels the problems faced by the profes- sion in trying to define what it is that each class of library employee does that makes it unique and thus rewarded differen- tially. This problem is compounded by the tendency of respondents to over-report the importance of their own jobs. To com- pensate we designed task descriptions that allowed us to correlate frequency of task performance with measures of com- plexity or responsibility. For example, we combined the responsibility of supervi- sion with the number and levels of em- ployees supervised, and working at the reference desk with the frequency with which the respondent worked unsuper- vised or with employees of a higher level. 302 College & Research Libraries POPULATION GROUP AND CLASSIFICATION STRUCTURE The first table shows the number and percent of respondents; the second table breaks down the responses by campus. The demographic section of our ques- tionnaire can be summarized to show a composite portrait of the "typical" librari- ans and library assistants who responded. The University of California librarian is most likely to be a female in the associate rank between the ages of 30 and 39 who has a master's in librarianship and a bach- elor's in another academic field. Although she has worked in the U. C. Library system from 11 to 20 years, she has only been in her present position an average of 0 to 5 years. Her primary responsibilities are in public service in a central, rather than a branch, library. She supervises library as- sistants and interacts with 6 to 15 fellow li- brary employees daily. Very little of her time (15 percent) involves clerical or repet- itive tasks and she spends between 1 and 4 hours per month on committee work. The composite library assistant respondent is female, but in contrast to the typical librar- ian, her age may range from 20 to 39. She is at the Library Assistant II rank with a bachelor's degree and 5 years or less of U.C. Library system experience. She also works in a central library but primarily in technical services where over 80 percent of her time is spent doing clerical or repeti- tive production tasks. She is most likely to supervise student library employees and not to serve on committees. From this composite the reader could conclude that librarians and library assistant job respon- sibilities are distinctive and that there is lit- tle overlap or blurring. However, when the library assistant responses are broken down by rank, it was found that the July 1990 higher ranks, LA lll and IV, showed im- portant areas of similarity to librarians. JOB RESPONSIBILITIES How did the duties of librarians and li- brary assistants compare? What were the significant areas of difference and/ or over- lap? To answer these questions, we exam- ined reported frequency of tasks and re- sponsibilities in four areas of library work: collection development, technical service (bibliographic access), public service, and management. Collection Development Respondents were asked to identify how frequently they performed four as- pects of collection development activity: bibliographic verification, selection, weeding, and consulting with faculty. Ta- ble 3 shows that those three activities that influence the content and purpose of the collection are, as we expected, more fre- quently done by librarians than by library assistants. But certain areas of overlap- ping responsibilities are also evident. Bibliographic verification, for instance, the one activity that we hypothesized would be overwhelmingly the responsi- bility of library assistants, is done almost equally by both groups. It is unclear from the responses if those librarians who re- port doing bibliographic checking for col- lection development see this as a legiti- mate part of their job responsibilities. Perhaps they are trouble-shooting diffi- cult orders already attempted by library assistants. This table also shows that 10 to 11 percent of library assistants frequently engage in building collections. However, a closer examination of the responses indi- cates that approximately 80 percent derive TABLE 1 NUMBER AND PERCENT OF RESPONDENTS BY PERSONNEL TITLE AND RANK No. % No. % Library Assistant I 88 16 Assistant Librarian 40 12 Library Assistant II 207 37 Associate Librarian 159 47 Library Assistant III 172 31 Librarian 123 36 Library Assistant IV 96 17 University Librarian 16 5 Totals 563 101* 338 100 *In this table, as well as subsequent ones, percentages sometimes total to more or less than 100 because of rounding. from library assistants at the step III or IV levels (see table 4). For example, of the forty-four library as- sistants who select materials to acquire "fairly often or very frequently," thirty- five are library assistant Ills and IVs. While this is a relatively small number, it does raise some interesting questions: Are these library assistants with esoteric lan- guages or located in small libraries, or has a decision been made by their library ad- ministrators permanently to reassign a traditionally professional task? Technical Services Job responsibilities in technical service areas have been shifting for some time in libraries. When respondents were asked TABLE2 PERCENTAGE OF RESPONDENTS BY STATUS AND CAMPUS % % CamEus Librarians Libr~ Assistants Berkeley 25 30 Davis 12 16 Irvine 6 7 Los An~eles 26 17 Riversi e 4 5 San Diego 7 10 San Francisco 4 3 Santa Barbara 9 7 Santa Cruz 7 6 Job Responsibilities 303 how frequently they performed five tasks involving bibliographic access and con- trol, it was clear that even those activities we hypothesized were professional-level tasks-original cataloging and name au- thority control-have become the respon- sibility of both groups (see table 5). This blurring becomes even more apparent when the responses are broken down by levels within each group as shown by ta- ble 6. While blurring of job duties in collection development could be seen as an anom- aly, we see from table 6 that original cata- loging and authority control is done with almost equal frequency by library assis- tants III and IV and assistant and associate librarians. Public Service A third ~ea of job responsibility investi- gated was the public service done by li- brarians and library assistants. Sixty-five percent of librarians compared with 48 percent of library assistants report public service as at least one of their primary re- sponsibilities. We identified six public ser- vice tasks, including professional and paraprofessional activities, and then asked respondents to indicate how fre- quently they performed these. Table 7 be- low shows these responses for all steps within both groups. TABLE 3 FREQUENCY OF TASKS IN SUPPORT OF COLLECTION DEVELOPMENT "Fairly often" and "Very frequently" Responses ~mbined LAs Develop the collection by: biblio~aphic verification of materials selectmg materials to acquire evaluating and weeding conferring with faculty TABLE4 35 11 11 10 FREQUENCY OF TASKS IN SUPPORT OF COLLECTION DEVELOPMENT AT THE LIBRARY ASSISTANT LEVELS Combined Responses o~'Fairly often" and "V~ry frequently" Selecting materials to acquire Evaluating and weeding Conferring with faculty LAl LAll 1 3 2 8 8 9 % LAlli 17 17 12 % Librarians 32 56 43 32 % LAN 18 14 16 304 College & Research Libraries This table shows some interesting rela- tionships. Clearly, handling materials is more frequently done by library assis- tants, and teaching library use is dramati- cally the purview of librarians. Informa- tion and directional assistance cuts across all lines. The responses to activity "c: an- swering complex reference questions'' highlight the lack of precision that Veaner lamented in his article-what is perceived TABLES FREQUENCY OF TASKS INVOLVED IN BIBLIOGRAPHIC ACCESS AND CONTROL "Fairly often" and "Very frequently" Respo%ses Comb.ted LAs Librarians Create bibliographic access by: preparing records for computer input assignmg classification numbers doing copy cataloging doing onginal catciloging estab1ishing name authority control 38 20 25 14 21 26 25 10 28 25 July 1990 as complex by one individual may be rou- tine to another. In total, 66% of the librari- ans, but also 26% of the library assistants report answering complex reference ques- tions. In an attempt to clarify "complex," we asked another set of questions that fo- cused on whether librarians and library assistants were responsible for working on a reference desk alone-hypothesizing that in such circumstances complex ques- tions would be routinely encountered. Li- brary assistants responding to this ques- tion indicated that 60% do work alone fairly often or very frequently. It is inter- esting to speculate whether this is the be- ginning of a change similar to the shifts in technical services responsibilities docu- mented above. A hierarchical division of increasing responsibility is more evident in public than technical service, with more clearly visible functions that are reserved for librarians only. Management and Supervision Several areas of library management were identified and studied including ad- TABLE6 ORIGINAL CATALOGING ACTIVITY BY STATUS AND LEVEL Combined Responses of "Fairly often" and "Very frequently" % % % % % LA! LAll LAill LAlV Asst. Lbn. Develop the collection by % Assoc . Lbn . % Lbn. doing original catalogin~ 7 6 21 21 37 36 19 Establishing name authonty control 5 13 33 22 22 33 18 TABLE7 PUBLIC SERVICE ACTIVITIES OF LIBRARIANS AND LIBRARY ASSISTANTS The Following Table Shows the Answers of "Fairly often':;nd "Ve~ frequent!~" Combin%d for Ea~ t!f.e Que~~sssoc. % LAI LAll LAin LAlV Lbn. Lbn . Lbn . Help patrons use ~he library by: a. pa~ng or .checkmg 58 40 38 53 18 16 17 ou matenals b. giviJ:l.g ~ormation or drrechons 60 51 49 63 65 68 64 c. answering complex 17 18 31 39 73 67 reference a,ueshons 56 d. teaching li rary use 1 6 12 16 35 37 througR tours 33 e. teachmg library use througR presentations, seminars, workshops, 0 3 3 8 32 32 30 lectures, etc. f. advising scholars about collections, research strateg!es 4 6 11 18 33 40 42 ministration, supervisiOn, decision- making and perceived influence, staff training, and report-writing. Administra- tion is more often done by librarians than by library assistants. Thirty-one percent of the librarians report administration as a primary job responsibility. For 7% of the librarians, it is their sole activity, and for an additional 24% it is a primary part of their jobs. In contrast, only 8% of library assistants report administration as a pri- mary job responsibility. Supervision and Training Both librarians and library assistants re- port a high amount of supervisory respon- sibility, as reflected by table 8. Although supervision is done by both li- brarians and library assistants table 9 shows that library assistants are more in- volved in the direct supervision of student employees than are librarians, whereas li- brarians are more involved in supervising library assistants. Not surprisingly, responsibility for training follows a similar pattern. Forty- six percent of library assistants, but only 10% of librarians, fairly often or very fre- · quently train student library employees. Library assistants also more often report training clerical employees. Librarians, as might be expected, more often report spending time training other librarians: 15% do so fairly often or very frequently and only 34% never train their colleagues. However, an interesting exception to the Job Responsibilities 305 parallel between supervision and training is found in the case of library assistants. Whereas 62% of the librarians report being responsible for the direct supervision of li- brary assistants, only 19% report that they fairly often or very frequently spend time training library assistants. By contrast, al- though a much smaller percentage (34%) of the library assistants report having di- rect supervision of other library assistants, a higher percentage (24%) report that they fairly often or very frequently spend time training their library assistant colleagues. While there is no way of knowing from these data what percent of library assistants-at what levels-require train- ing, there is an interesting difference in the amount of training time library assis- tants receive based on whose supervision they are under. Participatory Management The questionnaire responses show that whether or not librarians classify them- selves as administrators or supervisors, they are much more involved in participa- tory management activities that allow them to influence library policies, goals, and objectives. Committee work is the near-exclusive domain of librarians. Only 8% of librarians compared to fully 65% of the library assistants report spending no time on committee work. Furthermore, among those who report time spent on committees, the extent of time is far greater for librarians. TABLES SUPERVISORY RESPONSffiiLITIES OF LIBRARIANS AND LIBRARY ASSISTANTS Supervise 1-20+ Lbns LAs Lbns 41 1 Student library employee Clerical workers Other Library assistants Librarians LAS 62 34 TABLE9 SLES 41 59 CATEGORIES OF EMPLOYEES SUPERVISED % Who Supervise None Ls LAs 59 78 86 38 59 41 91 97 66 99 Clerical 22 9 Other 14 3 %Who Supervise 1-20+ Ls LAs 41 22 14 62 41 59 9 3 34 1 306 College & Research Libraries As has been shown, librarians are more heavily involved in the I?anagement of ac- ademic libraries-in administration, in su- pervision of higher-level employees, and in committee work. They are also more in- volved tha library assistants in direct and indirect activities that provide an opportu- nity to gain information and wield influ- ence. As can be seen in table 10, librarians report closer working relationships with colleagues and more frequent attendance at conferences, workshops, and continu- ing education programs than do library as- sistants. This higher level of contact, collabora- tion, and continuing education experi- enced by librarians translates into a greater amount of influence on manage- ment decision-making activities, such as analyzing, planning, evaluating, and de- veloping. Table 11 compares the decision- making activities and perceptions of li- brarians and library assistants. Not only do librarians have more July 1990 decision-making responsibilities than li- brary assistants, but the collaborative and continually changing nature of librarians' jobs allow access to information and chan- nels of influence not available to library as- sistants. Writing Tasks Involvement in job-related writing tasks is very heavily the responsibility of librari- ans. Although the writing done by each group is most often of letters and memos, 71% of the librarians compared with 46% of the library assistants report this activity on a fairly often or very frequent basis. In the next most frequent writing activity- evaluations, reports and proposals-the gap between librarians and library assis- tants remains at 25%. One half of librari- ans and almost one quarter of library assis- tants engage in this fairly often or very frequently . . Even the writing of proce- dures, manuals and handbooks- materials more often used by technical TABLE 10 FREQUENCY OF INTERACTIVE ACTIVITIES OF LffiRARIANS AND LIBRARY ASSISTANTS IN PERCENTS "Fairly often" and "Very frequently" Responses C%bined LAs Work collaboratively with others Have contact with staff beyond my immediate work unit Must learn new methods or technologies Attend workshops TABLE 11 64 58 36 9 FREQUENCY OF DECISION-MAKING ACTIVITIES OF LffiRARIANS AND LffiRARY ASSISTANTS IN PERCENTS "Fairly often" and "Very frequently" Responses C%mbined LAs Analyze and evaluate programs, policies and services Plan or develop new procedures or services for my immediate work unit or department Plan or develop new procedures or services for my library or library system Am able to influence important decisions in my department Am able to influence important decisions in the library Make policy decisions 17 27 7 24 15 7 % Librarians 81 75 53 49 % Librarians 46 51 24 58 26 48 services staff-is done more frequently by librarians (35%) than by library assistants (23%). Paralleling the teaching role of li- brarians, the writing of instructional li- brary materials is almost completely done by librarians. Twenty-one percent of li- brarians write instructional materials fairly often or very frequently and only 26% never do so. In contrast, only 6% of the library assistants write instructional materials with any real frequency and 72% report that they never do so. Blurring or Overlapping In examining self-reported frequency of job tasks and responsibilities, our study has found a major overlap of responsibili- ties in the area of creating bibliographic ac- cess, small but provocative overlaps in the areas of collection development and pub- lic services, and a strong division of re- sponsibilities in management-related ac- tivities. In many cases in which the overlap occurred, the duties and responsi- bilities of library assistants at the III and IV levels were blurring into those of librari- ans. The heaviest blurring occurred in the frequencies reported for certain tasks by li- brary assistant IV and assistant librarian, such as for original cataloging. If Veaner' s hypothesis is correct, these two groups of library assistants should be the most dis- satisfied since their roles are the most am- biguous. How satisfied are librarians and library assistants within the University of California system? Can this dissatisfaction be linked to role ambiguity or to specific employment conditions? JOB SATISFACTION As a group, University of California li- brary staff are extremely satisfied with the work they do-reporting higher levels of job satisfaction than many other American workers. However, a comparison of the satisfaction levels reported by librarians and library assistants shows a significant difference between the two groups. Library assistants and librarians were asked three questions relating to their overall job satisfaction. Asked ''In general how satisfied are you with your present job?" 76% of the librarians, but only 50% of the library assistants, selected the two . Job Responsibilities 307 highest categories of satisfaction on a 5- point scale. Also, when asked how satis- fied they are with the nature of the work they do, 82% of the librarians but only 52% of the library assistants checked the two highest satisfaction ratings. Furthermore, although 44% of the librarians gave the "nature of their work" the highest possi- ble rating (a #5), only 22% of the library as- sistants did so. A third question, included in the section on job description, asked the respondents how frequently they ''do the kind of work they enjoy.'' Response cate- gories for this item ranged from never, sel- dom, sometimes, and fairly often to very frequently. Whereas 45% of the librarians indicated that they very frequently do the kind of work they enjoy and another 42% said that they fairly often do, only 19% of the library assistants gave the very fre- quently response and another 39% indi- cated that this happened fairly often. Combining the two categories of fre- quency, fully 87% of the librarians indicate that they at least fairly often do the kind of work they enjoy: this compares with 59% of library assistants. The most significant result of our survey and, to us, the most surprising, was the high satisfaction level of the librarians. Table 12 compares the job satisfaction reported by librarians and li- brary assistants. Fully 87 percent of librarians indicate that they at least fairly often do the kind of work they enjoy: this com- pares with 59 percent of library assis- tants. This discrepancy between the two groups prompted us to investigate what areas show the most job dissatisfaction, and to ask if these differ for librarians and library assistants. The dissatisfaction of both groups is markedly clustered in cer- tain steps and ranges within the salary/ promotion hierarchy. However, some dis- sonant themes cut across all levels within each group. We found that one of the most signifi- cant ways the two groups differ is in their 308 College & Research Libraries assessment of how effectively the library is using their expertise and abilities. On two questions that asked how well re- spondents felt their education and train- ing were being used, 70% or more of the librarians answered in the highest two sat- isfaction categories compared to 30% or less of the library assistants. The ability to help the public was valued very highly by public and technical service librarians alike. In the essay section one librarian wrote that ''faculty contact'' and being en- gaged in ''ongoing university research through my liaison assignments" was the most rewarding part of the job. Another traditional area of dissatisfac- tion in organizations focuses on salary and promotion issues, and the library environ- ment is no exception. Both librarians and library assistants reported a significant amount of dissatisfaction with salary and advancement. However, the difference in responses was much wider in this area than in any other. Eighty percent or more of the library assistants reported dissatis- faction with this part of their jobs. Table 13 summarizes these areas of dissatisfaction and shows the wide discrepancy in re- sponses between the two groups. As noted before, when the responses to the job satisfaction questions were broken down by ranks within the librarian and li- July 1990 brary assistant series, there are markedly different satisfaction levels . The widest gap in response occurred between library assistants I and II and library assistants III and IV. The clumping of dissatisfaction around certain issues, and the division of re- sponse, especially between the two lower- levels of library assistants and the two upper-levels can be characterized as fo- cusing on issues of equity and just reward. Our assumption in designing the original questionnaire was that major sources of complaint for librarians would be the amount of "clerical" or paraprofessional work they had to perform, and that library assistants would object to monotonous and repetitive work. However, neither was the case. Pockets of dissatisfaction rather appeared at certain crucial steps within the library assistant rank around promotion opportunities, promotion cri- teria and procedures, as well as over the broad satisfaction question discussed above. In each case there was both a strong discrepancy between librarians and library assistants, and between the highest level (IV s) library assistants and the lower steps (most noticeably the LA Ills). This same discrepancy was noticed within the librarian ranks, but it was less pronounced. TABLE 12 OVERALL JOB SATISFACTION OF LffiRARIANS AND LffiRARY ASSISTANTS IN PERCENTS Not at all Somewhat satisfied satisfied (1) (2) (3) In general, how satisfied are you with your present job: 18 Librarians 2 5 Library Assistants 6 12 32 How satisfied are you with the nature of the work you do: Librarians 1 2 14 Library Assistants 5 12 31 Never Seldom Sometimes (1) (2) (3) On my present job, I do the kind of work I enjoy: Librarians 0 1 12 Library Assistants 3 10 28 Very satisfied (4) (5) 44 31 30 20 38 44 30 22 Fairly Very often frequently (4) (5) 42 45 39 19 Job Responsibilities 309 TABLE 13 SOME ASPECTS OF JOB SATISFACTION SHOWING THE GREATEST DISCREPANCY IN PERCENTS Two Highest Satisfaction Ratings ("4" and "5") Combined % % Librarians Work you do in relation to your education and training Opportunities to use your education and training Opportunities for your own advancement Scilary you receive compared with that of others doing a comparable job Opportunities you have to change your job Criteria used in advancement Procedures used in advancement Interestingly, salaries and promotions are viewed with greater dissatisfaction than the relationship to supervisors. This may be due to the fact that within the uni- versity and library structure, supervisors have significantly less control over the sal- ary/promotion opportunities of their em- ployees. Merit increases for eligible librari- ans and library assistants are rather fixed. · Direct supervisory control over librarians' merit/promotion decisions is buffered by other administrative input and a strong system of peer review with mutually es- tablished criteria for assessing perfor- mance and determining parity. Compared to librarians, a library supervisor can have a greater effect on a library assistants' sal- ary and promotion opportunities, yet even this influence is circumscribed by the library assistants' classification structure. Library assistant ranks I-IV are based on the job responsibilities of the position, not the skills and abilities of the person hired. Performance is rewarded within a rigid structure of steps that reach a final plateau for each rank. Many long-term library as- sistants have "topped-out" and are no longer eligible for merit raises. Movement from rank to rank, promotion, for library assistants is not based on the supervisor's assessment nor on the employee's job per- formance but on job duties of the position. We have observed some of the conse- quences of these differences in salary structure, performance expectations, and rewards in the job description section of this paper. LAs 27 30 16 28 23 19 16 70 73 47 58 48 39 35 Librarians, on the other hand, do not have a formal job description. They are ex- pected to show a high degree of initiative, professional and personal commitment to developing and contributing to the mis- sion of the library and the profession. Li- brarians unwilling to make this commit- ment remain indefinitely at a lower rank. However, no matter what their primary job responsibilities or descriptions, those librarians who choose to contribute will continue, for a much longer period than li- brary assistants, to be rewarded with sal- ary increases and promotions recognizing those contributions. CONCLUSION We decided to examine the rewards and responsibilities of librarians and library as- sistants at the University of California in order to test a thesis by Allan Veaner. He asserts that because librarians and library assistants often perform tasks demanding the same expertise as librarians, library as- sistants tend to feel resentful. Our study has found that their dissatisfactions stem not only from inequity in pay, but also in promotion procedures, job development, and general status. Blurring of responsi- bilities is an important issue in a hierarchi- cal organization, particularly as such blur- ring causes dissatisfaction in an environment that is as service-oriented and people-dependent as a library. We found that while there are a number of areas where both professionals and paraprofessionals appear to perform the 310 College & Research Libraries same work, when the frequency of that work and the span of control or responsi- bility are examined, there are often clear distinctions between the two groups. However, we did uncover some provoca- tive areas of blurring where tasks tradi- tionally regarded as professional were be- ing performed by library assistants. These blurred areas may well point to a gen- eral shifting of certain tasks from professional to paraprofessional levels of responsibility. Re- assignment of responsibilities from pro- fessional to support staff has character- ized library work for decades. Nowadays librarians can list many responsibilities that were always done by librarians and are now routinely done by support staff. This trend is likely to continue, and per- haps even accelerate as libraries deal with budget constraints and as the profession meets the demands and challenges of new information needs and constantly chang- ing technology. However, even if many tasks were not being done simultaneously by both groups, a work situation marked by shifting responsibilities may cause mis- understanding of roles and of appropriate rewards. And in fact this seems to be the case. Al- though each group's satisfaction rate is very high, a comparison of the satisfaction levels shows a wide gap between librari- ans and library assistants, with the high- est discrepancies in the areas of worker utilization and salaries. As a group, U.C. library assistants are seriously dissatisfied with the reward structure and perceive that they are being treated inequitably. This juxtaposition of high general satis- faction rate with strong dissatisfaction with parts of the job is reflected in the re- sponses library assistants wrote in the comment section. Written in response to the question, ''What do you like least about your job?'', the following statement illustrates the sense of injustice that was expressed by many: I would change the pay-scale so that I was paid according to my skills as I learned them; that is the built-in step raises are so far apart that one has to work twenty years to get to the top of the pay scale. After one gets to the top, there is no- where else to go, especially if one is doing pro- fessional work but not being paid professional July 1990 wages, as are librarians .... Sorry if this seems like more than one aspect, but it really is one im- portant problem, especially in determining ca- reer satisfaction and human dignity. Interestingly, this person marked the next highest column of the satisfaction scale in response to the question ''In general how satisfied are you with your present job?" and likewise when asked to rate his satis- faction with the nature of the work he was doing. Procedures and opportunities for advancement were given the lowest marks. After looking at a series of similar com- plaints and comparing the low satisfaction areas of promotion and compensation to the high satisfaction with intrinsic re- wards such as autonomy and variety, we could speculate that paradoxically what contributes to higher satisfaction in one area may lead to disappointment in an- other. A more challenging line of duties will make the work more interesting, but it will also invite unfavorable comparison with librarians who seem to be involved with similar or equally difficult assign- ments that offer them substantially better rewards. It is very easy to conclude that two interactive but unequal work and re- ward systems, one at a higher level than the other, will inevitably lead to conflict and dissatisfaction. However, if workers are not seeing their roles clearly, and if tasks are constantly shifting between li- brarians and library assistants causing dis- satisfaction, there may be some solid ways for management to clarify roles and to es- tablish equity. Processes both of action and communication are needed to affect staff perceptions. Library administrators should carefully examine library tasks to ensure that they are being done by the most appropriate personnel and re- warded at an appropriate level. Since 1977 when a fourth step was added to the initial three, the University of California library administration has been concerned with restructuring the library assistant series to compensate those em- ployees for their increasing supervisory responsibilities and special subject or management expertise. A fifth step was under consideration, but not yet imple- mented while our survey was conducted. Nevertheless our findings make it doubt- ful that this additional step (effective since April 1983) will solve the endemic prob- lems mentioned by library assistants in our report. Unlike the lower ranks of the assistant series, the library assistant V cat- egory is part of the Administrative and Professional Staff series that was estab- lished to recognize "unique and valuable contributions to the University's overall mission of education, research, and public service and to encourage individual achievement, professionalism, initiative, and creativity.'' Job descriptions resemble that of academic librarians: "advanced paraprofessional knowledge enabling the performance of a full range of coordinat- ing and/or highly specialized functional/subject-area activities (i.e. ref- erence service at a level comparable to pro- fessional librarians, full original catalog- ing without routine revision)." 19 Its pay scale is open-ended and based on compar- ative merit. 20 If role blurring is a problem now, this deliberate overlap, although reflected in salary and status will not permit access to peer review and other important charac- teristics that distinguish academic librari- ans from their paraprofessional col- leagues. If appropriately funded and administered, the new open merit system could, if applied to ranks I-IV, address the inequity in pay and status currently expe- rienced by library assistants who assume new responsibilities or contribute to the li- brary's mission in significant ways with- out a major change. However, because the University of Cal- ifornia libraries experience a varying level of funding in the state each year, they can- not always offer appropriate monetary re- wards for employee performance-a con- dition shared by many other public and academic libraries. The new group of li- brary assistant Vs are already experienc- ing problems in equity and monetary re- wards. The survey respondents wrote about other kinds of recognition in addition to pay. While mentioning the need for mon- etary rewards, many of the library assis- tants also emphasized a need for apprecia- tion. One respondent identified the two Job Responsibilities 311 major aspects of the job that he wished to change as "getting a salary increase com- mensurate with my responsibilities" and changing the ''apparent low prestige and incomprehension in which my area of work seems to be held by many librarians on campus." This comment reflects Rus- sell's finding that ''Many nonprofessional Library staff do not want to become pro- fessional librarians, but they do want a ful- filling job and one that offers some oppor- tunity for promotion.' ' 21 A key word here is fulfilling. There are other ways libraries can vali- date their employees' work but much per- ceivable good faith must go into the effort otherwise it will be construed as manipu- lative. As our survey has shown, library assistants are fairly restricted in their ac- cess to committee work and in their colle- gial relationships within the library. Per- haps more involvement by library assistants in participatory management activities would help them gain a sense of control and influence and allow them to communicate to professional librarians the importance and dignity of the work they do. Librarians also need to take a more ag- gressive role, as Veaner has called for, in communicating to library assistants the very real difference in job content, span of control and responsibility, peer review, and performance expectations between li- brarians and library assistants. Many li- brary assistants have very little idea of the true nature of librarians' work or of the open-ended nature of the performance ex- pectations they must meet for promotion. Another traditional area of dissatis- faction in organizations focuses on salary and promotion issues and the library environment is no exception. Further research is needed to ascertain the extent to which the obviously per- ceived inequity by library assistants in- jures their work performance or their rela- tionships with professional librarians. Our study shows that in general, the work 312 College & Research Libraries environment of the University of Califor- nia libraries provides a climate that con- tributes to the meaningfulness of work. The greatest agreement between librari- ans and library assistants was found in their satisfaction with such aspects of their work as the opportunity to be of help to others, good relationships with co- July 1990 workers, job security, variety, flexibility, and a surprising degree of autonomy. However, the responses also show that even workers who are in an intrinsically satisfying environment become critical and less satisfied if they perceive that they are not being treated fairly. REFERENCES AND NOTES 1. Betty Hartzell, "Publisher's Letter: Job Satisfaction Is Number One" Personnel Journal67:6 (Mar. 1988). 2. "Satisfaction Top Job Concern," San Francisco Examiner Oan. 31, 1988). 3. Michael M. Gruneberg, Understanding Job Satisfaction (London: Macmillan, 1979), p.142. 4. Philip H. Mirvis and Edward J. Hackett, "Work and Work Force Characteristics in the Nonprofit Sector," Monthly lAbor Review 106:3-12 (Apri11983). 5. Allen B. Veaner, "Continuity or Discontinuity-a Persistent Personnel Issue in Academic Librari- anship," Advances in Library Administration & Organization 1:1-20 (1982). 6. Ibid., p.3. 7. Norman J. Russell, "Professional and Non-Professional in Libraries: The Need for a New Rela- tionship," Journal of Librarianship 17:293-310 (Oct. 1985). 8. Ibid., p.303. 9. Jeffery H. Greenhaus, Claudene Seidel, and Michael Marinis, "The Impact of Expectations and Values on Job Attitudes" Organizational Behavior and Human Performance 31:394-417 Oune 1983); Charles A. O'Reilly III, G. Nicholas Parlette, and Joan R. Bloom, "Perceptual Measures of Task Characteristics: The Biasing Effects of Differing Frames of Reference and Job Attitudes, 11 Academy of Management Journal23:118-31 (Mar. 1980); and Cynthia D. Fisher, "On the Dubious Wisdom of Expecting Job Satisfaction to Correlate with Performance," Academy of Management Review 5:507-612 (Oct. 1980). 10. James L. Bowditch and Anthony F. Buono, Quality of Work Life Assessment: A Survey-Based Approach (Boston, Mass.: Auburn House, 1982), p.2, 3, 19. 11. Beverly P. Lynch and JoAnn Verdin, "Job Satisfaction in Libraries: Relationships of the Work Itself, Age, Sex, Occupational Group, Tenure, Supervisory Level, Career Commitment, and Li- brary Department," Library Quarterly 53:434-47 (Oct. 1983). 12. Kenneth H. Plate and Elizabeth W. Stone, "Factors Affecting Librarian's Job Satisfaction," A Reader in Library Management, Ross Shimmon, ed. (London: Clive Bingley, 1976), p.146-60. Su- sanne P. Wahba, "Motivation, Performance and Job Satisfaction of Librarians," lAw Library ]our- nal71:270-78 (May 1978). 13. William J. Vaughn and J.D. Dunn, "A Study of Job Satisfaction in Six University Libraries," Col- lege & Research Libraries 35:163-77 (May 1974). 14. Lawrence D. Prybil, "Job Satisfaction in Relation to Job Performance and Occupational Level," Personnel Journal54:94-100 (Feb. 1973). 15. Peter F. McNally, "Job Motivation and Satisfaction of Reference Staff in Public Libraries," Argus 11:15 Oan.-Feb. 1982). 16. Russell, "Professional and Non-Professional in Libraries," p.301-303. 17. S. S. Chwe, "A Comparative Study of Librarian's Job Satisfaction: Catalogers and Reference Li- brarians in University Libraries," Journal of Academic Librarianship 4:139-43 Ouly 1978). 18. Address labels were provided for the librarians from the secretary of each campus's Librarian's Association of the University of California (LAUC). For library assistants, a mailing list was ob- tained from the U. C. system-wide personnel office. 19. University of California. "Class Specifications-B.15 Series Concept," Staff Personnel Manual (April1983) p.2. 20. Currently each rank of library assistant is attached to a specific job. Therefore, to be promoted from LAI to LAll, one must change jobs. This system is a present source of major dissatisfaction. 21. Russell, "Professional and Non-Professional in Libraries," p.299.