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Manchester Libraries: Renewal and transformation

Manchester Library and Information Service (MLIS) is part of Manchester City Council’s Neighbourhood Services Directorate and is in year five of a major service improvement which has seen the service transform itself. Change has been rapid and the service is now winning awards, meeting national targets and has seen a sharp increase in customer satisfaction. The changes include:

• A whole service workforce restructure and workforce development plan
• A refocusing of the service to ensure the customer is at it’s heart
• The realignment of the budget
• A 5% increase in resident satisfaction
• A massive improvement in value for money and key performance indicators
• Investment in refurbished and new library buildings
• A major transformational change programme for both customers and staff alike
• Major increase in partnership working across the city, including other MCC services, HE/FE sector, PCT and the Third Sector and other library authorities
• A raised awareness of the library service
• Commissioning of services from partners (eg Homework Centres, Health Information Points, ICT facilitators)
• Evidence of library activity inline with Council priorities and their contribution to the LAA and other national indicators

MLIS delivers a wide range of leisure, cultural, learning and information services through a network of 22 community libraries, as well as Central Library, four mobile libraries, home library and Prison library services. It also manages the Greater Manchester County Record Office on behalf of AGMA (Association of Greater Manchester Authorities).

It has undertaken a thorough review and analysis of the service to ensure that resources are correctly allocated and to ensure best use of resources, be it books, people or buildings.

A thorough review of the community library network staffing has been carried out, in conjunction with a detailed analysis of how libraries are used, resulting in an increase in opening hours at nine libraries within existing resources, in line with public demand. Having been able to demonstrate that existing resources had been maximised, the service has been successful in bidding for revenue growth to extend Sunday opening to six libraries across the city and also for increased opening hours and staffing at new and refurbished libraries.

New libraries for Manchester

A major part of the improvement of the overall service has been the delivery of significant capital investment in library buildings - the estate has been reviewed and an Asset Management Plan (AMP) developed which has become the Renewal Programme : New Libraries for Manchester.

Phase 1 of the programme has been completed with three new co-located libraries, a complete refurbishment of our busiest district library and a further two refurbished libraries.

Phase 2 is well underway with three new co-located libraries and two complete refurbishments.

Phase 3 will see the refurbishment of Central Library, the creation of a multi agency Archive Centre of Excellence as well as a new City Library, a vibrant family and community library in the city centre.

Phase 4 The service is currently in discussions with various partner agencies in the meantime, the AMP has released funding from the corporate landlord for repair and maintenance of all library buildings that are not in the live phases to ensure that services can be delivered to residents in a safe and accessible environment.

In order to deliver a 21st century library service, MLIS has successfully received additional revenue through the City Council business planning process for a complete refresh of the 600 public facing PCs and the introduction of RFID technology across the city and the development of on-line services including an upgrade of the Library Management System.

One of the key activities has been to tell the good news story to the residents.

MLIS has over 123,500 active members (27% of the population), issues over 2.3m items and attracts over 3.3m visitors (Central Library 1m), as well as delivering over 750,000 public access computer sessions in libraries, nearly 45,000 online reservations and 263,000 renewals in 2008/2009. We are heavily committed to Web 2.0 and social networking and local studies web pages alone registered 350,000 page views.

For more information on this case study visit the case study section of the MLA research website.

November 2009