Perceived Influence of Library Professionalism as a Change Agent on the Management of University Libraries in Nasarawa State, Nigereia

The study investigated the perceived influence of library professionalism on the management of university libraries in Nasarawa State, Nigeria. The study looked at the influence of work experience of library staff, educational qualification of library staff and ICT skills of library staff as a change agent on the management of university libraries. Three (3) objectives with corresponding research questions guided the study while three hypotheses were formulated. The study adopted a survey research design. The population for the study comprises 98 library staff in the two universities in Nasarawa State. The entire population of the library staff was used for the study. The instrument for data collection was a self developed questionnaire, and titled “Perceived Influence of Library Professionalism on the Management of University Libraries in Nasarawa State” (PILPMULNS) which was validated by experts. The reliability of the questionnaire was established using Cronbach Alpha method and a reliability coefficient of 0.76 was obtained. Data was collected and analyzed using Means and Standard Deviation to answer the research questions and Chi-Square statistic to test the hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. Findings of the study revealed that, work experience of library staff, their educational qualifications and the Information and Communication Technology Skills possessed by the library staff has positive significant perceived influence on the management of university libraries in Nasarawa State, Nigeria. The study concluded that, library professionalism in terms of work experience of library staff, their educational qualifications and the Information and Communication Technology Skills possessed by the library staff has significant positive influence on the management of university libraries. Recommendations were made that, University management should ensure Library staff are provided access to professional development programmes/ in-service training to boost/upgrade their qualification since it has been found to influence the management of university libraries and Seminars/ workshops on the utilization of Information and Communication Technologies should be provided by university management to library staff to enhance their library skills necessary for management of university libraries