Untitled-3 Job Satisfaction of Canadian University Librarians 31 Job Satisfaction of Canadian University Librarians: A National Survey Gloria J. Leckie and Jim Brett This study investigates the job satisfaction of Canadian university li- brarians, using a replication of a 1993 American study to facilitate inter- national comparisons.1 It explores the relationships between faculty/ academic status, administration, and the participation of librarians in library planning and decision-making, university affairs, and professional activities. A survey was sent to all university librarians in Canada, re- sulting in 738 usable responses. Data analysis concentrated on com- parisons between faculty- and non-faculty-status librarians, and admin- istrative and nonadministrative librarians. Although faculty-/academic- status librarians were significantly more satisfied with their involvement in university affairs and promotion and tenure processes, they were not more satisfied with other dimensions of their work, such as workload and salary. Administrative librarians, on the other hand, were signifi- cantly more satisfied with most of the major aspects of work being mea- sured, and perceived themselves to be much more involved in library planning and university affairs than did nonadministrative librarians. cademic librarians work in a unique setting. The challenge of being in a dynamic environ- ment of research and learning is often viewed as an intangible benefit of their jobs. Yet, despite the excitement of participating in the constant changes in higher education over time, the daily reality of the university is one of ponder- ous stability: a very large proportion of the staff stay within the institution for their entire careers. Although faculty are the most likely to follow this pattern, the same is also true for many academic li- brarians, giving rise to concerns over the ability of individuals to stay motivated, involved, and happy in their positions, particularly if there are no opportunities for advancement. Thus, the question of what makes academic librarians satisfied or dissatisfied with their work over the long run has been of interest for decades and has generated a number of studies. In much of the research about job sat- isfaction among academic librarians, two kinds of relationships have been investi- gated. The first of these is the relation- ship between the characteristics of aca- demic librarians� work and their job sat- isfaction. Studies taking this approach Gloria J. Leckie is an Assistant Professor in the Graduate School of Library and Information Science at the University of Western Ontario; e-mail: leckie@julian.uwo.ca. Jim Brett is Coordinator, Document Delivery, at the University of Guelph; e-mail: jimbrett@uoguelph.ca. 31 32 College & Research Libraries January 1997 have looked at specific components of professional work, including workload, autonomy, creativity, challenge, special- ization, decision-making, control, salary, benefits, and various other characteris- tics.2 Another major avenue of exploration evident in the literature is the relation- ship between the relative institutional status of academic librarians (vis-à-vis other groups of employees) and their overall job satisfaction. Studies pursuing this line of investigation reflect an issue particular to academic librarians, that being the requirements of the faculty- or academic-status model. Aspects exam- ined include librarians� involvement in, and satisfaction with, research and pub- lication, teaching, tenure, collegiality, peer review, and participation in deci- sion-making within the library and the wider university.3 Questions often con- sidered are whether academic librarians who have faculty status or equivalent are more or less satisfied with their work than academic librarians who do not have faculty status within the university, and whether librarians who are required to do research and publish are more or less satisfied than those who do not. Unfortunately, both kinds of studies often produce conflicting or confusing re- sults, arising because of three major prob- lems. First, much of the research uses different variables and different instru- ments to assess satisfaction. Steven Chwe, for instance, looked at areas of work as a potential cause for differences in satisfaction, and noted that although catalogers and reference librarians had no significant differences in overall satisfac- tion, there were aspects of their work that reference librarians found to be more sat- isfying than catalogers.4 Susanne Wahba and Ilene Rockman were interested in the impact of gender on satisfaction, and suggested that it did seem to play a part in overall job satisfaction, although D�Elia refuted this finding.5�7 Patricia Kreitz and Annegret Ogden examined levels of responsibility as an important aspect of academic librarians� satisfac- tion, demonstrating that the higher lev- els of responsibility and control over their work experienced by librarians could account for their higher levels of job sat- isfaction when compared to library as- sistants.8 Bonnie Horenstein investigated the relationship between faculty status, participation, and satisfaction, and con- cluded that participation was a determin- ing factor in job satisfaction.9 Marjorie Benedict explored satisfaction with fac- ulty status, and found that librarians with professorial ranks and titles were the most satisfied.10 Recently, Tina Hovekamp has looked at the impact of union mem- bership on academic librarians� job satis- faction, noting that it was associated with lower levels of satisfaction.11 Although all these studies have useful and interesting findings, it is often hard to make com- parisons and thus to arrive at a greater understanding. Beyond the problems inherent in the choice of variables and instruments, a second issue is that, with a broad range of types of postsecondary institutions in the United States and Canada, the work of academic librarians varies consider- ably with institution type, making it dif- ficult to conduct comprehensive surveys that are meaningful. And, third, even if the group of academic librarians under study is limited to a specific type of in- stitution (such as librarians in research- intensive universities or liberal arts col- leges), very few studies are ever repli- cated using another population of aca- demic librarians for direct comparison. This study addresses the first and third problems with a Canadian replication of Bonnie Horenstein�s 1993 study of job satisfaction among American academic librarians.12 Her study examined both job satisfaction in general and with respect to faculty status, as well as the librarians� participation in library decision-making, university affairs, and professional activi- ties. The broad range of general factors Job Satisfaction of Canadian University Librarians 33 as well as the specific aspects of the fac- ulty-status model covered in the survey were appealing, because we were also interested in these issues in the Canadian context. Accordingly, Horenstein�s sur- vey was amended slightly (discussed below) and sent out to the entire popu- lation (1,558) of librarians working in Ca- nadian universities. Purpose The overall purpose of the study was to follow up on earlier research into the nature of faculty status for Canadian university librarians.13 In that study, the authors reviewed the evolution of the faculty-status model as applied to Cana- dian university librarians, noting that only a small number of sites actually have full faculty status (with the same ranks, titles, and evaluative criteria used by the faculty). In Canada, the general practice is to grant university librarians a modi- fied form of faculty status commonly re- ferred to as academic status, a term that will be used consistently throughout this article.14 The authors then analyzed the collective agreements at institutions where librarians had academic status and determined that the components of aca- demic status in the agreements varied quite widely across institutions. With so little common understanding of the terms and meaning of academic status, the authors speculated that there seemed to be no unified vision of academic librarianship in Canada. They further wondered if the lack of agreement about academic status would be reflected if aca- demic librarians were asked about their job satisfaction. Accordingly, the authors set out to conduct a national survey of the job satisfaction of Canadian univer- sity librarians, a feat that had never be- fore been attempted. Within that broad framework, the study had two goals. The first goal was to explore a series of questions relating to the job satisfac- tion of Canadian university librarians. Would academic status be related to job satisfaction in the Canadian context? If so, what were the elements of this rela- tionship? If not, what other factors might contribute to satisfaction or dissatisfac- tion? The second goal was to draw compari- sons with Horenstein�s American study. Would Horenstein�s finding that job sat- isfaction was very closely related to fac- ulty/academic status be confirmed? Would librarians with academic status perceive themselves to be more involved in library planning and decision-making, as Horenstein had found? If not, what could account for the differences between Canadian and American academic librar- ians? Methodology To answer the questions above, Horen- stein�s original survey was amended and sent out individually to all university li- brarians across Canada. Because the popu- lation of university librarians in Canada is much smaller than in the United States, the authors decided against sampling. When a possible response rate in the area of 20 percent was taken into account, achieving a data set comparable to Horenstein�s (n = 683) required a survey of the entire group. A master mailing list was compiled from a number of existing Canadian library directories and through personal contacts. The final list consisted of 1,558 librarians, including those in both managerial and nonmanagerial po- sitions (Horenstein did not include man- agers). A small amount of funding ob- ta i n e d f o r t h e s t u d y e n a b l e d t h e authors to mail to individuals rather than to directors for distribution, thus ensuring a better and more represen- tative response. Horenstein�s restriction to institutions with enrollments larger than 2,000 stu- dents was not replicated because almost all Canadian universities are government supported, and few have an enrollment that small. Thus, in an effort to be com- prehensive nationally, the authors did 34 College & Research Libraries January 1997 include smaller institutions. However, these institutions account for less than 5 percent of the librarians surveyed, so it is doubtful that their inclusion would sig- nificantly bias the results in terms of com- parability with the American study. To facilitate later comparisons, the authors made as few revisions as possible to the survey instrument. They did alter the order of the background questions (having to do with education, experience, salary, department, etc.) from the origi- nal. Also, because the authors intended to conduct a national survey and wanted to include all academic librarians (includ- ing managerial librarians), they added a category of administration to the ques- tion about primary department or service area.15 Furthermore, they amended the questions that asked about specific com- ponents of the faculty-status model (such as elibigility for tenure, sabbatical, etc.) to reflect Canadian conditions. The au- thors also added some questions not in Horenstein�s original survey that had to do with collective representation and committees, evaluation of colleagues, relationship with support staff, and per- formance review and promotion pro- cesses. The bulk of the questions then asked librarians to rate thirty-two vari- ables covering major aspects of their work, and were identical or very similar to the comparable questions on Horen- stein�s survey. The numerous idiosyncracies of trans- lating the surv ey into French were handled by Marc Richard, a librarian at McGill University. Both the English and French versions were pretested in early fall 1995, and a few adjustments were made based on the pretest. The final sur- veys were mailed out in October 1995. Response and Data Analysis Seven hundred and forty surveys were returned, realizing a response rate of 47.4 percent, far exceeding the authors� expec- tations. Like Horenstein, the authors were surprised at the high rate of return, and can only speculate that the topic is of great interest to Canadian university librarians, many of whom previously had not been asked about their job satisfaction. One hundred and sixty-two people also took the time to provide comments, some of which were rather lengthy, and numer- ous others requested a copy of the find- ings, thus further suggesting widespread interest in the topic. Out of the 740 re- sponses, only two surveys proved to be unusable. Thus, 738 surveys were coded and entered into an SPSS for Windows data matrix for analysis. Horenstein identified three groups of librarians for comparison, using combi- nations of faculty status and rank vari- ables. Because of the nature of faculty status in Canada, the authors could use only two groupings, based on responses to question 8: those with academic sta- tus (n = 463), and those with nonaca- demic status (n = 269). As data entry was taking place, the authors noted that li- brarians who had indicated administra- tion as their primary department or ser- vice area (n = 279) appeared to have slightly higher levels of job satisfaction, so it was decided to conduct some com- parative analyses of that group as well. Respondents General characteristics of the respon- dents are presented in table 1. A large percentage of the respondents (62%) in the study had more than fifteen years� experience as librarians, as Horenstein also found.16 Ninety-four percent of re- spondents held a master �s degree in li- brary and information science or equiva- lent, and about one-quarter had a second master�s degree. Administration and ref- erence were the two most common ser- vice areas indicated, although librarians Sixty-three percent of librarians indicated that they had academic status, whereas 36 percent had professional or other status. Job Satisfaction of Canadian University Librarians 35 from every service area were represented. Salaries tended to be on the high side, with 65 percent of librarians earning more than $50,000 per year. Sixty-three percent of librarians indi- cated that they had academic status, whereas 36 percent had professional or other status. A very large proportion of respondents (87%) indicated that they were eligible for either tenure or continu- ing appointment, a much higher figure than the 58 percent eligible for tenure in the American study. The higher figure is undoubtedly because the question on eligibilty for tenure was reworded as �eli- gibility for tenure or continuing appoint- ment.� In Canada, the phrase �continu- ing appointment� is commonly used to describe a tenurelike process for librar- ians, but it can also apply to non-faculty- status librarians, thus increasing affirma- tive responses to this question. The ma- jority of librarians have relatively little pressure to do research and publish: 72 percent indicated that research and pub- lication were not required, even though TABLE 1 Characteristics of Respondents Characteristic % of sample Experience 0–3 years 5.3 4–9 years 16.7 10–15 years 16.0 >15 years 62.1 Education MLS 94.4 Extra master’s 27.4 Ph.D. 4.6 Gender Female 67.9 Male 32.1 Primary Department Acquisitions 0 .8 Administration 37.8 Cataloging 10.3 Circulation 0.1 Collections 8.1 ILL 0.9 Reference 33.2 Serials 0.9 Systems 3.0 Other 4.7 Management Style Autocratic 25.0 Collegial 41.3 Team 22.2 Other 11.5 Characteristic % of sample Salary <$30,000 2.2 $30–40,000 12.2 $40–50,000 20.3 $50–60,000 29.5 >$60,000 35.7 Status Academic/faculty 63.3 Professional/other 36.8 Eligible for Tenure/ Continuing Appointment Yes 86.4 No 13.3 Eligible for Sabbatical Yes 77.9 No 22.1 Publication Requirements None 31.7 Encouraged only 40.4 Some required 23.1 Substantial record required 4.8 Eligible for Seats on University Governance Structures Yes 89.4 No 10.6 36 College & Research Libraries January 1997 they might be encouraged. This is slightly higher than in Horenstein�s sample, where 65 percent of respondents indi- cated that little or no research and publi- cation were required. Seventy-eight per- cent of librarians in the study were eli- gible for research leave, and 89 percent indicated that they were eligible to hold seats on university governance bodies, again suggesting that these privileges are extended to non-faculty-status librarians at some insitutions. In terms of representation for job-re- lated negotiation, a large majority (70%) of librarians indicated that they were rep- resented by their faculty association or union. The next most common form of representation (13%) was a professional/ managerial association or union. Finally, responses to the question on management style in the library suggest that an autocratic style of academic li- brary management appears to be wan- ing. Sixty-three percent of librarians in- dicated that the management style in their library was based on either a colle- gial or team model. Another 11 percent indicated �other,� with many respon- dents making comments that their library was in transition to a more collegial or team approach. Elements of Satisfaction As Horenstein notes, the aspects of job satisfaction on the questionnaire were derived from numerous studies, and in- clude both intrinsic and extrinsic mea- sures.17 Intrinsic items are those that re- flect the nature of the work, such as assigned duties, using your own judg- ment, and opportunities for challenge. Extrinsic items are those that are exter- nal to the work, such as salary, benefits, promotion opportunities, and so on. The various aspects of job satisfaction were measured using a five-point scale, with five being highly satisfactory, three being satisfactory, and one being highly unsatisfactory. In addition to all the par- ticular aspects of their work, a final item asked respondents to scale their overall job satisfaction. Also, a second measure of overall satisfaction was calculated by summing the responses to all the satis- faction variables for those individuals who had completed all those items. Horenstein found that this composite measure provided a slightly more reliable measure of overall satisfaction than the final question alone.18 The response to the final question on �overall satisfaction with your job� re- sulted in a mean response of 3.59 (n = 724). Thus, as in Horenstein�s study, li- brarians responding to the Canadian sur- vey reported above satisfactory levels of overall job satisfaction. Higher levels were also confirmed using the compos- ite satisfaction variable, with a mean re- sponse of 78.57 (n = 591/sd = 17.22). Within the composite satisfaction vari- able, a mean value of seventy-two indi- cates �satisfactory� and a value of one hundred twenty indicates �highly satis- factory.� The specific elements of satisfaction for all the respondents are shown in table 2, ranked in order of most to least satis- factory items. In Horenstein�s original study, the item providing the most satis- faction for librarians was their relation- ship with library users. At the time, the authors found this somewhat puzzling, considering that all types of librarians were included in the study, some of whom (like technical services and sys- tems librarians) would have little or no direct contact with library users. It was surprising, then, to find that the relation- ship with library users came out as the single most satisfactory item on the Ca- nadian study as well. Other items in the top five most satis- factory elements were benefits, oppor- In other words, levels of satisfaction with workload were below satisfac- tory on the scale. Job Satisfaction of Canadian University Librarians 37 tunties to use own judgment, relationship with nonprofessional staff, and assigned duties. Relationship with colleagues came sixth, but if the item concerning re- lationship with nonprofessional staff is removed from the analysis (because it was not in Horenstein�s survey), then relationship with colleagues is in the top five. Thus, four items in the top five in the Canadian study (relationship with users, judgment, duties, and relationship with colleagues) were also in the top five in the American study. Items ranked lowest were promotion opportunities, performance review pro- cess, relationship with university admin- istration, support for publication and research, and participation in university decision-making. The items on workload and recogni- tion of accomplishments were sixth and seventh lowest, but, again, if support for publication/ research and performance review are dropped (because they were not in Horenstein�s survey), then they are among the lowest five. Accordingly, three of the items ranked lowest in the authors� study (recognition of accomplish- ments, promotion opportunities, and relationship with university administration) were also the low- est in Horenstein�s study. With respect to workload in particular, the averaging of satis- faction scores ranked it near the bottom, with a mean of 2.89 (2.96 in Horenstein�s study). In other words, levels of satisfaction with workload were below satisfactory on the scale. This point was brought home by forty-five re- spondents (28% of those com- menting), all of whom remarked that their workloads were a very distressing aspect of their posi- tions. The most frequent concern was that as resources (both human and fiscal) continued to shrink, the pressures to do more in their workday steadily increased. Thus, the current cli- mate of cutbacks in government funding to higher education in Canada appears to be having a very tangible impact on individual academic librarians. The strong similarity of the findings between the two studies regarding the el- ements of satisfaction caused the authors to rethink the meaning of table 2 and the comparable table in Horenstein�s paper. They were intrigued by the notion that a very large sample of North American academic librarians, in two different countries, had said that despite all the other attractions or benefits of working TABLE 2 Aspects of Practice Ranked Most to Least Satisfactory, Based on Responses of Total Sample Satisfaction variable Mean Relationship with library users 3.86 Benefits 3.82 Opportunities to use own judgment 3.81 Relationship with nonprofessional staff 3.80 Assigned duties 3.75 Relationship with professional colleagues 3.75 Opportunities for independent action 3.64 Salary 3.57 Working conditions 3.51 Opportunities for variety 3.45 Librarians’ status at your university 3.41 Opportunities for challenge 3.38 Opportunities for professional 3.26 participation Relationship with library administration 3.19 Promotion and tenure process 3.05 Management style 2.95 Opportunities to participate in 2.95 library management Recognition of accomplishments 2.91 Workload 2.89 Promotion opportunities 2.88 Performance review process 2.85 Relationship with univ. administration 2.83 Support for publication and research 2.74 Participation in univ. decision-making 2.50 38 College & Research Libraries January 1997 in an academic environment, the single most satisfactory element of their work was their relationship to their clientele. In thinking about the implications of this finding, the authors noted that the items in table 2 split roughly into two parts� intrinsic measures (such as relationship with users, opportunities for challenge, independence, judgment) were ranked in the top half, whereas extrinsic measures (such as management�s style, promotion opportunities, relationship with admin- istration) fell in the bottom half, with a few exceptions. This distribution is even more startling in Horenstein�s data, where the midpoint item on working conditions marks a turning point; items ranked above it are intrinsic measures and those below it are extrinsic.19 This distribution suggests that academic li- brarians are most satisfied with the traditonal elements of librarianship as a profession (such as service, working with users, independence of work, challenge) and less satisfied with the peculiarities of working in an academic environment where occupational status, promotion and tenure, publishing, and political in- volvement are a concern, all of which are components of the faculty- or academic- status model. Academic Status and Job Satisfaction To examine the relationship between aca- demic status and job satisfaction in greater detail, analysis of variance was used to determine the satisfaction of two groups of librarians�those with aca- demic status (n = 463) and those without (n = 269)�on the satisfaction items (shown in table 2), and the composite satisfaction score. Significant differences found through the analysis are presented in table 3. Generally, the Canadian study did not find as many significant differences as did the American research. Overall sat- isfaction (from the final question) and composite satisfaction levels did not dif- fer significantly between academic-sta- tus librarians and other librarians. Nev- ertheless, Canadian librarians who have faculty/academic status do seem to be TABLE 3 Significant Differences in Satisfaction, by Group (Academic vs. Nonacademic Status) Overall Non- Variable Mean Academic academic Signif. PRE* Librarians’ status at your 3.41 3.60 3.08 .000 .045 university (n=726) Opportunities for challenge (n=727) 3.38 3.48 3.21 .003 .012 Opportunities for professional 3.26 3.38 3.06 .000 .022 participation and development (n=727) †Promotion and tenure process (n=697) 3.05 3.20 2.76 .000 .038 Promotion and advancement opportunities (n=716) 2.88 3.01 2.65 .000 .022 Relationship with university 2.83 2.91 2.67 .004 .011 admin. (n=702) Support for research (n=679) 2.74 2.85 2.53 .001 .017 Opportunities to participate in univ. 2.50 2.64 2.25 .000 .029 manage. and decision-making (n=714) * PRE = Proportional Reduction in Error. Used to describe the amount of variance for which the variable is responsible. The larger the number, the more significant the variable. † Not investigated in Horenstein’s study. Job Satisfaction of Canadian University Librarians 39 more satisfied with their status in the university, and with opportunities avail- able to them for challenge, promotion, professional participation, and participa- tion in the university. They are also more satisfied with the promotion and tenure process and with support for doing re- search, but this is not surprising given that most faculty collective agreements clearly outline how these two processes should work, thus removing a potential cause of dissatisfaction. There were a number of differences found significant in Horenstein�s study that were not evident in the Canadian data. For instance, having academic sta- tus in Canada did not appear to affect satisfaction with salary and benefits nor with the relationship with the library ad- ministration or participation in library management. It is likely that these results are directly related to the fact that the aca- demic-status model common in Canada emphasizes evaluative criteria based on professional responsibilities rather than teaching, research, and university service. Salaries and benefits, therefore, would not vary as much as they would in the United States, where some academic li- brarians have full faculty status and rank (and thus different priorities and salary), some have a modified form of faculty status, and others have neither. In both studies, academic-status librar- ians were not significantly more satisfied with their assigned duties, workloads, opportunities to use their own judgment or act independently, and relationships with users and colleagues. Administration and Job Satisfaction As noted earlier, it was observed infor- mally during data entry that librarians who had indicated that their primary service area or department was admin- istration appeared to have high levels of satisfaction. The questions that arose from this observation were: (1) Would administrators have higher levels of sat- isfaction than librarians who did not have administrative responsibilities (i.e., those working primarily as reference librarians, cataloguers, systems librarians, etc.)? and (2) In the Canadian context, would ad- ministration prove to be a more signifi- cant determinant of satisfaction than aca- demic status? Table 4 presents the results of analysis of variance performed on the adminis- trative (n = 279) and nonadministrative (n = 459) groupings. In general, admin- istrators appear to be significantly more satisfied than nonadministrators with those elements relating to control over their work, including opportunities to use their own judgment, act indepen- dently, and experience challenge in their work. They are also more satisfied with the opportunities to participate in both library and university decision-making and, not surprisingly, are more satisfied with their relationship with library and university administration, and the man- agement style in the library. Perhaps be- cause of their greater participation in li- brary decision-making, they are also more satisfied with promotion, tenure, and performance review processes. In addition, administrators are more satis- fied with the working conditions and responsibilities. Finally, they also have higher overall levels of satisfaction on both the single-question and the compos- ite satisfaction scores. It appears, there- fore, that having administrative respon- sibilities tends to increase overall job sat- isfaction, a finding also strongly sup- ported in the work of Lynch and Verdin.20 Furthermore, highly significant differ- ences between administrators and nonadministrators were found on eigh- teen items (table 4), suggesting that ad- ministration may be a better predictor of job satisfaction for Canadian academic librarians than academic status, which produced highly significant differences on only eight items (table 3). Once again, no significant differences between administrators and nonadmini- strators were found regarding salary, 40 College & Research Libraries January 1997 TABLE 4 Significant Difference in Satisfaction, by Group (Administration vs. Nonadministration) Overall Non- Variable Mean Admin. admin. Signif. PRE Benefits (n=736) 3.82 3.94 3.74 .006 .010 Opportunities to use own judgment (n=724) 3.81 4.10 3.62 .000 .051 Assigned duties (n=730) 3.75 3.96 3.62 .000 .026 Opportunties for independence 3.64 3.93 3.46 .000 .043 of action (n=735) Working conditions (n=734) 3.51 3.84 3.30 .000 .059 Opportunities for job enrichment (n=730) 3.45 3.75 3.26 .000 .044 Opportunities for challenge (n=733) 3.38 3.70 3.17 .000 .049 Opportunities for professional 3.26 3.49 3.11 .000 .030 participation (n=733) Relations with library admin. (n=723) 3.19 3.63 2.92 .000 .078 Promotion and tenure process (n=703) 3.05 3.22 2.94 .001 .014 Management style (n=729) 2.95 3.37 2.69 .000 .073 Opportunities to participate in library 2.95 3.66 2.51 .000 .185 decision-making (n=727) Recognition of accomplishments (n=727) 2.91 3.13 2.77 .000 .025 Opportunities for promotion (n=722) 2.88 3.18 2.69 .000 .039 Performance review process (n=711) 2.85 2.99 2.75 .004 .011 Relations with university admin. (n=707) 2.83 3.11 2.64 .000 .048 Support for research (n=684) 2.74 2.92 2.63 .001 .015 Opportunities to participate in univ. 2.50 2.86 2.26 .000 .072 manage. and decision-making (n=720) workload, and relationships with users, colleagues, and staff. Participation and Academic Status Horenstein posed the question: �To what extent do academic librarians participate in library planning and decision-making, university academic affairs, and profes- sional activities beyond their institu- tion?�21 Would different groups of librar- ians have different levels of participation? Participation measures are found throughout the questionnaire. A number of questions looked at actual participa- tion through teaching, meetings at- tended, membership in library organiza- tions, and conference attendance. Partici- pation of librarians in library manage- ment and decision-making was also as- sessed in several other questions having to do with internal structures of the li- brary. Also, librarians� perceptions of their participation were measured on a four-point scale in questions that ex- plored the extent to which librarians felt involved, consulted, and informed re- garding decision-making in the library, the control they had over their profes- sional activities, their participation in university affairs and professional activi- ties outside their library, and their in- volvement in evaluating colleagues. Horenstein found relatively few dif- ferences in actual participation among the three groups of librarians she consid- ered.22 This was also true in the Canadian study: no highly significant differences were found between academic-status li- brarians and other librarians in terms of teaching, attending library and univer- sity meetings, or conference attendance. Academic status librarians did tend to Job Satisfaction of Canadian University Librarians 41 have more memberships in library asso- ciations (p < .01, PRE = .050). However, perceived participation proved to be a different matter. Horen- stein noted that faculty librarians felt �more involved in library planning and decision making, more consulted, more informed by the administration about matters affecting the library, and more involved in the university than other li- brarians.�23 Librarians with full faculty status and rank felt most involved, whereas those with neither felt least in- volved. This study only partially confirmed Horenstein�s findings about the relation- ship between perceived participation and faculty status. As table 5 shows, aca- demic-status librarians in Canada do not perceive themselves as more in control over their daily work and more involved in decision-making nor do they feel more consulted and informed about matters affecting the library. They do, however, perceive themselves to be more involved in evaluating their colleagues (perhaps because of their participation in the ten- ure process), participating more in pro- fessional activities beyond their institu- tions (not found significant by Horen- stein), and participating more in institu- tional academic affairs. Thus, the find- ings in common between the two stud- ies regarding perceived participation were: librarians with faculty/academic status do not perceive themselves as hav- ing more control over their daily work than other librarians, but they do per- ceive themselves to be participating more in university affairs. A third finding, that academic-status librarians are signifi- cantly more involved in evaluating their colleagues, was not explored by Horen- stein. Participation and Administration As was the case with the various aspects of job satisfaction, administration proved to be a slightly stronger predictor of dif- ferences in participation than academic status. With respect to actual participation, there were significant differences be- tween administrative and nonadmini- strative librarians regarding participation in library and university meetings (ad- ministrators attend more), and teaching (administrators teach less). They were also more likely to be aware of decisions made by the library planning group or council than other librarians. However, there were no significant differences in professional memberships or conference attendance. There were significant differences be- tween library administrators and nonad- ministrators in all of the perceived par- ticipation items (table 5). Administrators TABLE 5 Significant Differences in Perceived Participation, by Group Academic Nonacademic Non- Variable* Status vs. Status admin. vs. Admin. Involved in management Not significant 3.37 2.25 and decision-making Feels consulted Not significant 3.48 2.80 Feels informed Not significant 3.45 2.77 Control over own activities Not significant 3.59 3.31 University participation 2.18 1.67 2.34 1.77 Professional participation 2.56 2.29 2.61 2.36 Evaluation of others 2.41 1.76 2.80 1.80 *Unless indicated, differences in mean scores for each variable are significant at p<.01. 42 College & Research Libraries January 1997 felt more in control over their work, more involved in decision-making, and more consulted and in- formed about library mat- ters. They also perceived themselves as being more involved in evaluating col- leagues, participating more in professional activities beyond their institutions, and participating more in the university. Participation and Satisfaction Do librarians who participate more on the various dimensions discussed above also have greater levels of job satisfac- tion? To answer this question, Horenstein ran correlations between the participa- tion items and all the satisfaction items. In addition, composite scores were cre- ated for actual and perceived participa- tion and correlated with satisfaction. She found that librarians who scored high in actual and perceived participation also scored high in satisfaction. Using the same methodology, this study also generally confirms these find- ings (table 6). There is a positive relation- ship between actual participation (in teaching, meetings, professional associa- tions, conferences) and satisfaction, but the correlation (.1525) is rather weak. However, in terms of perceived partici- pation, there is a very strong relationship (.7059) between the composite of items related to decision-making (feeling in- volved in library decision-making, con- sulted and informed about library mat- ters, and in control of daily work) and overall job satisfaction. Also, there is a significant relationship between the com- posite of items relating to external in- volvement (participation in university affairs and professional activities beyond the insitution) and overall satisfaction. In- volvement in the evaluation of colleagues is also related to overall satisfaction. Both studies, therefore, have confirmed that greater levels of actual and perceived participation do increase job satisfaction. Demographic Variables and Satisfaction What other factors, beyond participation and status, might affect job satisfaction? To answer this, the demographic charac- teristics of the respondents were exam- ined with regard to satisfaction. Horen- stein found that higher levels of benefits (sabbaticals, tenure, research grants, etc.) were associated with higher levels of overall satisfaction, as were higher sala- ries and more experience as a librarian. On the other hand, gender and the de- partment of respondents were not found to be strongly associated with overall sat- isfaction.25 The authors took a slightly different approach to demographic factors, and again used analysis of variance to deter- mine whether there were significant dif- ferences in satisfaction based on the char- acteristics of the respondents or their li- TABLE 6 Correlations of Participation with Composite Satisfaction Composite Variables Satisfaction* Actual participation (in teaching, meetings, .1525 professional organizations, conferences) Feels involved, informed, consulted about .7059 library decisions; in control of own activities Perceived participation in university affairs .3182 and extra-institutional professional activities Involved in evaluating colleagues .3764 *Using a two-tailed test of significance, all values are significant at p<.01. Administrators felt more in control over their work, more involved in decision-making, and more consulted and informed about library matters. Job Satisfaction of Canadian University Librarians 43 braries. Although their study confirmed some of Horenstein�s findings, the au- thors also found other interesting differ- ences in satisfaction not previously re- vealed. In terms of the characteristics of librar- ies, table 7 shows that both the decision- making model in the library (i.e., how much librarians are able to participate in decision-making) and the management style of the library are perhaps the most significant factors in this group of vari- ables affecting librarians� overall satisfac- tion. In particular, librarians who were the most involved in library decision- making were also more satisfied. Those who indicated that the management style in their library was autocratic were sig- nificantly less satisfed than those who in- dicated a team or collegial approach. Also related to these variables, a library that had regular meetings of the professional staff resulted in higher levels of satisfac- tion. In terms of the characteristics of librar- ians, salary, experience, and elibility for tenure, sabattical, and governance seats also produced significant differences in satisfaction, although not to the same de- gree as the previous variables. This compares to Horen- stein�s finding that salary, eli- gibility for tenure, and sabat- tical were related to higher overall satisfaction. Department did appear to affect satisfaction, but this could be due to the presence of a large number of adminis- trative librarians in the sample. When administrative librar- ians were removed from the analysis, there were no signifi- cant differences in satisfaction by department, which is com- parable to Horenstein�s find- ing using correlation. Variables that did not pro- duce significant differences in overall satisfaction were gen- der, education, librarian status, publica- tion requirements, and the presence or absence of a library council. Again, these findings are comparable to Horenstein�s that gender, education, and publication requirements are not associated with higher overall satisfaction. Stepwise Regression Using a stepwise regression of all the variables most closely correlated with overall satisfaction, Horenstein found that the best predictors of overall satis- faction were the perceived participation variables (feeling involved, informed, consulted, and in control of daily activi- ties), followed by salary and academic rank.26 Using the same approach, the Canadian study generally confirms these findings. The perceived participation variables re- garding feeling involved in library deci- sion-making, consulted and informed about library matters, in control over one�s work, and involved in evaluating col- leagues proved to be the best predictors of overall satisfaction. Following these variables, the degree of librarians� partici- pation in library management and deci- TABLE 7 Significant Differences in Satisfaction by Demographic Variables Variable F Ratio PRE Signif. Decision-making 80.79 .299 .000 model in library Management style in library* 72.31 .221 .000 Department 24.52 .077 .000 Regular meetings of 44.23 .071 .000 professional librarians Salary 9.66 .063 .000 Experience 4.84 .024 .002 Eligibility for tenure/ 11.63 .019 .001 continuing appt. Eligibility for seats on 10.28 .017 .001 university governance Eligibility for sabattical 8.83 .015 .003 * Not included in Horenstein’s study. 44 College & Research Libraries January 1997 sion-making also proved to be a strong predictor, although it was not found to be so by Horenstein. Salary, found to be im- portant by Horenstein, did not prove to be a strong predictor of overall satisfac- tion, even though correlation did show a mild relationship between the two. Conclusion This study and Horenstein�s have found that librarians report above satisfactory levels of job satisfaction, a finding also noted by other authors.27 Also, when re- sponses of the entire sample are consid- ered, both studies found that the intrin- sic aspects of librarianship (such as relationship with users, creativity, or chal- lenge) were the elements of their work that librarians indicated were the most satisfying. What are the implications of this? It would seem that what academic librarians find satisfying or attractive about their work are the traditional ele- ments of librarianship itself�a strong emphasis on service, with ample oppor- tunities for challenge, independence, cre- ativity, using one�s judgment, and par- ticipation in professional activities. What they appear to find less satisfying are the requirements of practicing librarian- s h i p i n a n a c a d e m i c e n v i r o n m e n t , where they must be overly concerned with occupational status, promotion, evaluation, and library and university governance, all of which are emphasized when librarians attain faculty status. These findings seem to support authors such as Rachel Applegate, who have ar- gued that the pursuit of faculty status for academic librarians has been based on a set of incorrent assumptions about who librarians are and what they should be doing within insitutions of higher edu- cation.28 However, the situation may not be so clear-cut because other factors also ap- pear to affect the satisfaction equation. Horenstein was able to demonstrate that librarians with both faculty status and rank were clearly the most satisfied with their work. Although the Canadian study does not have data that are entirely com- parable, its findings do show that Cana- dian university librarians with academic status are more satisfied with certain di- mensions of their work, including their status within the institution and their opportunities to participate outside the library, in either professional activities or the university. In addition, related to the latter, they are more satisfied with their relationship with the university admin- istration and university processes such as promotion and tenure. However, they are not more satisfied with other impor- tant features of their work, such as workload or duties; salary; relationship with colleagues, staff, and users; and opportunties to use their own judgment, to exercise independent action, or for job enrichment. A further complication in the satisfac- tion equation is that, in the Canadian context, having administrative responsi- bilities appears to have an even stronger impact on overall satisfaction than does academic status. Administrative librar- ians are significantly more satisfied with their ability to participate in library de- cision-making and planning, their rela- tionship with the library administration, and management style in the library. They are also more satisfied with the opportunities available to them regard- ing promotion, job enrichment, chal- lenge, using their own judgment, and independence of action. Also, they are more satisfied in terms of assigned du- ties, working conditions, and benefits, though not salary. Administrative librarians are significantly more satisfied with their ability to participate in library decision-making and planning, their relationship with the library administration, and management style in the library. Job Satisfaction of Canadian University Librarians 45 What do faculty/academic-status li- brarians and administrative librarians have in common that would account for increased satisfaction levels in those groups? The answer appears to have something to do with actual or perceived participation. However, in both Horen- stein�s and in this research, academic sta- tus did not result in significant differ- ences in actual participation (as mea- sured through teaching, attending library and university meetings, attending con- ferences, etc.). Furthermore, this study found that although administrative li- brarians did have significiant differ- ences in their actual participation, this was not true for all the variables. Actual participation, then, does not seem to ac- count adequately for differences in job satisfaction. Horenstein has stated: �Perception of participation appears to be the crucial factor in job satisfaction,� and the authors of this study would concur.29 Both aca- demic-status and administrative librar- ians felt significantly more involved, con- sulted, and informed with respect to li- brary matters and more in control over their work than other librarians. They also perceived themselves to be more in- volved in university decision-making and planning, and in evaluating their colleagues. These results are also very consistent with the authors� analysis of the characteristics of respondents and their libraries, which showed that librar- ians in institutions with a collegial or team management style, and a model of decision-making that allowed greater input from librarians, had higher over- all satisfaction. Demographic variables such as education, gender, department, and to a certain extent salary were rela- tively unimportant as predictors of over- all satisfaction when compared to the perceived participation variables. In light of the findings regarding par- ticipation, which have now been con- firmed in two large-scale studies, the question remains as to what is the best mechanism for increasing actual and per- ceived participation, and thus providing greater job satisfaction for academic li- brarians. The authors� data suggest that there may not be one best route to achiev- ing this goal. One traditional way for academic li- brarians to widen their responsibilities and progress in their careers has been to apply for successively more senior, more managerial positions. Administrative duties often also bring with them oppor- tunities to participate at a higher level, through committee work and collabora- tive projects. For those who succeed in attaining a managerial position, job sat- isfaction does seem to be enhanced sig- nificantly. Administrative librarians felt much more involved in library decision- making and planning, and were notice- ably more satisfied with many of the instrinsic and extrinsic aspects of their work. Unfortunately, this route is no longer an option for many academic librarians who choose to remain at one institution for a large part of their careers. First, there have always been far fewer managerial positions than working academic librar- ians. Second, there is a trend toward re- ducing the number of managerial posi- tions in academic libraries in favor of more streamlined organizational struc- tures. And, third, not every librarian as- pires to a managerial position. Instead, many prefer to remain at the front lines of service as reference librarians, cata- loguers, collections specialists, and sys- tems librarians. This is entirely consistent with the authors� findings that it is the nature of librarianship itself that is deeply satisfying to the majority of academic li- brarians. Horenstein concluded: Faculty status and rank may offer a solution to the routine nature of the profession, by adding greater involvement within the university as a way to enrich the jobs of aca- demic librarians.30 46 College & Research Libraries January 1997 However, her data also clearly dem- onstrate that unless the faculty-status model is rigorously applied to the high- est level, greater satisfaction may not re- sult. The Canadian study echoes this: in general, Canadian university librarians with academic status are not more in- volved when actual participation mea- sures are considered and do not perceive themselves to be more in control of their work, more involved in library decision- making, more consulted, and more in- formed about library matters.31 These findings suggest that faculty/academic status must be taken seriously by the ad- ministration of both the library and the university if it is to be a means of pro- viding greater involvement and oppor- tunities and of rekindling enthusiasm. The written comments of respondents in the authors� study also confirm that hav- ing the trappings of faculty status, with- out the real benefits, is an undesirable state of affairs. An excellent example of this is the issue of eligibility for sabattical or research leave. Personal comments from numerous librarians indicated that although they did have such eligibility, they were actively discouraged from tak- ing research leaves because of institu- tional constraints such as inadequate staffing. Such institutional barriers are unlikely to result in greater job satisfac- tion for the librarians at those sites. Because they manage and develop one of the most important symbols of higher education, academic librarians should be at the center of campus life. But, like the faculty, who also spend most of their pro- fessional lives at one institution, to achieve this they must feel rewarded and satisfied with their work and contribu- tions to the institution. This study has shown that academic librarians, in gen- eral, have levels of job satisfaction that are slightly higher than merely satisfac- tory. However, those with either some form of faculty status or administrative responsibilities perceive themselves to be more actively involved in the decision- making processes of the library and/or the university, and as a result, have sig- nificantly higher levels of satisfaction on many dimensions. In addition, librarians in academic libraries where the manage- rial style is toward a team or collegial ap- proach, and where there is a high level of input into library decision-making by librarians, are more satisfied with their jobs, findings that are also strongly sup- ported in the work of Bengston and Shields.32 These findings suggest, then, that the faculty/academic-status model is not necessarily the best, nor the only way to provide greater participation op- portunities for academic librarians over the course of their working lives. The authors would like to acknowledge funding from the Social Sciences and Hu- manities Research Council of Canada (Grant K023A3). They would also like to thank their research assistant, Kim Kofmel, for her able assistance. Notes 1. Bonnie Horenstein, "Job Satisfaction of Academic Librarians: An Examination of the Rela- tionships between Satisfaction, Faculty Status, and Participation," College & Research Libraries 54 (May 1993): 255�69. 2. See, for instance, George D'Elia, "The Determinants of Job Satisfaction among Beginning Librarians," Library Quarterly 49 (July 1979): 282�302; Dale Susan Bengston and Dorothy Shields, "A Test of Marchant's Predictive Formulas Involving Job Satisfaction," Journal of Academic Librarianship 11 (May 1985): 88�92; Beverly Lynch and JoAnn Verdin, "Job Satisfaction in Librar- ies: A Replication," Library Quarterly 57 (April 1987):190-202; and Mohammad Mirfakhrai, "Cor- relates of Job Satisfaction among Academic Librarians in the United States," Journal of Library Administration 14 (1991): 117�31. Job Satisfaction of Canadian University Librarians 47 3. Two examples are Marjorie Benedict, "Librarians' Satisfaction with Faculty Status," College & Research Libraries 52 (Nov. 1991): 538�48; and Horenstein, "Job Satisfaction of Academic Librar- ians." 4. Steven Chwe, "A Comparative Study of Job Satisfaction: Catalogers and Reference Librar- ians in University Libraries," Journal of Academic Librarianship 4 (July 1978): 139�43. 5. Susanne Wahba, "Job Satisfaction of Librarians: A Comparison between Men and Women," College & Research Libraries 36 (Jan. 1975): 45�51. 6. Ilene Rockman, "Job Satisfaction among Faculty and Librarians: A Study of Gender, Automony, and Decision Making Opportunities," Journal of Library Administration 5 (fall 1984): 43�56. 7. D'Elia, "The Determinants of Job Satisfaction," 299. 8. Patricia A. Kreitz and Annegret Ogden, "Job Responsibilities and Job Satisfaction at the University of California Libraries," College & Research Libraries 51 (July 1990): 297�312. 9. Horenstein, "Job Satisfaction of Academic Librarians." 10. Benedict, "Librarians' Satisfaction with Faculty Status." 11. Tina Hovekamp, "Unionization and Job Satisfaction among Professional Library Employ- ees in Academic Research Institutions," College & Research Libraries 56 (July 1995): 341�50. 12. Horenstein, "Job Satisfaction of Academic Librarians." 13. Gloria J. Leckie and Jim Brett, "Academic Status for Canadian University Librarians: An Examination of Key Terms and Conditions," Canadian Journal of Information and Library Science 20 (Apr. 1995): 1�28. 14. Academic status usually does not confer on librarians the identical ranks or titles used by the faculty, although there is no consistency in this across universities. Also, performance criteria may or may not include the same criteria as for faculty (i.e., teaching, research, service). For ex- ample, academic status for librarians frequently entails a substitution of "professional duties" for teaching, and a loosening of the criteria for what is considered to be acceptable in terms of re- search. 15. Horenstein excluded managerial librarians, preferring instead to concentrate on frontline librarians. The authors included managerial librarians, thus bringing the number of primary ser- vice areas or departments to ten, including acquisitions, administration, cataloging, circulation, collections, document delivery/ILL, reference, serials, systems, and other. 16. Horenstein, "Job Satisfaction of Academic Librarians," 259. 17. Ibid., 258. 18. Ibid., 258. 19. Ibid., 261. 20. Lynch and Verdin, "Job Satisfaction in Libraries," 197. 21. Horenstein, "Job Satisfaction of Academic Librarians," 261. 22. Ibid., 262. 23. Ibid., 262. 24. Ibid., 263. 25. Ibid., 263. 26. Ibid., 264. 27. Kreitz and Ogden, "Job Responsibilities," 307. 28. Rachel Applegate, "Deconstructing Faculty Status: Research and Assumptions," Journal of Academic Librarianship 19 (July 1993): 158�64. 29. Horenstein, "Job Satisfaction of Academic Librarians," 264. 30. Ibid., 265. 31. However, librarians with academic/faculty status are more satisfied with other dimen- sions of their work, as the earlier section on Academic Status and Job Satisfaction has discussed. 32. Bengston and Shields, "A Test of Marchant's Predictive Formulas," 91.