1. Do they mean us?: an episode of The Library A fly-on-the-wall documentary filmed at the Enterprise Library and Information Service May 2005 PART FIVE

2. User Behaviour Over a well-earned coffee break Owen Oracle is telling the other Enterprise library assistants about a course that his wife Olga, a local GP, has recently attended on the topic of the “heartsink patient”.

3. Heartsink Patients Owen Oracle: “Apparently, the phrase “heartsink patient” was coined a few years ago to describe patients who particularly demand a lot of the GP’s time and emotional energies. Would you believe there is a whole list of labels that GPs have come up with to describe these particular types of behaviour? Obviously it isn’t really politically correct to use such labels anymore – the GP trainer warned them to make sure that the term “heartsink” doesn’t appear anywhere on their notes – or their lawyers would have a field day! Anyway it got me thinking…..”

4. “Heartsink” Readers? Owen Oracle : “…..I guess if GPs have “heartsink patients” then we have “heartsink readers” - those readers who make our heart quite literally sink when they enter the library. The GP trainer actually said “There are no heartsink patients, only heartsink doctors” by which he meant that if they can understand their behaviour and adapt their strategies to meet them they are well on the way to solving the problem.”

5. “That’s okay in theory but…” Petra Part-Time: “Well I for one am certainly interested in finding out how I could adapt and make a better job of handling difficult user behaviours….Perhaps you could bring in the handouts from Olga’s workshop and we can see if they might apply to our readers”.

6. The next day Owen Oracle : “I thought it would be fun to look at some of the scenarios that were used during the workshop and we could see if we recognise the behaviours in our readers” “Then tomorrow we could pool our suggestions on why we think these particular types of users are behaving the way that they do”.

7. The dependent clinger Always thanks you gratefully for all that you have done but keeps on needing reassurance. So they keep on coming back time after time – each time with a different, and yet apparently related, problem.

8. The entitled demander Always views the staff as a barrier to receiving the services to which s/he is entitled and complains when every request is not met.

9. The manipulative help-rejector Has a quenchless need for emotional support and returns repeatedly to tell the staff that they still haven’t managed to solve their particular problem.

10. The self-destructive denier Although lurching from one problem to another makes no attempt to sort things out. It seems to members of staff that this person wants to fail.

11. Familiar? Martin Meekly: “I certainly recognise one or two of those behaviours straightaway. Depressing isn’t it? Almost makes me need to go and visit my local GP!” “So shall we all put our thinking caps on and come back tomorrow and share our ideas?”

12. End of Part Five