Strategic planning for efficient utilization of information technology in Iranian public universitie's libraries (province centers)

The purpose of the research was to study the current status of information technology utilization in Iranian universitie's libraries, to find out its strengths and weaknesses and to offer useful guidelines to formulate effective and appropriate strategic plan for information technology progress and development. The sample population for this survey equaled the statistical population and included 39 directors of libraries in public universities located in the capital city of Iranian provinces. A self designed instrument was used to collect data and data collected was analyzed by use of central tendencies such as mean and standard deviations and chi- square. The results indicate that the university libraries management, planning for information technology training courses, librarianship software support for all specialized activities, protection and preservation of digital sources, security of digital data, levels of accessibility to data, formulation of utilization strategy, development and expansion of database collections, codified scheduled plan to utilize and improve the technology, and provision of infrastructures for information technology are not suitable while human resources, online access to library database, utilization of library software, allocation of special space for technology, access to computers and their accessories in network, electronic data delivery services, electronic books and periodicals, online book & non-book catalogue, and strategy to provide electronic sources are suitable and in development route. On the whole about 90 percent of these libraries are lacking strategic information technology plan.