BRASS Excellence in Business Librarianship sponsored by Mergent Names It’s 2023 Winner – Hal P. Kirkwood, Bodleian Business Librarian, Saïd Business School, University of Oxford

“Hal’s contributions to business librarianship include extensive publication and editorial work related to business information literacy, entrepreneurship, and information sources. Other notable contributions encompass mentorship of business librarians, years of service to professional organizations, teaching and outreach to underrepresented populations, and support of veterans’ entrepreneurship initiatives.” – Award Committee statement

Hal Kirkwood is the Bodleian Business Librarian at the Saïd Business School, University of Oxford. He was previously a business librarian at Purdue University for many years, achieving tenure as an associate professor.

Hal revised the most recent edition of Strauss’s Handbook of Business Information, updating many resources and adding new chapters and appendices. He is on the editorial board of the Business Information Review and writes the column Perspectives: Revisited that reviews articles across Sage Publications that are related to business information and business librarianship.

Collaborative efforts include a faculty collaboration to prepare underrepresented minority students into the undergraduate business program at Purdue University; working with other business librarians to provide support to disabled veterans starting entrepreneurship endeavors, and various information literacy articles and book chapters for business and entrepreneurship. He has also presented a workshop series for public libraries in Indiana. Hal is currently designing a set of online modules for asynchronous business information literacy that will be wrapped in a badging framework.

Actively working towards connecting business librarians, Hal facilitated a mentoring program within SLA’s Business & Finance Division (now Community). He served on the SLA Board of Directors, as SLA President, and is recently lead two task forces, one on the Return of the Investment of Librarians and Information Centers and the other on developing a Workplace Information Literacy Framework. Currently, he is working with the European Business School Libraries Group in developing a global benchmarking survey of database and dataset holdings.

BRASS Excellence in Business Librarianship Award selection committee was Chaired by Holly Inglis.