Business is currently one of the most popular degree programs among both graduate and undergraduate students, and non-business programs including engineering, design, and pure sciences—all interested in innovation, commercialization, and marketing—are increasingly integrating business training into their curriculum in the name of interdisciplinarity and improved job placement. There is a sustained and growing need for libraries to effectively support business information literacy.
 
At the same time, the resources, research techniques, and assignments that business students need to master often have little in common with a traditional research paper. Teaching Business Information Literacy provides guidance to new business specialists, generalists, and subject librarians in other disciplines being asked to teach business research classes for the first time. Featuring more than 40 practical, classroom-proven lesson plans for one-shot, embedded, and credit-bearing library classes, it’s divided into nine sections:
 

• Basic Business Research
• Finance and Accounting
• Entrepreneurship
• Management
• Marketing
• Specialty Subjects
• Data Literacy/Data Visualization
• Experiential Learning/Career
• Using Technology in the Classroom

 
Chapters cover such crucial topics as competitive intelligence, market research, financial analysis, ethics, intellectual property, accounting and auditing, supply chain management, job searching, and more. Each one guides you through the background of the topic and activity being taught, pre-class planning and preparation, a step-by-step lesson plan, how to adapt the activity for other institutional contexts, and learning outcomes. Additional supporting materials such as slide decks, worksheets, and game boards are freely available in the ACRL Sandbox (sandbox.acrl.org) and findable with the tag “#bizinfolit.”
 

Genifer Snipes is the Business and Entrepreneurship Librarian at the University of Oregon. She holds an MSLIS from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and MS in Integrated Marketing Communications from West Virginia University. Her work focuses on entrepreneurial and innovation education, data literacy, and business information literacy instruction. She has published and presented at national and international conferences on topics including open education resources, business information literacy, and entrepreneurial outreach.
 
Marlinda Karo, MLIS, MLOS has over 18 years of librarianship experience working in various types of libraries and holds a second master’s degree in Leadership and Organizational Studies. She is currently a Collection Services Librarian at Houston Community College where she manages the procurement process for library materials by ordering, receiving, and managing fund accounting for print and non-print library materials. When she teaches library instruction and webinars she is known for having an infectious and interactive teaching style that encourages student and faculty participation and enthusiasm while facilitating learning.
 
Lauren Reiter is Business Liaison Librarian at the Pennsylvania State University and earned her MLIS at the University of Pittsburgh. Prior to entering the library profession, she honed business research skills as Corporate Analyst at The Freedonia Group and now enjoys teaching business information literacy to students who will apply these skills in their studies and future workplace. She has published and presented on topics such as financial literacy, research consultations, and data, and co-edited the book Envisioning the Future of Reference: Trends, Reflections and Innovations (Libraries Unlimited, 2020). Her professional service includes roles as section chair and secretary of the Business Reference and Services Section of the Reference and User Services Association.
 
Ash E. Faulkner earned her MBA and MLIS at Kent State University.  She has served as a business or data librarian in a variety of university settings over the past eight years.  She is currently the Business Librarian at The Ohio State University Libraries.  She has experience teaching business information literacy in both large and small classrooms and workshop settings.  She has published and presented at national conferences on the topics of business information literacy, financial literacy, outreach and library support to entrepreneurs.
 

Contents
Introduction
SECTION I. Basic Business Research
Chapter 1. Constrain Yourself: Practical Company Research
Kristina Batiste
 
Chapter 2. Disrupting the Business Writing Course: Critical Pedagogy to Frame Business Information Literacy Instruction
Carmen Cole
 
Chapter 3. Let’s Compare: Using a Recommendation Report to Teach Basic Business Research Skills
Emily Mross
 
Chapter 4. Let’s Duel: The Gamification of Business Information Literacy for Undergraduate Students
Amanda Wheatley
 
Chapter 5. Storytelling with Business Research
Reece Steinberg
 
Chapter 6. I Can Read the Business Section for My Paper?: Discovering Connections Between Sources
Theresa Carlson
 
SECTION II. Finance and Accounting
Chapter 7. Database Scavenger Hunt and Analysis for Accounting Students
Robbi De Peri
 
Chapter 8. Evaluating Information Quality: The Use of Research Logs in Academic and Professional Business Research
Mariana Jardim
 
Chapter 9. Collaborating with a Finance Executive-in-Residence to Build Finance Students’ Information Literacy Skills
Catherine Fournier Boulianne
 
SECTION III. Entrepreneurship
Chapter 10. A Tour of Public-Use Market Research
Carolyn Klotzbach-Russell
 
Chapter 11. Pitching Through Storytelling
Reece Steinberg
 
Chapter 12. Hospitality and Tourism Case Competition
Hal Kirkwood
 
Chapter 13. More Than a Secondary Strategy: How to Actively Incorporate Primary Research into Your Instruction Session
Sara Heimann and Summer Krstevska
 
Chapter 14. Aligning Business IL with Startup Thinking: A Series of Open Workshops
Carey Toane, Holly Inglis, Sarah Shujah, and Michelle Spence
 
SECTION IV. Management
Chapter 15. SWOT Analysis
Meryl Brodsky
 
Chapter 16. Managing Your Management Information Literacy: A Focus on Interdisciplinary Research
Janet Hauck

Chapter 17. Concept Mapping: Activities for Complex Business Research or Experiential Learning Projects
Grace Liu
 
Chapter 18. Teaching Business Research Using Strategic Analysis Diagrams
Genifer Snipes
 
Chapter 19. Using Critically Appraised Topics to Teach Evidence-based Management to Graduate Business Students
Zahra Premji
 
SECTION V. Marketing
Chapter 20. Teaching Consumer Market Segmentation through Brainstorming Demographic and Psychographic Variables
Steve Cramer
 
Chapter 21. Critical Consumption: Empowering Students to Evaluate Sources in a One-Shot Session on Introductory Consumer Marketing Research
Abigail Morgan
 
Chapter 22. Dissecting Data to Make Better Decisions
Juliet Conlon
 
Chapter 23. Market Sizing Activity
Meryl Brodsky
 
Chapter 24. Teaching Secondary Market Research through Active Learning Workshops
Wendy Pothier
 
Chapter 25. Using Facebook and Google Digital Marketing Tools to Engage with Consumer Data
Ben Richards
 
Section VI. Specialty Subjects
Chapter 26. Franchise Frenzy: Business Research for Marketing a New Franchise Location
Emily Mross
 
Chapter 27. Thinking Outside the “Box”: Conducting Supply Chain Procurement Research
Katharine V. Macy
 
Chapter 28. Goin’ Global: What Is the Best Way to Export Jeans to Dubai?
Judy Opdahl
 
Chapter 29. Business Ethics and Intellectual Property: Barbie & Bratz
Hal Kirkwood
 
Chapter 30. Connecting the Real Estate Industry and Library Instruction: A Geospatial Example of Experiential Learning
Scott St Martin, Amanda Belantara, and Daniel Hickey

Section VII. Data Literacy/Data Visualization
Chapter 31. 60-Minute Data Literacy Workshop Using the Junk Charts Trifecta Checkup
Nancy Lovas
 
Chapter 32. Data Visualization: Visualizing Decisions
Chelsea H. Barrett
 
Chapter 33. Using the DIG Method for Data Literacy
Dana Statton Thompson
 
Section VIII. Experiential Learning/Career
Chapter 34. Building a Better Business Consultant: A Framework for Instruction
Olivia Olivares
 
Chapter 35. FIRE Starters: Using a Train-the-Trainer Model and Team Consultations to Support a First-Year Experience Business Competition
Benjamin Peck and Wendy Pothier
 
Chapter 36. Next Level Career Research: Helping Students Land Their Dream Jobs
Laura Leavitt Walesby
 
Chapter 37. Hot Topics Trade Publications Connect Research with Career Ambitions
Lateka Grays and Mark Lenker
 
Section IX. Using Technology in the Classroom
Chapter 38. Scaling Up: Asynchronous Information Literacy Instruction for First-Year Business Students
Orolando Duffus
 
Chapter 39. Flip Your One-Shot Instruction Session with Survey Software
Natalia Tingle
 
Chapter 40. Teaching Company Research through a Virtual Research Workshop
Chris Cooper
 
Chapter 41. Metaliterate Learning Through Self-Assessment of Recorded Research Presentations
Amanda Kraft
 
Biographies