University Librarian and Director of Library Services

Job Title: University Librarian and Director of Library Services 

Reporting To: Deputy Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs 

Location: 26 York Street, Dublin 2 School (or department): RCSI Library 

Contract type/duration: Permanent 

Closing date for applications: 24th May 2026

About the post: 

RCSI is seeking to appoint its next visionary leader to the position of University Librarian and Director of Library Services. This post is a senior, permanent appointment within RCSI reporting to the Deputy Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs. 

This mission-critical role drives the ongoing innovation and delivery of library services, collections, and infrastructures that enable the delivery of RCSI undergraduate, postgraduate and professional education programmes, RCSI translational research goals, and the stewardship of RCSI heritage collections. 

The person appointed will have extensive senior management level experience in a university or a similarly sized health sciences library, and a comprehensive understanding of the role and purpose of library services in academic and clinical health sciences environments. They will be a strategic, tactical, and creative thinker with the drive, determination and ambition to lead the library team in developing and delivering future-focused library services, responsive to user needs, and will have a clear vision for RCSI Library services in the age of AI and the strategic position of university library services as a critical component in RCSI institutional infrastructure(s).

Knowledge & Experience – (Essential): 

• Primary degree and a post graduate qualification in Library and Information Science, or a cognate equivalent with demonstrated experience relevant to the role of university librarian 

• Significant management and leadership experience in a research-intensive, academic or health sciences library, environment 

• Strategic and operational planning, policy development, human and financial resource management experience 

• Experience of leading, managing and motivating teams to high performance 

• Excellent interpersonal, written and oral communication skills 

• Strong understanding of current trends and issues impacting academic and health sciences libraries, such as scholarly communication, Open Science, content licensing, information costs, artificial intelligence, open press publishing etc 

• A collaborative, consultative management style and the ability to work in partnership across the institution