Abstract: From the global environment to the local, information and communication technologies are changing our lives and changing the way libraries do business. No longer are libraries an arcane world of their own. Every major trend impacting on today's society is also impacting on libraries. Today's environment is one of paradox: there is decentralisation within globalism, fragmentation within mass culture, and customisation within mass manufacturing. Boundaries are breaking down: between disciplines, among industries, and between suppliers and customers. Dominant functions and processes in the information age are increasingly organised around networks, and this enables virtual services to come together in partnerships and alliances. Process has become as important as product as the knowledge era increases emphasis on abstraction; it is an age dominated by ideas, concepts, and experience—and services are a form of process.All of these factors combine to create a new market for library services with a new style of client. The result is a demand, in a sense in which libraries have never before experienced the word, for high quality services that are quick, convenient, and reliable. Historically only the last of these terms characterised libraries' interactions with their clients. As the information centre of people's lives shifts to their home or work environments, instead of remaining directly with libraries, there is a challenge to produce integrated customer designed services based on fluid, flexible processes. Integrated services require an integrated infrastructure, and nothing short of a systemic view will create the services capable of meeting the evolving needs of clients in the knowledge age.