Broad discussion about change and dealing with change.
Taiga forum: 4 of their provocative statements (see also the Darien Statements)
Within the next five years:
- ...Collection development as we know will cease to exist and will become patron initiated.
Not well received by the group. Faculty and grad students should not drive acquisitions. At Penn State, ILL requests that meet certain criteria will be routed to acquisitions for purchasing. Penn has a fast-track missing replacement policy. Patron-initiated is a part of collection development. Special collections will be what makes us special. We need more collaboration. - ...Libraries will provide no in-person services; all will be supported by technology.
Why are we building more group study rooms? Self-check, as an example is not perfect and users like to turn to a human when there is a problem. - ...Libraries will have abandoned the hybrid model to focus on electronic collections.
Statistics, so far, have shown that people are still using the libraries despite the increase in electronic resources. We will also need to continue building storage facilities for our print material. - ...Library buildings will no longer house collections and will become campus community centers.
What competencies are needed? What leadership is needed within Access Services to address the changes coming ahead? Is it enough to react to the changes, or do we need to be more active in presenting the opportunities?
IT component moved from preferred to required, as are degrees. But the "legacy staff" do not have these skills or competencies and so there is a gap in skill level. So, the position descriptions need to be an accurate reflection of the work. How do we then re-purpose the legacy staff so that they remain full contributors to the library and the services we provide. Does library education provide the appropriate level of skills training. Higher skill sets also serves to provide greater coverage in the library. There is a need for negotiation with staff for them to learn these new skills.
Rutgers, thinking about getting out of the course reserves business. Faculty are going directly to course management systems anyway. Staff in this area could be used for some digital projects. Service models are changing.
Widener will no longer check-in periodicals and is considering not binding them either. What are the long-term effects of this decision.
Yale: Library Information Access Technical Integration position (new position)
What is the required technology that folks should know? Is there a standard set of knowledge that is expected? The lost art of supervision article mentioned. Have we moved away from supervision.
How do we define the areas of expertise and the necessary skill sets.
Penn State: Create a job ladder within Access Services. Folks can become the expert in an area without necessarily becoming a supervisor. They are specialists in particular areas but will also often work at public service desks.
Phipps/Sullivan Change Leadership Institute.
Even within the financially constrained times, our mission remains the same. How we get there may a bit different.
Applegate B. & Kloth C. (2004) “Inter-Organization Collaboration & Partnerships: A Critical Analysis,” Ohio Coalition on Sexual Assault Exchange newsletter. [Read Article, PDF file]
Discussion on collaborative efforts:
Brown has been working with outside-the-library campus organizations.
Temple working with IT department to train students on some basic IT functions in the library.
Rutgers working with IT to expand student computing lab services.
Penn has two collaborative spaces: Wiegle Information Commons (Schools of Arts and Sciences, the Office of the Provost and the Libraries) provides a host of services. The Film Studies Center a jointly funded project because there was need for space and programmatic support.
Yale's Social Science and Science Libraries and Academic Systems folks will move into the same physical space. Meetings have begun to advance this move. Also leveraging staff with expertise to share resources for e-reserves processing.
Dartmouth is beginning to identify areas across campus where duplicate work is being done and have been asking the question how can we reduce the redundancy? This is as a result of the budget crisis. The work will be ongoing. Even within our libraries, or within Access Services, what work is being done redundantly and are these necessary?
Penn State: ILL staff and Circ staff would do stack retrieval for different functions, but they now have the same supervisor. The other supervisor has been reassigned to other tasks.
How can we, in Access Services, have the types of collaborative services such as joint collection development as is being discussed among the Borrow Direct partners? This is often difficult within the same institution, can we make this work across institutions?
What product can we deliver as a result of the Ivies+ Access Services Symposium? Notes from the meeting are fine, but how can we define some areas for collaboration or places for documentation?
Can we move away from the idiosynchratic ways of doing business so that we can have "plug-n-play" model? What are our best practices? How can we share these in an easy way?
Cheryl has created a Google Group for the Ivies+ group and some documents have been added.
Questions to ask about change?
What would happen if the change is implemented?
What would happen if it is not implemented?
What would happen if change is only partially implemented?
Posts
