Thursday 25 November 2010

Update on our requirements document

We didn't have a team meeting on Friday 19th, as about half the team weren't available. The remainder started to look at our requirements document and rated each criterion using the MoSCoW method:

Must have
Should have if possible
Could have if it does not affect anything else
Would like to have


More will follow on this after our meeting tomorrow (26th), where we will be looking at the document again, and preparing to mark each ERM based on this system.

Our current procedures - map

Here you can see the 'process map' showing all of our E-resources processes in one document:

https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&pid=explorer&chrome=true&srcid=0Bxug72ZifwRlODBlMmMzYTgtYWQ1Ni00MGFhLWE2ZDYtNTYxYTg4MjhlMjQ0&hl=en&authkey=CKf3hVQ


Just to clarify, 'Collections' on this document refers to JA & DL/AD (see previous post on people involved in the process), who look after our resources on SFX and Metalib, collect stats etc.

'Acquisitions' refers to ST & RF, who work more with the Talis records, financial information etc

Thursday 18 November 2010

Notes from our meeting on 12th November

1. Our current processes
1.1. The ‘process map’ document is in the MERI folder on the V drive. Please have a look and make any changes/additions, or pass suggestions to Charlotte who will update it
1.2. Angela will email David Kay with the updated workflows
1.3. Regina will organise a meeting with some representatives from Academic Support, Acquisitions team etc to review our processes and work out whether we are including tasks that aren’t necessary

2. Timing our processes
2.1. We will be looking at timing our current processes, as part of working out the cost benefits of an ERM. After the review we will time the ‘new’ processes and compare the two.

3. Feedback from ERM Demos
3.1. Charlotte reminded everyone to give some feedback on the ERM demos, and will contact Andy Callen for feedback on the Verde demo that he attended

4. Visit to Manchester
4.1. Angela, Regina and Jenny visited the University of Manchester to see their ERM system
4.2. Because the ERM market is in a state of flux, Manchester opted to produce their own in-house system. It is due for completion in February 2011, and they hope to use the system for the next 2-4 years. They have a software developer in their team, and received some funding in order to set up the system.
The system stores supplier info, stats, contact details etc – holdings information is acquired from suppliers and inputted, and checked against their holdings on SFX. Links to licence information are via Livelink (content management system)
They are still using Talis to store all the financial information, as they have integration with the finance system
They are also working on Journal Usage Statistics Portal (JUSP), a shared resource which will enable libraries to access statistics from one place (more info at http://www.jusp.mimas.ac.uk/)

5. Requirements document
5.1. We looked at Jenny’s tidied-up version of the Requirements list and clarified some ambiguous points. We will look at this further next week when we will concentrate on rating the ERMs using the ‘MOSCOW’ scoring system

6. Next meeting
6.1. 19th November 11.00am

Friday 12 November 2010

People involved in the acquisition and maintenance of our E-resources

The flowcharts I added that depict our current processes are the instructions used by our staff. As such, they are very specific to Salford and there are quite a few inititals used to denote the people invovled, so below is a bit of an explanation of the various people and teams involved in the E-resources process:


Collections and Digital Developments Team:

Stella To (ST) - Acquisitions & Serials Officer: creates records on Talis, pays invoices, looks after renewals etc - has quite a lot of contact with vendors and keeps our information up to date on the E-resources spreadsheet as well as Talis

James Allen (JA) - Collections Officer and
David Lockley & Angela Dudley (DL/AD) - Collection Management Team Leader: maintain access to resources via SFX & Metalib - queries from the enquiry desk etc are passed on to the Collections Officer. Collect stats at renewal times; contact suppliers about problems, queries etc. Will speak to suppliers regarding trials and advertise these on the E-library blog

Regina Ferguson (RF) - Collections Manager: Checks & signs licences, manages funds so oversees the whole acquisition process
Licences also need to be read/signed by Sue Hodges (SH), Head of learning and research support; and Julie Berry (JB), our Acting Director


Academic Support Team

Academic Support Librarians (previously called Information Specialists and Liaison Officers) look after the resources for a particular school. They will often receive information from suppliers about new resources, trials etc. They are consulted when ordering, cancelling and renewing resources; they are in contact with acdamic staff so know which resources are most relelvant, on reading lists etc
They also provide training to students on using resources relevant to their subject


Customer Services Team

I spoke to some members of the Customer Services team regarding access issues. Although this team isn't directly involved with the acquisition and maintenance of resources, and not included on the flowcharts, they play a key role in making users aware of available resources, and are the first point of contact for any queries, access problems etc.


Enquiry desk staff (both on the physical desk and on the phone) answer queries from borrowers regarding electronic resources e.g. how to access resources, problems with access etc

Service Delivery Team Leader - currently working on a project to make more electronic resources accessible to external borrowers. Currently there are very few electronic resources made available on walk-in access PCs, but there are more resources that could be made available. Between the Collections and Customer Service teams, we are finding the licences that will allow some access to external users, and making those resources available.

We have been working on presenting our processes in a slightly diffrent format, which breaks down the individual tasks by team, hopefully making it clearer who is responsible for each stage.

Thursday 11 November 2010

Notes from our meeting on 5th November

1. Ex Libris user group conference
1.1. Jenny attended the Ex Libris user group conference earlier this week, and attended a discussion on Verde which was interesting. She spoke to Richard Cross from Nottingham Trent, he is happy for us to contact him and a visit may be possible to see how they use Verde


2. Meeting with David Kay
2.1. James reported on the meeting last week with David Kay from SERO Consulting (attended by JA, RF, AW, SH). David is working with JISC and SCONUL on their shared services plan, and he discussed their upcoming project in relation to ours.
2.2. The project will include around 12 institutions; they will look at their workflows and consider what elements could work at a national level. A lot of the work they will do will be similar to the work we have already done, so we would be brought in as an ‘extra’ institution
2.3. If we join the project, between November and April, we will visit about 6 of the participating institutions; work on a requirements catalogue and workflow templates for other institutions to use; look at open source systems – install, test and rate them; participate in meetings/events; rate the commercial ERMs we have seen; do a costing exercise for the workflows involved
2.4. We will still produce our list of requirements in December as originally planned

3. Feedback from ERM Demos
3.1. Charlotte has been asked for some feedback by some of the ERM suppliers. Can you please send any feedback/questions to Charlotte, particularly for the Swetswise demo as they are waiting for a response

4. Our current processes
4.1. Charlotte has been working on putting our existing workflows into another format. The ‘process map’ document is in the MERI folder on the V drive. Please have a look and make any changes/additions, or pass suggestions to Charlotte who will update it

5. Requirements document
5.1. We discussed whether any further additions need to be made to the requirements list. Jenny is doing some work on this before sending it to David Kay, so if you have any suggestions for items we have missed, please pass them to Jenny by next Tuesday

6. Next meeting
6.1. 12th November 11.00am

Friday 5 November 2010

E-resources procedures

The flowcharts for our current Electronic Resources processes can be found below:

Overall process:
https://docs.google.com/fileview?id=0Bxug72ZifwRlZmU1MDA2ZjgtMzFmZS00ZjY3LThlNDUtM2IwMTBkM2RmMDg2&hl=en&authkey=CO3n03o

New orders:
https://docs.google.com/fileview?id=0Bxug72ZifwRlY2Y5ZDAzNjYtYTk2NS00MTkyLWIxYjItNDI0M2I2MDZkMTg3&hl=en&authkey=CPmEssAO

Renewals:
https://docs.google.com/fileview?id=0Bxug72ZifwRlOTdiYTExYzYtZTg3Zi00NDRmLWFlZmYtZjk4YTYwYjlmZjAz&hl=en&authkey=CLyO9bwH

Cancellations:
https://docs.google.com/fileview?id=0Bxug72ZifwRlOTQ2ZjkyYmUtM2Q0Ni00YzlmLWFmOGEtMDc1MDIwOTlkNDQy&hl=en&authkey=COTo5KQL

Our current procedures - more information

As the aim of this project is to produce a list of requirements for an ERM system, we first had to establish our existing processes and all the people involved, hence my interviews with various people across the Library. We discovered that a large number of people/teams are involved in the process of looking after Electronic Resources, or have an interest at least.
Obvious people are those responsible for the acquisition of resources and setting up access, as well as Academic Support staff who will nominate resources for trial/purchase in the first place, and who are consulted on renewals etc. We also discovered that there is work going on in our Customer Service team to improve electronic access for external borrowers, and the staff involved need as much information as possible on which resources might be available, what level of access they might have etc. Customer-facing staff on the Enquiry Desk etc need to be able to help and advise our users when they have problems using/accessing our electronic resources.
A lot of the information around electronic resources can be difficult to find - we keep information in various locations, like spreadsheets, filing cabinets, and inside people's heads. Also, we have recently had some staff moves and transferring of certain responsibilities, so it can be difficult to know who to ask and where to look for certain information.
Looking at our current processes turned out to be a worthwhile exercise, as it gave us a chance to review and update processes where necessary, and has prompted people to think about how procedures might be improved.
After going over our current procedures and updating our flowcharts, we're now working on one 'process map' detailing the entire process in stages, and going into more detail where appropriate. The original flowcharts are very specific to Salford, so the new format may be more useful to other institutions.

ERM demos

For the past few weeks we have had some demos of various ERM systems. Some brief descriptions are below:

Swetswise ERM as a Service: This system builds upon services already available through Swetswise; a benefit for existing Swets customers is that a lot of the subscription information, including licensing and financial information, is already in the system. This can also get usage statistics from publishers and present them in user-friendly formats

TDNet Core ERM: looks after the ‘core’ processes of electronic resource management – acquisition of resources, licence information, access, statistics and contact information. It's possible to link to licences from their A-Z list; we were shown the front-facing element of this system. It is possible to import and export data to/from other systems

Innovative Interfaces ERM: designed to manage the whole life-cycle of electronic resources, from identification and trials, to purchasing the resource (or subscribing to it), and then managing access and harvesting of usage statistics using SUSHI, providing information such as cost per use for renewals decisions etc. The system can be populated using data from e.g. an SFX knowledgebase.
It can be used as an integrated part of Millennium LMS or as a stand-alone system; at the moment there are no sites using the ERM module with Talis,

Serials Solutions 360 Manager: tracks changes in titles and licences; deals with trials including reminders when the end of the trial period is approaching; The system can include retrieval of statistics which will work with SUSHI and COUNTER. It’s possible to display key points from licences; also to search for resources using alternate titles (abbreviations etc) There is also an online community/support centre

Ex Libris Verde: Can be a stand-alone system, integrates with other Ex Libris products (SFX etc). This system can manage trials, with the option to add notes on reasons to subscribe etc. Licence details can be added manually or a link to website, pdf etc can be added. Uses SUSHI when collecting stats

EBSCO NET ERM: This system works best with resources purchased through EBSCO; it can be automatically populated with all the subscription information. This system is fully customisable, enabling users to match field titles etc in the ERM to existing systems (LMS etc). it is able to work with a library’s catalogue, link resolver etc. Stats are collected using SUSHI/COUNTER; licence and financial information can be tracked; reminders can be set for individuals to perform certain tasks within workflows