More Product, Less Process:

1. More Product, Less Process: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

2. Mark Greene • Director, American Heritage Center, University of Wyoming

3. Why did we work on this? • My experience at four repositories with significant backlogs of unprocessed materials: Carleton College, Minnesota Historical Society, Henry Ford Museum, AHC • Dennis’ experience as processing manager at MHS

4. The Problem • Archival processing does not keep pace with the growth of collections

5. The Problem • Archival processing does not keep pace with the growth of collections • Unprocessed backlogs continue to grow

7. The Problem • Archival processing does not keep pace with the growth of collections • Unprocessed backlogs continue to grow • Researchers denied access to collections

9. The Problem • Archival processing does not keep pace with the growth of collections • Unprocessed backlogs continue to grow • Researchers denied access to collections • Our image with donors and resource allocators suffers

11. Findings • Processing benchmarks and practices are inappropriate to deal with problems posed by large contemporary collections

13. Findings • Processing benchmarks and practices are inappropriate to deal with problems posed by large contemporary collections • Ideal vs. necessary

14. Findings • Processing benchmarks and practices are inappropriate to deal with problems posed by large contemporary collections • Ideal vs. necessary • Fixation on item level tasks

15. Findings • Processing benchmarks and practices are inappropriate to deal with problems posed by large contemporary collections • Ideal vs. necessary • Fixation on item level tasks • Preservation anxieties trump user needs

17. Findings • Arrangement • Practice: Still often at the item level

18. Findings • Arrangement • Practice: Still often at the item level • Warrant: Literature mixed, but much advises against item level work

19. Findings • Description • Practice: • Weak commitment to online access • Little focus on item level

20. Findings • Description • Practice: • Weak commitment to online access • Little focus on item level • Warrant: • Describe all holdings, in general, before describing some in detail • Descriptive level follows arrangement level • Level varies from collection to collection

21. Findings • Conservation • Practice: Strong commitment to item level work

22. Findings • Conservation • Practice: Strong commitment to item level work • Warrant: Item-focused conservation prescriptions often contradict advice on arrangement and description

23. Findings • Metrics • Literature: Range of 4-40 hours per cubic foot

25. Findings • Metrics • Literature: Range of 4-40 hours per cubic foot • However, a convincing body of experience coalesces at the high-productivity end: • Maher, 1982 (3.4 hours per cubic foot) • Haller, 1987 (3.8 hours per cubic foot) • Northeastern University Processing Manual (4-10 hours per cubic foot)

26. Findings • Metrics • Literature: Range of 4 - 40 hours per cubic foot • Grant Project Survey: 0.6 – 67 hours per cubic foot (Mode = 33 hours ; Mean = 9 hours)

27. Findings • Metrics • Literature: Range of 4 - 40 hours per cubic foot • Grant Project Survey: 0.6 – 67 hours per cubic foot (Mode = 33 ; Mean = 9) • Survey of Archivists: 2 – 250 hours per cubic foot (Mode = 8 ; Mean = 14.8)

28. Recommendations • General Principles for Change

29. Recommendations • General Principles for Change • Establish acceptable minimum level of work, and make it the processing benchmark

30. Recommendations • General Principles for Change • Establish acceptable minimum level of work, and make it the benchmark • Don’t assume all collections, or all collection components, will be processed to same level

31. Recommendations • Arrangement • Description • Conservation • Productivity

32. Recommendations • Arrangement • In normal or typical situations, the physical arrangement of materials in archival groups and manuscript collections should not take place below the series level

33. Recommendations • Arrangement • In normal or typical situations, the physical arrangement of materials in archival groups and manuscript collections should not take place below the series level • Not all series andall files in a collection need to be arranged to the same level

34. Recommendations • Description • Since description represents arrangement: describe materials at a level of detail appropriate to that level of arrangement.

35. Recommendations • Description • Since description represents arrangement: describe materials at a level of detail appropriate to that level of arrangement • Keep description brief and simple

36. Recommendations • Description • Since description represents arrangement: describe materials at a level of detail appropriate to that level of arrangement • Keep description brief and simple • Level of description should vary across collections, and across components within a collection

37. Recommendations • Conservation • Rely on storage area environmental controls to carry the conservation burden

38. Recommendations • Conservation • Rely on storage area environmental controls to carry the conservation burden • Avoid wholesale refoldering • Avoid removing and replacing metal fasteners • Avoid photocopying items on poor paper

40. Recommendations • Conservation • Rely on storage area environmental controls to carry the conservation burden • Don’t perform conservation tasks at a lower hierarchical level than you perform arrangement and description

41. Recommendations • Productivity • A processing archivist ought to be able to arrange and describe large twentieth century archival materials at an average rate of four hours per cubic foot

43. The goal of all this… • …is to make our patrons, donors, administrators, and funders happy, proving that repositories can use the resources they have to the best advantage and with the greatest efficiency.

44. Questions