The Politics of e-access and e-funding in the Library environment

1. The Politics of e-access and e-funding in the Library environment Jill Taylor-Roe, Newcastle University Library Jill.Taylor-Roe@ncl.ac.uk UKSG Managing E-Resources Seminar 27 Oct 2005

2. Topics to be covered • Funding of Library Resources • Stock Selection • Management and Exploitation • Staffing • Future Trends • Summary

3. In the beginning… • Budgets for print based resources: • Journals = recurrent = may be reviewed on an annual basis • Monographs = non-recurrent = more flexible • Miscellaneous = e.g. AV, CD-ROM, Maps • Balance varied according to type of library.

4. How is funding managed? • By Format • By Administrative Unit or Cost Centre • By Budgetholder • Centrally • Devolved • Mixed Economy!

6. Characteristics of Funding in the print environment • Usually item level attribution • Costs may be shared across cost centres/ admin units/budget codes • Generally easy to assign items by format if desired • Mixture of recurrent and one-off expenditure • Minimal VATable expenditure

7. Let there be E… • E-journals, E-docs • E-Databases – cd-rom, then web • E-Books – Encyclopedias, Reference Books, Textbooks • E-Datasets – Human Genome Project, Research Databases, Experimental Data

8. New Ways of Packaging Information • Big Deals – by publisher • Subject Clusters • Book Collections – e.g. ORO, Xrefer • Multi year deals • Huge growth in recurrent vs one-off expenditure • Significant Increase in VATable expenditure

9. Funding Solutions? • Re-allocate resources from traditional funds • Create new funding structures • Bid for new money – one off or recurrent • Use contingency to fund experiments • Stick with what you know and hope the problem • goes away?!

10. What we did at Newcastle • Bid for project funds - £100K pa for ejournals, £25K pa for e-books • Created new general funds – e.g. ejourmaingref for “big deals” • Created new e-cost centres to match to print codes and moved some funding across • Negotiated with Academic Schools for additional funds

11. Challenges • Takes time to make cases for extra money • Much harder to cost library provision at cost centre level esp for journals in Big Deals • Takes time to edit old budget codes to reflect new purchasing models • Much harder to effect change at micro level when tied in to packages and multi yr deals

12. Benefits • Project funding allows experiment without detriment to established expenditure • Additional dialogue with schools has increased their awareness of how info resources are priced and packaged • Package deals have effectively doubled the size of our journal portfolio

13. Who decides what to buy? • Subject Specialist • Subject Cataloguer • Acquisitions Librarian • End users – Academics, Researchers, Company staff, Members of the Public • Library Committee

14. How is it bought? • Individual Library Deal • Approval Plans • Deal brokered via Company HQ • Regional Purchasing Consortium • National Deal • International Deal

15. How has purchasing practice changed in the e-environment?(1) • More people involved in the purchasing decision • Possible loss of local control • Takes longer to make purchasing decisions? • Harder to fine tune collection management at micro level • You may need to factor in software and equipment costs!!

16. How has purchasing practice changed in the e-environment?(2) • User demand often still focussed at micro level • Harder to “match” this against prevailing purchasing models • New models still emerging – open access- pay to publish

17. Management of Library Resources: who’s involved? • In traditional print environment: • Librarian • Subject Specialists/Information Staff • Acquisitions Staff • Technical Services Staff • Reader Services Staff • Bindery Staff? • Any one else??

18. And where e-resources are involved? • New Players: • Information Systems Staff • Legal Eagles – checking and approving licences • Library Managers – dealing with access issues • IT Help desk staff – “I can’t get this journal to work on my PC…” • IT staff employed by publisher or vendor

19. And who loses out? • Acquisitions staff – fewer print items to process • Shelvers – fewer print items/vols to shelve and tidy • Issue desk staff – fewer items/vols going out on loan • Bindery Staff • NB Changes have hit journals hardest – books still predominantly print, but this will change too.

20. Collection Management • Selection • Relegation • Disposal • Fitness for purpose – meets needs of core users – e.g. University Staff and Students, Company Employees, General Public

21. Key Aspects of Collection Management in Print Environment • Material tends to be bought outright • Physical items reside in Library – or are relegated to local or remote Stores • Relatively easy to apply specific or general focus – e.g. to expand or contract a particular subject area or resource format • Space (or lack of it) can be a key driver

22. Collection Management of E-Resources (1) • Tend to be annual lease rather than outright purchase • Resources reside on publishers/aggregators servers or in repositories • What happens to previously subscribed content if you cancel? • What happens when publisher sells e-content and it leaves the package you were subscribing to?

23. Collection Management of E-Resources (2) • Disposal of print back runs may require additional investment in e-versions • Should we/Can we afford to retain print back runs “just in case”? • Space (or lack of it) can also be a key driver • Customer pressure may lead to demand for more extensive backruns

24. Promotion • Print – catalogues, user guides, web pages? • E-Resources – all of the above – plus… • Tutorials, (online and face to face) • FAQs, Helpsheets • Demos

25. Staffing: managerial aspects • Existing staff need new skills, esp IT skills • Regular training/updates are needed • More library staff are involved – good communication needed • More support/services needed from agents and other vendors • Staff profile is changing – implications for recruitment, budgeting and deployment of existing staff

26. Staffing: impact on people (1) • Traditional, familiar tasks may reduce or disappear • Jobs may be lost • Staff may feel threatened, undervalued, lack confidence about the future – supportive management needed! • Workloads may increase and become more complex

27. Staffing: impact on people (2) • Staff can and will become enthusiastic supporters, promoters and managers of e-resources… • But it requires considerable investment of time and resources to achieve this!! • May take time before your staffing profile matches the needs of the e-library

28. Future Trends • More e-resources – less print • Revised funding models to take account of new publishing models - e.g. OA • Radical revision of traditional library “footprint” – learning café, social learning space etc • Staffing profile reflects growth in resources • Regional or National Solutions to print legacy question? • More cross-sectoral activity?

29. Summary • E-resources have radically changed the ways in which we acquire, manage and promote library resources • We have had to acquire new skills, new staff ( if we can!) and new strategies to cope • Staff workloads have increased • The growth in e-resources has generally been viewed positively by librarians, but has also been seen as a threat by some staff • We are still learning how best to manage e-resources • Emerging technology will undoubtedly require new skills

30. And finally…remember that: • “Change is Constant” (Benjamin Disraeli) • “ “S/He who hesitates is lost “ (Proverbs)