Another year, another post about the current state of our scaled-up Off-Site Storage output!

Following my last post, a number of people expressed concern about the type and amount - especially the amount - of material that has been leaving the building, so I think it's time for me to talk a little bit more about that.

When we first began sending material to be housed at the Clancy-Cullen Moving & Storage Company 7 years ago, in the spring of 2003, the first category of books to go were "single-part, single-copy" monographs from the circulating collection that had not circulated in 5 years or more. That is: any monograph was fair game if was not part of a larger set, was not one of multiple copies, and had not been checked out in 5 years or more according to our computer records.

Subject specialists were given a chance to exclude from consideration any specific books meeting these criteria, but which they wanted to keep here in Bobst anyway. But few subject specialists took advantage of this chance, and everyone was in agreement that all this little-used material was fair game. This policy was decided in the year before a single book left the building.

Since that 2003, we have also sent out archival boxes, microfilms, LPs, multivolume sets, and tens of thousands of bound Serials, but the crux of our activity still remains the low-use monographs.

A few years ago, after we had done at least one pass through almost every call number range, our collection was still growing faster than we could send low-use materials out, and so we needed to look for ways to help us make even more space. We changed the criteria slightly, and the only difference was as follows: "any monograph was fair game if was not part of a larger set, was not one of multiple copies, and had not been checked out fewer than two times in 5 years or more according to our computer records. That is, if it's been checked out only once it can go off-site, but twice or more and it must stay here.

Surprisingly, this gave us a larger list of books but not nearly as many more as we had anticipated! It is as if most books get checked out either a lot, or not at all, and few fall in between.

With our recent ramp-up to send at least 400k in one year, as opposed to our usual average of under 100k per year, there has been a lot of concern over how empty the 4th and 5th floor stacks are looking, but I can promise that this is only because of the speed at which we are working - NOT because the selection criteria have changed.

And we would not be able to do this if it wasn't for Aleph.

This has been hinted at in All-Staff and All-Access Staff meetings in the past, but with our old Advance system, we were usually unable to generate accurate reports of books fitting the established criteria. Many books would appear on these reports that were not, in fact, eligible, due to their circulation history or due to their being one of many copies of a book (of a title that was circulating heavily, even if that particular copy was not). Conversely, thousands of books that were eligible were not appearing at all.

Now with Aleph, we've been able to fix these problems and generate accurate lists. It's been quite a revelation, and on a personal level, I have felt satisfied to have my frequent suspicions about our old system validated.

Of course, now that we've sent Clancy-Cullen more material, they need to find someplace to put it! That will be a topic for another day, but for now I'll leave you with a few images from their website, where you can go to learn a bit more about them.

Clancy-Cullen Moving & Storage Company, Inc.
Or, just check out the Library Relocation section of the site.

Some pictures from Clancy:

Adventures in Library School, Part One

So, I've decided to become a librarian...

I recently started the Master's Program at the Palmer School at Long Island University. As many of you probably know, they have a remote office in Bobst Library and offer classes here in the building.

I came into the program thinking, "Oh, I've worked in libraries for a while, this will be a breeze." While, so far, the work is introductory, I am actually learning a lot.

In my "Intro to Library & Information Science" class, the instructor gave a lecture on the permeability of library knowledge in other occupational fields. The main theme of the lecture was that librarianship does not limit you to working in a library. Much of the theory that applies to librarianship can be applied to jobs in the business world, sociology, journalism and elsewhere. In addition, there is the "knowledge industry," those companies that produce and service everything from library furniture to online databases and library systems like Aleph & ILLiad.

One is not confined to libraries by obtaining a Master's in Libary Science. Though jobs outside the library world do not interest me at the moment, it's nice to know that the job market will be flexible to accomodate my degree and that changing careers will not be outside the realm of possibilities.

In my "Reference Sources & Services" class, we're learning the basics of what it means to work as a reference librarian. Almost half of the textbook deals with the customer service aspect of the job, as well as staff performance, evaluation, development, and continual learning.

It is comforting, in a way, to have a textbook reinforce the things I learn at my job. It's also nice to know that when Access Services implements things like the Service Excellence Initiative or various ClimateQual-related activities, it is a mark of what a good library should undertake.

A library's virtue is in its ability to share knowledge, not only with patrons but also among all tiers of library employees. By trying to improve our services, we are evaluating our workplace and our "work selves," something in which a library should constantly engage.

I'm also bringing a lot of what I'm learning into my collaboration with the Access Services Advisory Council, which is currently working on a project for the Service Excellence Working Group. My library classes have informed my approach to the project, and the Council, of course, has already done amazing work. As we gather information from our colleagues and analyze it, we are on our way to preparing a cohesive and thorough report that accurately represents the concerns of each Access Services division.

I plan to post more as I come across interesting library school-related bits of information. For now, I'm glad I've taken the plunge.

Can we make the library a more welcoming place?

Congratulations on another incredibly successful Book Circle. I was so glad that I was able to attend. What I found there was a cozy, intimate, welcoming atmosphere full of great conversation. What a great event sponsored by the Access Services Advisory Council and made successful by everyone who attended. Yet another reason why I'm really proud to be part of Access Services.

I just returned from a vacation that included a really long plane ride and no household responsibilities (I do love my in-laws) so I actually had some time to read for the first time in a long time. I'm reading a book called Setting the Table, written by restaurateur Danny Meyer of the Union Square Cafe. If you've never been to USC, I highly recommend it. By New York City standards, it's a high quality restaurant (Zagat top 10) that's pretty reasonably priced. But, what sets USC apart is its service, or what Danny Meyer calls hospitality. It's a very relaxed, welcoming atmosphere. Making the distinction between hospitality and service, he writes:

Understanding the distinction between service and hospitality has been at the foundation of our success. Service is the technical delivery of a product. Hospitality is how the delivery makes the recipient feel. Service is a monologue--we decide how we want to do things and set our own standards for service. Hospitality, on the other hand, is a dialogue. To be on one's guest's side requires listening to that person with every sense and following up with a thoughtful, gracious, appropriate response. It takes both great service and great hospitality to rise to the top. (p. 65)

If library service is the technical delivery of a product, we certainly have excellent service. We know how to place claim returns, create reserve links, create guest passes, shelve books and borrow materials from other libraries without problems. There is no question that with all of the demands on us, we are getting the job done. But there is another level of service that we have yet to conquer, and that's hospitality. Delivering hospitality is what stands between providing good service and providing excellent service.

Tomorrow, we roll out our Service Excellence Initiative. Unlike other one-off customer service training classes, this is a semester long series of experiences designed to get all of us thinking about how we can provide welcoming, hospitable service. How we can listen and be genuinely empathetic to our users. I know this is possible because Access Services has created an exemplar of a welcoming, hospitable environment in the Book Circle, so we simply need to extend this to our communications with users and co-workers. This will be a shared goal that we will all work together on through the Spring semester. Eileen, Eric, Deb and I, aided by the rest of the Access Sups and the Access Services Advisory Council, have devised a program that will be both fun and informative and we look forward to experiencing this process together.

Bobst Student Orientation

When students become new employees of Access Services at Bobst Library, they join more than a department. They become part of a wider team that serves as the face of the library for its patrons. It is no small task to provide this service -- we realized new employees needed an efficient and understandable introduction to their jobs. The Access Services Student Employee Orientation Work Group decided a video presentation was the best way to convey that information.

This presentation takes just over 10 minutes to watch, but hours of preparation went into creating it. We narrowed the focus to touch key issues that are important to new student employees and then developed the presentation to be clear, informative and engaging. We hope by the end of the presentation, all new student employees will be better prepared to contribute to the Access Services mission.

Access Services supervisors are welcomed to share this presentation with their student workers that are returning in the Spring 2010.

Work Group:

Kimberly Sweetman, Project Sponsor

Deborah Caesar, Project Leader

Members:

Cameron Collins

Amy Donnelly

Liudmilla Hirsch

Kimberly Walker-Long

Robert Jamison

Rosa Monteleone

Victor Munoz

Sharon Thomas

A note from Deborah:

Thank all of the work group members for your hard work in putting this together. It's been a long process and thank you for your patience in allowing us to perfect it. I especially want to thank Amy and Cameron for putting the extra work into this. I hope people enjoy it.

When Technology is Meaningful

Happy New Year everyone!

It's been nearly a month since my last post, and I apologize for the delay. In just a few days we'll start our new semester, with our recently upgraded ILS. This upgrade opens up several possibilities for us. In a general sense, those whose time was occupied by planning for the upgrade will now have time to work on ILS-based service improvements and in a more specific sense, the upgrade offers several new features we may choose to implement--cool things like text message notices.

Thinking about these potential new features and services has me thinking about the ways we use technology. Over the Christmas break I drove to Massachusetts to see my family. Driving 5 hours is hardly a technological innovation, but it gave me a chance to experience my latest favorite technology: EZ Pass.

For those of you who don't know, EZ Pass is a device which allows drivers to merely slow down at toll booths and have any tolls owed posted to an account linked to a credit card. I love EZ Pass, and as I was driving 5 hours in silence, my spouse and child both sleeping, I had a lot of time to reflect on why. EZ Pass is a technology which meets my needs perfectly. It's like it was designed for me. Here's why:

• My family is in a different state, always at least one toll-road away, and we visit often
  
• I'm a super disorganized person when it comes to cash, and frequently have absolutely none
• I have a kid who, although a great car-tripper, is two, so speed in transit is essential
• I'm a bit of a cheapskate, and EZ Pass gives discounts on tolls
• I get a big kick out of "getting a head start" on others, and EZ Pass often lets me blow by dozens of other drivers waiting to pay their tolls.

So, on so many levels I love EZ Pass. I love it so much that a couple of years ago I gave it to my dad as a birthday gift--I pay his tolls (see above comment about being a cheapskate--I admit my dad rarely has tolls and when he does he's probably driving to visit me). It's a technology that improves the quality of my life and that of my family.

When I think about offering new technologies in Access Services, I try to think about what we could offer that would be as meaningful to our users as EZ Pass is to me. What services have we recently rolled out that are this type of success for certain user groups? What services could we plan that would delight our users?