Charter Mark for HE Libraries UC&R Wales, January 2007 The Leeds Met Experience: Re-accreditation, feedback & putting things right Dilys Young, Service Development Manager Leeds Met Libraries

Charter Leeds Met  first success  2004 – new criteria – back to the drawing board  2005 – re accreditation – what’s different, what’s the same?  2006 – choice: light vs. heavy  2008? – ‘heavy’ touch? Who knows – all change?

Making the grade – how to approach it  Logical approach  Setting up the systems – QuIG  ‘interpreting’  Action planning  ‘gathering’ information at every opportunity  Remember the context

Re-accreditation in 2005 – the visit  Documentation  Format  Briefing – same assessor?  Preparation  Meetings  Outcomes  Celebrations!

Feedback mechanisms – what we do  Developing the culture of continuous improvement  Who are the customers  How do we get to them  Variety of methods  Variety of constituencies  Keeping track of it all

Putting it right (when it goes wrong)  Treat complaints positively  Put yourself in their shoes  Bend the rules  Take risks  Allow staff to use their initiative  Learning from it & making sure it doesn’t happen again – how to avoid complacency

Benefits: service, staff, university  Service: standards, monitoring, doing the ‘right’ things (as well as doing things right)  Staff: achievement, input, acknowledgement, clarity of priorities  University: pride, best practice, trust, value-added service

Where next?  Charter Mark becomes irrelevant, but useful to demonstrate quality standards  How will it change and can we still do it?  Other standards: Service Mark, ITIL

Any questions? Dilys Young ext. 3975/6576