Alma Swan Key Perspectives Ltd Truro, UK

Key Perspectives Ltd  Overall theme: The digital world  How users (faculty and students) use libraries  The library as a place  Use of resources  Finding of resources  Way work is done  Access  The evolution of reference services  A time of change for the library profession

Key Perspectives Ltd

 To access print resources  To order inter-library loan material  To talk to a subject librarian  To use the library as a laboratory

 Opening hours  Browsing  Quiet study  The library is now ‘an undergraduate space’ Key Perspectives Ltd

 Reading rights:47%  Exercise borrowing rights:30%  SCONUL Research Extra:11%  Considered a major advance in providing access  Those as yet unaware are very interested  N.B. Those working away from their home institution are increasing Key Perspectives Ltd

 Information wants to be digital  e-journals  e-books  e-datasets  Digital archival collections  Digital finding aids Key Perspectives Ltd

 Not at all expert:  Use what they’ve always used  Use Google – a lot  ‘Good enough’ tendency  Contrary: ask for full-text databases and then say Web of Science is enough  Easily deterred:  Remote holdings  Locally held microform, microfilm  Locally-held print Key Perspectives Ltd

 Electronic full-text locally  Google for an easily located version  a friend in another institution  author  Inter-Library Loan  Subject librarian  Level of need versus effort Key Perspectives Ltd

 Static or declining  Decline particularly marked for journal articles  Decline gradual for conference papers  More or less static for books, theses, audio- visual materials  Becoming more challenging to fulfil  Increasingly associated with rise of interdisciplinary research? Key Perspectives Ltd

 Products/offerings: books, information (free, reliable, accessible, trustworthy)  Facility/environment: quiet, comfortable, work space  Staff: helpful, friendly, knowledgable  Customer service: Open to public, online catalogue, ILL and linking to other libraries Key Perspectives Ltd

 Are unsure what to expect at university with respect to ICT provision  Regard ubiquitous internet access as the norm  Half look at ICT provision when applying for university places Key Perspectives Ltd

 Only 5% never use social networking sites  65% use them regularly  62% use wikis, blogs and online networks  44% maintain their own website or blog  Flexible and ready to accommodate new technological solutions to their needs Key Perspectives Ltd

 Yes, the space will continue to change  Beware driving away users  Study space, computers  Communal study space  What about print?  68% of Harvard’s acquisitions goes straight to warehouse … Key Perspectives Ltd

 The print-based library had a multitude of delivery technologies:  print  microfiche  microform  video, audio, slides  The electronic library has only one: computers Key Perspectives Ltd

 Old:  Selection and purchase of resources for research and learning  Instruction in how to use them  New:  Creation of resources for research and learning  Instruction on how to use them (they are delivered through one technology)  Dissemination of the research and learning outputs of the institution Key Perspectives Ltd

 A much closer partnership between librarians and faculty  A vast increase in potential collection resources  The collection is increasingly outside of the “library” Key Perspectives Ltd

 Increase in the resources and services that can be provided  This includes digitisation of the institution’s own resources  Focus moves from collection to service  Much of the ‘collection’ is outside the institution  Potential for greater and more meaningful collaboration between librarians and faculty (e.g. the National Underground Railroad Museum and University of Cincinnati Library) Key Perspectives Ltd

 Users (researchers and students) think they can do this themselves…  … and in most cases they can  But they still turn to the library for difficult cases  They perceive the library as the producer of authoritative, reliable, trustworthy information  And many are turning back to the library (information overload?)  Evidence that users are returning to library technology Key Perspectives Ltd

 Interface increasingly important  Ensure OA journals are catalogued  Provide tools for self-training (give them the tools and they will come)  Engage students early  One bad experience tends to convince them that the Web is a better, easier, more fun route to what they seek  Brand the library! Key Perspectives Ltd

 Sitting at a reference desk…  Teaching library instruction  Providing distance learning  Staffing chat reference  Cataloging books and journals  Integrating library automation with university automation, e.g. Blackboard/WebCT  Providing metadata for library holdings (to make them web searchable)  Placing orders for books and journals  Negotiating contracts for bundled digital journals and ebooks  Creating information resources  Circulating the local collection  Arranging storage/retrieval in high density repositories  Setting up massive consortial circulation systems Courtesy: David Kohl, Cincinnati University Libraries

 Library directors will increasingly have to provide evidence of the value the library adds to the institution  Libraries will need to think new thoughts about performance and success indicators  How will libraries measure new services offered to a wider base than just the institution?  Librarianship will include new career paths  New library education programmes will be needed Key Perspectives Ltd

 Custodian of information  Manager of institutional repositories  Administrator of information purchasing and delivery services  Subject information expert  Teacher of information literacy skills  Manager of data  Technology specialist Key Perspectives Ltd

 Increasingly, to support both research and learning, libraries will be guiding users to trusted resources outside the institution  The library will facilitate access and integration with respect to external resources  New licensing deals, many transitory  Strengthen links with other institutional libraries:  ILL  Consortial arrangements  Look seriously at ad hoc affiliations (collaborative research)  New collaborations with other stewards of public information (museums, national libraries, data centres) Key Perspectives Ltd

 Two views: more … or less!  Collaboration in research and dissemination  Research: the library has particular expertise in technologies  Dissemination: the new end-game  Management of the institutional repository to give maximal value to the institution and individual researchers  Liaison with the university press Key Perspectives Ltd

 Interdisciplinary research  Big science and e-research  Medium-to-small e-science / research pools  Virtual Research Environments  Data  Metrics  Demands:  New and different resources  New ways to assess and plan for needs  Awareness that these researchers may not know themselves what they need or should consult Key Perspectives Ltd

 Interdisciplinary research  e-research  Semantic technologies bringing new ways to do research  Implications for library services  Not just infrastructural, but cultural too  Cornell’s VIVO Key Perspectives Ltd

 What are libraries to do about this?  Watch out for more funder mandates  Growing importance as outputs in themselves  Big data are safe (ish)  But we should be worrying about small data (who need carers)  Data are only really important if they are re- usable Key Perspectives Ltd

 The Research Excellence Framework is fanning the flames now in the UK (and in Australia)  Can only produce a range of really good metrics on an open corpus  What metrics do YOU want to see?  Can you help by producing the raw material? Key Perspectives Ltd

Researchers Research managers / funders LIBRARY Institutional management Key Perspectives Ltd

Key Perspectives Ltd