Thursday, April 2, 2009

Random thoughts on the strategic plan

After Tuesday's meeting, and reflecting on my conversation at the airport with Olivia and Carolyn, I decided to try rearranging the items in the current iteration of the strategic plan (access, preservation, etc.) to see if they made better sense in a different configuration.

It's very rough and in need of wordsmithing, but tell me what you think anyway. (We have demonstrated already that we're not blogging types, so commenting via phone or email is fine.  I used this because it was already set up and easy to edit.)

The the sections below  were developed by asking two central questions (influenced by Patty Iannuzzi's comments before the meeting):

  1. What are our libraries uniquely positioned to do?  What do they do that nobody else on campus does? What projects do they take on from other areas of campus (sometimes out of some sense of obligation or to prevent loss of content)?
  2. What can we do as a group to leverage our individual strengths? What can we do to support students and researchers collectively, regardless of location? 
I also have been thinking about strategic planning fatigue--everyone is on multiple planning committees for their library, institution, GWLA, other consortia, other professional organizations, etc.  I wonder if others find it exhausting or if the very phrase strategic planning fills everyone with fear and dread.   What if we called it something different?

The areas of focus below are a bit Ranganathan-esque, albeit unintentionally.  But maybe "kicking it old school" is not such a bad thing--everyone seems to be in the mood these days to get down to the core.  The examples of activities within each area are repeated multiple times within the postings--perhaps redundant, or perhaps illustrative of the interconnectedness of what we do.

Wednesday, April 1, 2009

Improve Efficiency/Reduce Duplication

  • Make information resources more accessible and affordable.

  • RSDD Delivery Benchmarks.

  • Home-grown resource sharing.  Examples:
    1. Connect programmers/app developers
    2. Instructional/assessment materials
    3. Cooperative collection and deselection
    4. Develop best practices and standards
  • Coordinate with others on advocacy issues where appropriate
    1. SIU/Springer, NIH, AAAS/JSTOR, etc.

Enhance Value to Our Institutions

  • Engage in projects and activities that leverage current resources (increase use of previous investments).  Examples:
    1. BCR Shelf-to-Life
    2. ILL/RSDD
    3. Increase digital availability (coordinated digital projects)
    4. TRAIL (Google/Hathi trust)
    5. Discovery tools, federated search products
  • Provide resources/opportunities to increase participation/visibility in institution's community.  Examples:
    1. Exchange of resources that help library's staff interact with users (professional development, sharing of home-grown resources, BI instruction, embedded reference, etc.)
    2. Quantify impact (shared BI curriculum materials, LibQual, NASULGC/APLU assessment program, open curriculum, LibGuides/Course Views, etc.)

Connect Seekers to Resources & Communities

  • Support OA Journals and Societies

  • Support Public Access Policy Expansion

  • Develop Strategies for Data Curation and Preservation
  •  
    • Blur lines of workflow and delivery between:
      1. Collection development and ILL
      2. ILL and Circuation
    • Decrease impact of distance
      1. RSDD/Rapid
      2. Tele- and web-communications

    Address Inevitabilities

    • Disaster Planning

    • Succession Planning

    • Professional development (ACRL Scholarly Communication, CRL Global Resources, etc.)

    Create Learning Environments

    • Create learning opportunities/environments for member institution staff.  Examples:
      • Professional development
      • Webinars
      • In-person: ACRL Scholarly Communication, CRL Global Resources Forum

    • Space management to redeploy space to student use.  Examples:
      • TRAIL
      • Cooperative collection selection/deselection (JSTOR and other common serial runs)