INFORMATION SERVICES REVIEW

Library Staff Consultation Session: 98/11/30

Service Points: Physical / Electronic

These notes from the Consultative Forum on Information Services attempt to provide an unbiased, accurate and unfiltered record of the meetings.  Attendees were invited to engage in discussion of their observations, concerns, proposals, ideas and questions related to Information Services.

While members of the Information Services Review Group were present as observers, a neutral facilitator managed these discussions among UW Library staff stakeholders.

1. Questions re Porter Reserve desk re-location:

• Reserve Desk moving to second floor (main). There will still be a service point on first floor for Microfiche & some Controlled Access materials.

2. Question re staffing and impact on planning number of service points:

• Yes; likely to maintain the same number of positions overall. Status Quo.

3. Noted that some service points now have restricted hours, e.g. Government Publications.

• This is likely to continue.
• These restrictions do cause problems for users.
• Government Publications is a difficult collection to access.
• Users on weekends, evenings do comment re the closed service points (e.g. why can’t I access ILL staff?)
• User needs are only partly addressed by electronic forms

• Some users cannot come in during our current service hours.
• The hours were cut back because of staff leaving and not being replaced
• Weekday afternoon hours (noon – 4pm) is really not adequate for Government Publication service.

4. Question: Are there alternatives?

• Specifically re G.P. it is difficult to utilise other staff without extensive training because of specialised nature of G.P. materials.
• Used to have four librarian's in G.P.; now have 1.5
• These cuts were caused by budgetary change.
• Decisions were not based on service needs; Driven by staffing shortages
• Feel hands tied regarding suggesting alternatives because staff with other reference and collections responsibilities also in short supply.

• Perhaps some staff should be "full time" reference with no other duties? Possible? No, seven hours on desk too much.

5. User Services staff noted impacts during periods of "0 Ref., 0 ILL".

• They are not trained, not the right type of staff, to satisfy user needs during these periods.
• Library needs more staff.
• More electronic resources will not address the need they observe.
• User Services staff often receive quite negative comments on weekends and evenings.

6. Observations / questions regarding Special Collections & Space Review in Porter:

• Special Collections was allocated more space. Was this at too great a cost?
• Could Rare Books be relocated outside Porter?
• Alternatives were examined during the review and no other adequate space was available.

7. Observations / questions regarding EDS (Electronic Data Service):

• EDS location: It is now on main floor, might the office be better on fifth adjacent to Government Publications. This alignment is common at many Universities. Might save staff time. Might bring some incremental improvement in service. Many EDS consults involve Government information resources.

• EDS staffing: Currently there is no official allocation of staff time to EDS. There are advertised hours of staff availability (3 hours between two staff). Should there be allocation of staff time at an greater level? The need is growing.
• EDS "Staff" do the whole ball of wax: selection, cataloguing, User support: reference & consultation
• EDS is currently under used. Could be more valuable if more staff available.
• Difficult to measure EDS work load/service because of diffuse hours
• Most EDS work not reflected in "STATS"; Needs different weighting to measure.

8. What will the impact of the "TUG Data Resource Service" be?

• Users get turned on and will want more.
• Increase in faculty opportunity to include data resources in courses.
• More staff time required preparing data.

• UG has human resource limits as well and are at their limit in this area.
• Also, UW has some unique needs best understood by UW staff.
• But it might be possible.

• The service was conceived of as a co-operative venture, like TRELLIS.
• But the service point / reference service aspects needs to be local. The resources are complex (e.g. census data).

9. Signage.

• Davis and Porter lack effective signage.
• This is a serious and universal problem in UW libraries
• It does impact of Reference and User Services; generates many routine but important questions
• There were numerous comments to the effect that more effective signs would have significant positive benefit.

10. Regarding our experiment in "Roving" Librarians near Workstations.

Was it Successful? Is it a good alternative to deploy assistance?

• The experience showed that "Being There" attracts questions that don't come to desks.
• It addresses a different need, helps people anchored to workstations, helps people who fear losing their workstation access.
• We must at least think about addressing these different needs.
• Both Porter and Davis reference desk staff do continue to rove in the workstation areas.

11. Should all staff have more training to enable helping users anywhere and anytime?

• Users do ask anyone who looks like staff: anything, anywhere and anytime.
• Users who look knowledgeable get asked as well.

12. Re: Peer / Student Assistance

• Should we hire / pay some students to offer help. Could this address the needs of some users who are reluctant to ask staff but will ask "peers"? Could this provide more hours of availability of assistance?
• Concern expressed re limited knowledge of peers / students. Great if it happens but can’t promote it.
• But there are good experiences observed. Is some help better than no help? Could peer helpers or more student workers fill a gap?

13. Re Impact of TRELLIS.

• A larger and more complex system
• It makes students and faculty angry at times
• It's been "whimsical" this term
• TUG Homepage and TRELLIS assume a high level of computer and library literacy
• TRELLIS is a better tool for sophisticated users but too much for neophytes
• Question: Can we afford to focus on those users who are having basic problems understanding the system interfaces? Answer: We must.
• "Holdings" are a very problematic aspect of TRELLIS for many users, including staff.
• Staff needs more TRELLIS training
• There will always be a need for reference staff to assist many users with TRELLIS
• Users often confused among TRELLIS and other services (including "the Web")
• Students are often stopped dead by initial TRELLIS screen. They can’t figure out they have to select the "local catalogue" option

• They are hindered and confused by jargon ("OPAC", "indexes", etc)
• Many libraries are now doing usability studies and some very different gateways are emerging. Users must be involved in developing better gateway / interfaces.
• With current TRELLIS and TUG Website we have a "Starter Kit".

14. RE: Electronic Information "service points"

• AskLib has very low utilisation in Davis.
• Use of AskLib in Porter has doubled (to 300) in past year, but that is still very low use.
• Students wouldn't recognise the existence or name of AskLib.
• "TUG comments" is used by many for asking questions that are essentially Reference or User Services questions. Could there be a general "Electronic Reference" for TUG covering the needs for all users?
• UW Community Needs Assessment group has had recent discussions regarding feedback / measurement / community needs. This is a very important issue, which needs discussion on a TUG-wide basis.
• Can any electronic reference service give anything approaching instant assistance?
• Generally agreed that someone needs to be physically available or at the end of a phone.
• Assistance for remote users needs to expand. And needs more human resources not replaceable by electronic help. Need to final a balance of human and electronic help.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

• Seems to work well in some specific disciplines
• Some calls come in or are referred that could or should have been referred to the information desk(s). Perhaps we haven't adequately advertised the assistance available at the desks
• On the other hand few students contact the liaison librarians.
• Special needs like those related to Government Publications have more impact on reference/information desks than the discipline needs addressed by the liaison consultation service.

• Two-tier system was examined in the past
• With more training of other staff could more of them be used to support a two-tier model?
• It would require reorganisation or money. Is it practical to even consider more expensive options?
• Assuming we had money? Even then, unsure of benefits of two-tier approach.
• What are the benefits of two-tier, what new problems would arise?

• Many statistical ‘ticks" at service points reflect routine or directional questions.
• What is the role of the Library Attendant desk? Do they have more time? With more training, could they deal with much of the routine or directional load?
• On the other hand; users ask whomever is closest; whomever they can see.
• The Attendant Desk situation differs between Davis and Porter (visibility).

• For years we had separate "Catalogue" assistance service (staffed by cataloguers). Why do we think that need for the type of assistance they provided disappeared with the cards? Should such a service focused on TRELLIS instruction be introduced?
• Would that only confront users with more choice and more confusion? They need more people to ask in fewer places, not more places to find to ask their questions.

17. Is our pattern of staffing optimal (e.g. double staffing at peak periods, etc.)?

• These are very hard to measure and predict except at a very gross level.
• "System" problems create unpredictable demands for more assistance
• On-call / backup staffing does not work effectively for information service points
• Our staff numbers are inadequate for normal load let alone for contingencies.
• This terms experience with new resources and systems is that is that it takes more staff time per user to provide assistance (e.g. TRELLIS, ERL, other electronic resources)
• The combination of more "time per user" and system problems and limited number of functioning workstation has lead to long lines waiting for workstations. This has increased user and staff frustration.
• It is exhausting at information desks at peak periods.

18. TRELLIS revisited / User education / Student helpers.

• If so much of unsatisfied need relates to using TRELLIS, do we need separate staff separate service points for assistance focused on those needs?
• Is this an educational issue rather than a reference issue?
• Was the large number of TRELLIS workshops offered to users of little value?
• Timing and context of "classes" and "tours" are difficult issues.
• How can we get more staff for a separate "TRELLIS help" area? Are paid student helpers a possibility?
• The complexity of TRELLIS varies with the complexity of the information resources involved. It is not a simple "How to use TRELLIS" issue. It is a complex problem related to teaching strategies regarding information resources.
• Many other universities use more student employees.
• Is there potential benefit in using Teaching Assistants; What would be the impact of working more with faculty?
• Need a visible (Flashing light? tutorial or assistance area for TRELLIS/
• What about a Kiosk with Touch Screen for basic directional and routine information (i.e. as alternative to or in addition to signage)?
• Does the library have an 1-800 number? Who would answer it?

19. Re Technical / Systems Support for Service Points.

• Time periods (e.g. noon hours, weekends, evenings) when help is unavailable can be very bad (Note made re System Staff pager)
• Weekend experience especially bad recently because of problems with TRELLIS, ERL, Network printing, the WEB, etc.
• Signs regarding problems really help, but they must be up-to-date.
• Often very difficult for Information and User Services staff to figure out the nature of technical problems that arise.
• There was no call on this past weekend to let Reference staff know Web Voyage was back.
• Should / could some pre-opening checks be done regarding technical availability of TRELLIS, ERL, etc.?

• Ii should be viewed as an emergency when TRELLIS or other critical systems are down. Users have no alternative, there are no backups.
• Workstation maintenance is another area of frustration.
• Students are frustrated by ERL timeouts
• There are still lots of ERL problems on weekends (e.g. "Fatal ERROR" while awaiting record display or download.
• There is a need for technical support staff on weekends and evenings, especially at peak times of term.

20. Assessment.

• What are we doing now?
• We have lots of hourly "Tick Marks" data (quantitative).
• What information do we need to tell us how well or how poorly we are doing?
• We need more information but staff have no time to spend on recording more information.
• Re Government Publications desk: Few tick marks but they don't reflect the workload because of the weight of complex collection.
• Tick marks are valuable in that they can show trends.
• Could we get better picture by observation of the Information Desks.
• There are other survey or assessment instruments that may be worth investigating (e.g. Murfin, etc.)
• Can't depend on asking students only. Faculty and library staff opinion also important.
• If surveying is considered, perhaps better to focus on a small number of departments to start?
• Faculty assumptions are inflated regarding student knowledge of Library of information resources.
• More Faculty involvement re assessment would serve two purposes:

• Community Needs Assessment group purposed assessment of Reference Service in the past. It wasn’t the right time then. Is it the right time now?
• Possible to log more data at desks: e.g. time, complexity level? No, we’re keeping track of as much as possible now.
• When assessing Information Services we can focus on performance or on results. Do we need to put more emphasis on the staff performance issues? Would this tell us, e.g. if more staff training was a significant issue? Are the "results" too hard to measure?

• Satisfaction is a very dubious concept to measure. Typically most users (70%) in Libraries say they are satisfied
• What we need to do is focus on "success rate"/ "failure rate".
• There is no demonstrated correlation between success and satisfaction.
• We do have to ask our users more about our impact on them.
• We need to ask them more often but in smaller doses (small surveys, samples).
• Can we do this ourselves (expertise? objectivity?) or should we look to outside help?
• Direct user feedback is best. How to capture?
• We had good experience last year with focus groups.
• Do we really want more ticks? Do we really want a quantitative increase in business? Over-emphasis on quantitative rather than qualitative measures is bad.
• How can we assess the impact of the new electronic information resources and systems?

21. Any other comments for the Information Services Review group?

• Noted the positive experience in UMD of being proactive with faculty, knowing courses, assignments etc.
• Noted re decreased ILL service hours that the service is now being provided a different way utilising Information Services and User Services staff and service points.
• We need more staff available to provide direct assistance to users.

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