Where are the service points in UW Library? What kind of service is offered at these points? What kind of service would we like to offer? Where are the “gaps”? How well do we work together in an integrated fashion to provide the information service needed by our users?
1. Number and Location of Service Points
- Are the physical service points we provide sufficient in number and appropriately located?
- General reference/information in Davis and Porter Main
- Specialized reference/information: Gov. Pub., Special Coll., Cartographic, EDS, and IBIS
- Integrated reference/user services: UMD, Special Collections, Optometry
- User Services: Davis, Porter
- ILL/DD
- Attendant stations: Davis and Porter
- Are the electronic service points we provide well known and easily accessible to our users? What is their purpose? What kind of turn-around time do we provide? For example,
- ASKLIB
- "Comments" button on TUG Homepage
- Evaluation form integrated into the Journal Indexes interface
- TUGDoc
- Do we have any gaps in time or space in providing these services that disadvantage our users?
- Where does provision of information service/instruction by appointment (i.e. consultations) fit
into our service plan? How well is this aspect of information services known?
2. Staffing of Information Service Points
- How are these service points staffed?
- How well do we plan for and/or respond to peaks (and valleys) in service demands?
- What level of training (initial and ongoing) are we providing? Should we provide?
- How well are all of these services integrated into an overall plan? Should they be?
- What kind of role do other staff, for example in User Services and ILL, play in the provision of reference/
information services? Is this a function we should foster with improved training and
communication (or not?)?
- Is having to staff our various physical service points as much as possible a “sacred cow”? Are
there other ways of providing effective service?
3. Support for Information Service Points
- What type of technical support is available to those on the “front lines” when various electronic
software and hardware is malfunctioning?
- How well does this support parallel the hours of these service points?
4. Assessment
- How well do the reference/information services we offer our various types of users meet their
particular research needs?
- How can we evaluate these services to help us determine what to improve, what to focus on,
what gaps might exist in our current approach, as well as what we might stop doing?
November 23, 1998
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Waterloo, Ontario, Canada N2L 3G1
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