Abstract
Karl Maria Fattig and Rebecca Kemp, two librarians who have completed a majority of the steps involved in their electronic resource management (ERM) system implementation, and a subscription agent, Christine Stamison, shared their experiences working with electronic resources in this ERM system integration session. Bob McQuillan, an ERM system vendor, led the panel through a series of topics relating to the transition from print to electronic resources and ongoing management of electronic resources. They included addressing budget strategies, allocating and integrating staff workflows, and harvesting usage statistics. The session wrapped up with some soothsayer “dreams” for the future role of ERM systems, which included some observations from the audience.
KEYWORDS:
- electronic resource management (ERM) systems
- electronic resources
- budgets
- workflow
- electronic resource usage statistics
- knowledgebases
- Counting Online Usage of NeTworked Electronic Resources (COUNTER)
- Standardized Usage Statistics Harvesting Initiative (SUSHI)
- National Information Standards Organization (NISO)
INTRODUCTION
To set the stage for this strategy session the moderator, Bob McQuillan, Senior Product Manager of eProducts at Innovative Interfaces, asked the audience how many attendees have an electronic resource management (ERM) system. A majority of hands were raised. A large number of the hands remained raised for McQuillan's next question, “How many of you are currently implementing?” With the last question only a few hands remained raised: “How many of you would say you're fully integrated?” McQuillan exclaimed, “This session is for you!”
As digital content continues to push through the information pipeline traditionally dominated by print materials, there is increasing pressure for libraries to maximize use and investment of electronic resources. ERM systems have created a new set of opportunities and challenges for institutions.
Rebecca Kemp, Serials Librarian at University of North Carolina–Wilmington, and Karl Maria Fattig, Systems and Digital Initiatives Librarian at Maine's Bowdoin College, represented libraries, while Christine Stamison, Senior Customer Relations Manager at Swets, represented the vendor community. They provided insights on current issues and some strategies for meeting long-term objectives for working with electronic resources. The panel led by McQuillan addressed four topics, which included budget strategies for print versus electronic resources, library workflow, usage statistics, and the future of ERM systems.
BUDGETS FOR ELECTRONIC VERSUS PRINTED MATERIALS
Fattig started off addressing budgets by offering Bowdoin's subscription commitment for 2008–2009, which was roughly 60 percent spent on electronic and 40 percent on print resources. This number has been changing over the last ten years. Per Fattig, Bowdoin has been fortunate to be able to receive more bang for their buck due to membership in the CBB consortium with Colby College and Bates College, both located in Maine. The subscription number commitments do not include the added value of the consortial deals.
A big issue at Bowdoin is space. “Space is almost as important to us as the actual budget in terms of finances,” said Fattig. Bowdoin is currently at 85 percent capacity and has been for some years. Some materials have been moved to off-site storage, but this practice has diminished in recent times. To address the space issue, a solution was arrived at that allows for an increase in electronic versus print resources. Staff-wise Bowdoin is in relatively good shape. Bowdoin adjusted workflow processes by implementing PromptCat and shelf-ready monographs. Staff are now spending less time on monographs and more time on “complicated things such as electronic resources.” Fattig noted that libraries need to look at workflow processes and outsourcing agreements. This involves “hiring consultants to come in and tell you things that you already know or don't know, but things that your administration will receive better from a consultant rather than … you saying it.” Fattig concluded his talk on budgets with addressing serials review. Bowdoin has been doing serials and standing order reviews about every other year for the last twelve years.
The University of North Carolina–Wilmington's (UNCW's) budget for the past fiscal year before revisions was just over $2.2 million with $1.5 million devoted to electronic serials, leaving half a million for print. With package deals included, this translates to 27,319 titles online and about 1,166 print subscriptions. UNCW is also doing a serials review. Kemp noted the number of titles is shrinking and will continue to shrink over the next couple of months as UNCW finalizes which titles to cancel for 2010.
Apart from the subscription costs, there are also investments in terms of staff time spent managing electronic resources to ensure they are accessible, including licensing and the cyclic package renewals. These activities are time consuming and labor intensive. Kemp estimated “about 40 percent of my time is spent on a combination of access set-up and access troubleshooting; there's definitely a lot that goes into that.”
For UNCW, the electronic format is a good alternative to print and possibly the only alternative since they have exceeded their space capacity with serials and bound journals. Kemp concluded with hopes that initiatives like Portico, LOCKSS (Lots of Copies Keep Stuff Safe), and CLOCKSS (Controlled LOCKSS), UNCW will be able to maintain access to all the volumes for which they paid.
When beginning her talk about budgets, Stamison stated she would try to be “vendor agnostic and not promote my company or any other in the spirit of NASIG.” Stamison noted she thought all subscription agents could attest to the fact that there has been a dramatic shift from print to electronic. In 2009, 67 percent of subscriptions handled globally by Swets have an electronic component. For Swets this number is up 10 percent from 2008 and “that is a dramatic shift,” according to Stamison. Swets is seeing libraries trending to “e-only” when possible, particularly during renewal season. When renewal notices are sent out, libraries are asking for reports that show what is only available electronically. Swets is hearing from libraries that driving this format change are shelf-space concerns and user behavior. Users, especially researchers, want to access everything from their dorm or office. Over the past two years, libraries have been going direct to the publisher for many of the big deals and agents are administering the payment and invoicing. Agent's electronic data interchange (EDI) invoices can be uploaded into an integrated library system (ILS) to provide better tracking of funds.
Due to the massive influx of electronic titles, subscription agents have also invested heavily in technologies in order to assist libraries with managing electronic collections. Stamison noted, “You've probably seen many small subscription agents go out of business and the reason for that is they didn't really do the investment in the e-technology side. This is very costly, especially in these times of shrinking budgets and with cancellations coming through. It's something that we have to do.”
Many agents conduct on-site visits with customers, meet with customer advisory boards, and attend all the major meetings like the NASIG Annual Conference, Electronic Resources & Libraries (ER&L), the Charleston Conference, and the American Library Association conferences. Agents look at the trends to see what is coming and consider where they think their money will be spent most efficiently. Agents are tracking and hosting more information, particularly license data, in their subscription systems. Many have a license bank and resource management systems built into their system. Agents are “pushing all that information out to libraries in order to help you manage your electronic journal collection.”
With electronic subscriptions at 60 to 67 percent, the moderator asked the panel if there is a sense where these numbers are going to shift over the next one to two years. Stamison replied that Swets is seeing a shift of 10 percent each year. She suggested, “We've almost hit the peak because we're waiting for some of the smaller publishers to digitize. I'm thinking at least 5 to 10 percent a year.”
ALLOCATING, INTEGRATING, AND/OR REPLACING STAFF WITHIN LIBRARY WORKFLOW
UNCW has a team of three librarians who are responsible for the implementation of their Innovative ERM system. This project is a work in progress as they are still implementing it. The Head of Systems, Head of Acquisitions, and Serials Librarian looked at and formulated the field definitions for the resource, contact, and license records. The Head of Systems then worked with Innovative to configure the ERM system. The Head of Acquisitions is responsible for creating the contact, resource, and license records, although Kemp noted she might put in some brief records.
As the Serials Librarian, Kemp is responsible for loading coverage data from their knowledgebase, Innovative's Content Access Service (CASE), into the ERM system. She ensures the coverage information, titles, ISSNs, URLs, and holdings data are added to the knowledgebase and uploaded into the ERM system. Once the coverage load process is concluded, Kemp and two staffers in her department fix any problems in the coverage information. Additionally, they update administrative information within the resource record such as the URL, username, and password needed for accessing usage statistics and update contact information for vendors.
Stamison explained that new procedures and processes are taking place within the subscription agent arena to handle electronic resources. Like libraries, agents have had to invest in retraining staff. Extensive training needs to be done on the subscription agent side to deal with “all these electronic resources and that is just licensing.” Most of the people who handle print subscriptions never had to deal with licensing. They have had to become “Web savvy” and learn to deal with Web access. Subscription agent staff have to be trained on new modules within their systems. “A lot of time and effort has gone on inside the subscription agency world in order to help you deal with electronic issues as well,” noted Stamison.
Agents are now working with different contacts. Stamison said that in the past they would have a contact for the print, but now they usually have a contact for print, as well as for print and electronic within the larger publishers. With small publishers it is still easier. Sometimes agents have to send money for print journals to one place and electronic payments to a different office. Gathering all the information to ensure subscriptions are handled correctly has been a challenge. There are different subscription numbers for print and electronic. This can wreak havoc when trying to register an e-journal because the print and electronic subscription numbers differ or the print number is needed to activate the electronic. Agents have collected that information through their contacts with publishers and entered it into their subscription systems. Not only are agents dealing with more publisher contacts, but they are also dealing with more contacts in libraries. In the past they would speak to the serials librarian or technical services librarian. Stamison observed, “We're also talking to the e-resources librarian or the collection development person who is handling electronic. It's a whole new group of people that we have to deal with and get to know as well. Many agents also have new products for electronic journals, so again that's another new person we have to talk to.”
“Just as the libraries have seen, we need higher caliber personnel to deal with licensing issues. We can't have someone who has always handled claims handle some of these complex licensing issues,” declared Stamison. At Swets, higher-qualified people are being assigned to deal with licensing issues and more routine database issues are being assigned to staff members that are less tech savvy. By implementing this new structure, Swets is ensuring “we're handling your e-access as efficiently as possible.”
Fattig noted that Bowdoin's ERM system is not yet fully implemented. Their process has some similarities with UNCW. The Acquisitions Librarian creates initial resource records at the point of trial because almost everything is trialed. If contact records are involved, contacts are either selected from existing records or a new one is created. The same process applies for the license record. The Serials and Electronic Resource Coordinator maintains the Serials Solutions knowledgebase. Bowdoin has elected to add their print holdings to Serials Solutions and has done a lot of troubleshooting relative to coverage loads. Bowdoin has done three coverage loads in the past three months. Due to budget restrictions the Serials and Electronic Resources Assistant position was lost. The Collection Development Librarian, student workers, and a contract staff person located in Oregon are now involved in the current process. The contract position has produced a number of scripted programs for Bowdoin. This position manages the EZproxy database and was doing the WebBridge coverage load.
Next Fattig showed a slide that displayed the main page for a program used for pre-processing a Serials Solutions Excel file. This program is used to improve the coverage load process within the local Innovative ERM system. Bowdoin's resource records are then exported and merged with records from consortial partners in a shared resource discovery system used for public display. In order to facilitate this process, all three libraries have to have the same resource ID. Fattig noted, “With Serials Solutions, sometimes resource IDs change and are not discovered until problems arise with coverage load.” Bowdoin is running a little script that compares the resource IDs to the previous load and to an authority database of resource IDs for the consortium.
McQuillan wrapped up this topic with a couple of questions for the panel: What method drives the change process when adapting or modifying an electronic resources workflow and what's been the bigger challenge within your organization?
At Bowdoin it is management of expectations. “Sometimes we have new initiatives that come along and steal the thunder away from things we had started,” replied Fattig. “I think that's one of the reasons why electronic resources management at our institution has not been completed. We get 85 percent of the way and then we're pulled off to do another project.”
USAGE STATISTICS HARVESTING AND IMPLICATIONS FOR COLLECTION DEVELOPMENT
Stamison began the discussion of usage statistics with an observation: “We've been talking for a long time at NASIG, at ER&L, and at Charleston about usage statistics, but it seems to be becoming hotter and hotter, especially in these shrinking budget times.” Agents have to show libraries a return on investment for the money they give agents. Some agents with electronic gateway systems have tried to do this by ensuring they are COUNTER (Counting Online Usage of NeTworked Electronic Resources) compliant in order to provide libraries with useful usage statistics. To become COUNTER compliant, a publisher or agent must undergo an auditing process that is not easy, according to Stamison. The latest version, COUNTER 3, requires a provider to be SUSHI (Standardized Usage Statistics Harvesting Initiative) compliant by August 31, 2009. COUNTER 3 also requires providers to subtract out all downloads that come through federated search services. Subscription agents have played a major role in developing and testing SUSHI in order to download usage statistics consistently into ERM systems. Most agents are very involved within standards organizations such as the National Information Standards Organization (NISO), the International Committee on EDI for Serials (ICEDIS), and EDItEUR to develop standards to make libraries and agents work easier. “We like to do everything with standards in order to make everything less proprietary for each university and especially to leverage our budget more efficiently,” offered Stamison. Some agents offer usage statistics services to libraries. Agents are also developing modules within their subscription systems to offer cost-per-view for e-journals because feedback from libraries indicates that is what is needed to demonstrate the libraries' return on investment to top management.
Fattig noted that Bowdoin has graduated through a series of homegrown and proprietary databases to manage their usage statistics. From 2000 to 2007 a student worker would retrieve statistics and load them into a homegrown system. From 2007 to 2008 they subscribed to Serials Solutions' 360 Counter for a year. Recently, Bowdoin developed an open-source prototype and is in the process of moving everything into an ERM system and developing a homegrown hybrid.
After examining every type of licensed electronic resource, they were able to determine which resources were important to count and which were not. Database searches are really important. Some ERM systems do not handle the COUNTER Database Report 1 (DB1). Another problem for Bowdoin is the percentage of federated searches in statistics. Bowdoin uses a statistical program within their searching to subtract federated search statistics from database usage statistics.
Kemp noted that usage statistics and their integration into the ERM system at UNCW are a work in progress. Usage statistic harvesting is done “by hand,” a process by which a serials staffer armed with URLs, usernames, and passwords accesses publisher and vendor online platforms once a month to download whatever statistics are available. Some statistics can be gathered through ScholarlyStats. Statistics from platforms are downloaded as a comma delimited file and then put into an Excel spreadsheet, which is stored on their Intranet. This disseminates those statistics to the rest of the librarians. ScholarlyStats, a subscription-based service from Swets, goes out and retrieves COUNTER-compliant statistics. Because currently it can only be utilized for COUNTER-compliant statistics, it gathers only a subset of UNCW's titles. This necessitates having to do the rest of it by hand, according to Kemp.
UNCW is still learning about the import process to bring text or Excel files into their ERM system. Currently the only report that can be uploaded into their ERM system is the COUNTER Journal Report 1 (JR1). Journal-level statistics are required for their ERM system to calculate cost-per-use. The University of Nebraska–Lincoln has a Web page set up where one can input a comma delimited file and get an XML file out of it that can be uploaded into their ERM system. Before moving forward with loading usage statistics in their ERM system, coverage load must first be entered.
Bowdoin has yet to load usage statistics in their ERM system. According to Fattig, it is one of the reasons they are spending so much time on the COUNTER reports. SUSHI has been tested, but “we haven't gotten SUSHI to work correctly; it continues to be a work in process,” reported Fattig. Another thing that needs to be brought to light, according to Fattig, is that Bowdoin is not retaining subscription period data within their payment fields. These data are needed to match up periods to calculate accurate cost-per-use data in their ERM system. “Make sure you're doing that if you're not doing that,” advised Fattig.
McQuillan, who is a member of NISO's SUSHI Committee, commented he has seen a real momentum with SUSHI 1.6 and COUNTER 3. “The number of agents who've been awarded compliance recently is very, very encouraging and it may be a much different story a year from now.”
FUTURE ROLE OF ERM SYSTEMS
With soothsayer role in hand, Fattig began looking toward the near future. He sees the complete creation of licensing and contact records, which was put on hold due to Bowdoin's AquaBrowser implementation. Resource records will be updated and reviewed to ensure the information needed for accessing and loading statistics is entered. Another project is maintenance work on the consortial resource ID list, which involves several individuals working at the three institutions. To facilitate this Bowdoin has given read-only access rights to their administrative back-end Serials Solutions knowledgebase to their consortial partners, Colby and Bates colleges. This enables the partners to see the titles to which Bowdoin has subscribed. The final task is documenting coverage load information, handling deleted records, and preprocessing files.
In three to five years, Fattig would like to see a consortial behind-the‐scenes ERM system that does not involve merging all these records. He joked he would be creating his “cancellation ray gun and sing along blog,” then qualified this by stressing the need for integrated functionality with all systems. Fattig exclaimed, “We used to have an integrated library system, but now we have five different systems. Everything is all over the place and we need to have more talking back and forth between these systems.” Fattig closed his talk with a mock-up slide of what his dream for the future, “Dr. Fattig's Cancellation Ray Gun,” would look like. When a button is pressed to active the “ray gun,” the software would look at all statistics. Based on the cost-per-use calculation that is weighted by whatever factors a library chooses to have in the formula, the system would then generate a report, which would provide a starting point for libraries to use for cancellation projects.
UNCW has a retrospective project to finish populating contact, resource, and license records. Kemp observed, “One of the main advantages to ERM [systems] that I see is one database where we can store a wide variety of information about all our different resources… . We really want to take advantage of that to its fullest.” Kemp's current project has one of her staffers inputting usernames, passwords, and URLs for usage statistics in resource records. Contact information will also be updated. Another major task will be to continue to load coverage information. Up to this point UNCW has been loading one package at a time. Kemp stated, “My great dream is to populate ERM [systems] based on a legacy spreadsheet and not have to use the spreadsheet anymore.” Once coverage information is loaded, Kemp wants to upload COUNTER usage statistics and calculate cost-per-use. After statistics are uploaded, work on profiling the link resolver, WebBridge, will begin by using the knowledgebase in the ERM system for the target information for the link resolver.
Agents want to continue their role of liaising between publishers and libraries in the future. Stamison stressed agents want to continue to supply libraries with electronic resources and provide the best return on their investment possible. Agents are doing this by working in the standards community to help libraries download information from the place where they buy their journals, the subscription agent's database system, into a library's ERM system. Agents have entered a wealth of generic and library-specific negotiated terms in their systems. By using ONIX-PL (ONline Information eXchange for Publications Licenses), agents can help libraries with loading license information from their systems into ERM systems. Some agents have also developed a licensing module within their systems to populate license data for libraries. Stamison pointed out, “Our working within the standards community can help you.”
Cost of Resource Exchange (CORE) is a NISO initiative. The CORE standard provides a way to upload acquisitions information into an ERM system, particularly for libraries that have stand-alone ERM systems that are not integrated with the ILS. Stamison shared that her dream is for agents to be able to facilitate an easy way for libraries to extract license terms and acquisition data for direct upload into an ERM system. Agents are also working with SUSHI so libraries can upload usage statistics for a complete picture of cost-per-use. Subscription agents are constantly redeveloping the services they provide to libraries and publishers. “We're also trying to get publishers to become COUNTER compliant as well. I still think we have a valuable role to play as a liaison for the libraries, publishers, and ILS system vendors,” stated Stamison. “That's my dream.”
AUDIENCE RESPONSE AND PERSPECTIVE
After all the dreams for the future of ERM systems were shared, McQuillan opened up the floor to the audience for reaction and questions. Representatives from both the subscription agents and libraries voiced their frustrations over the difficulties involved with electronic resource management. Electronic resources have been available for some time now, but little progress seems to have been made towards simplifying their acquisition, registration, and access. With more and more of libraries' budgets going toward these resources, it becomes all the more important to make the management of electronic resources easier and more consistent. Library challenges noted include staff and budgets not being properly allocated by administrators to handle these resources; too much red tape, rules, and regulations; and software challenges demanding more time than is available.
Audience members also voiced their concern over the lack of communication and consistency between publishers and vendors, and therefore the multiple knowledgebases that a library will use. KBART (Knowledge Bases And Related Tools) was noted as an initiative working toward a solution for this problem. One audience member noted that he would like to see “a very strong advocate do with knowledgebases what we did with the OCLC WorldCat. Take the effort from vendors and publishers and combine that with efforts to produce one really high quality, well-maintained knowledgebase that all of us can work in.” This idea elicited a round of applause from the audience, but also received a response regarding the challenges in creating this solution. One person noted that due to each library and consortium having different holdings for packages, there are too many iterations of the package to simplify it. For example, there are many different ScienceDirect packages, all with different coverage. The library has to know which is theirs.
Discussion also focused on the future of the relationship between the ERM system and the ILS. Panelists noted that ERM systems will likely cease to be an add-on service. It was also noted that the library should be sure to express their desires and concerns to their ILS vendors to ensure they help inform development.
Lastly, the audience noted that it would be a good step forward to have standards created for the import of publisher and vendor contact information. It was pointed out that there are efforts being made toward this end, but there continue to be challenges for maintaining current, accurate information.
With the time allotted exhausted, moderator McQuillan thanked all for attending. It would be interesting to re-convene this group in five years to revisit the topic and see if any of the dreams have come true or if we will all still be expressing the unfilled potential of ERM system integration.