Transcript Strategies for Keeping Your Collection Alive and Vibrant During Budget Cuts An Infopeople Workshop Spring 2005 Carolyn M.

Strategies for Keeping Your
Collection Alive and Vibrant
During Budget Cuts
An Infopeople Workshop
Spring 2005
Carolyn M. Myers
[email protected]
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This Workshop Is Brought to
You By the Infopeople Project
Infopeople is a federally-funded grant project
supported by the California State Library. It
provides a wide variety of training to California
libraries. Infopeople workshops are offered
around the state and are open registration on a
first-come, first-served basis.
For a complete list of workshops, and for other
information about the Project, go to the
Infopeople Web site at infopeople.org.
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Agenda

Prepare for Cuts Before they Happen

Making Cuts to the Collection Budget

Continue Developing for the Future

Ideas For Keeping Your Collection Vibrant
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Introductions
1.
Name
2.
Title
3.
Library
4.
Did you have to make cuts to your budget
last year? What amount or percent?
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The Challenge of Cuts
What problems have occurred in your
community as a result of cuts you had to
make?
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Prepare Ahead for Cuts
• Have a collection plan in place
• Know how your collection reflects your
library purpose and policies
• Make use of documents such as:
• Mission Statement
• Long Range Plan
• Collection Development Policy
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Mission Statement Extracts
“Multnomah County Library serves the people…by
providing…materials to meet their informational,
educational, cultural and recreational
needs…providing people of all ages with access
and guidance to information and collections that
reflect all points of view.”
“The Millar library facilitates Portland State
University’s mission of teaching and learning to
enhance intellectual, social, cultural and
economic life for undergraduates and
professional programs relevant to metropolitan
areas.”
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Long Range Plan
Sets direction
 Measurable goals and objectives

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Update and Write Policies and
Procedures

Use slack time to write policies on
collection development, materials
selection, or disaster recovery

Analyze ordering, processing, workflow,
and job descriptions

Review policies and practices with staff
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Measures that Help Assess Your
Collection Development Policy
Statistical reports
 Usage patterns
 Holdings
 Demographics
 Benchmarks

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What Statistics Do You Collect
and How Do You Use Them?
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Turnover Rates
Are you familiar with turnover rates and
their use as a tool for evaluating your
collection?
Turnover = Circulation divided by holdings
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Analyze Your Collection
Consider using some form of collection
analysis, such as Conspectus or other
formal process
 Two examples:

– WorldCat Collection Analysis
http://www.oclc.org/collectionanalysis
– Bowker’s Book Analysis System
http://www.BowkerSupport.com
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Understand The Place of the
Collection
Status and importance within the library
 Within the local political context
 Compared to national peer libraries

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Exercise #1
Using Statistics
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Developing a Strategy for
Making Cuts
Who will make the decision
 What type of cuts will be made
 Decide on a process
 Communicate the rationale

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Who Decides?
Your funding agency
 Your library director
 Executive committee
 Selection committee
 Yourself

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What is the Nature of the
Cuts?
 One
time
 Short duration
 Long term
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Decide How the Cuts
Will Be Made
Request input and involve all concerned
 Develop guidelines to help staff who will
make specific cuts
 Offer support to staff making the cuts

– consider a team leader or a person who can
handle the documentation
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After the Cuts Have Been
Made…Communicate!
Tell staff the specific cuts and give the
reasons and rationale used
 Inform the public if appropriate
 If there is an implementation delay, remind
the staff again about the cuts and the
rationale
 Thank all staff for their hard work

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Exercise #2
Handling Budget Cuts
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Document Cuts For Future Use

List each cut, its magnitude, and the
rationale behind it

Make a file of memos sent

Write down and make a file of anything
useful you learned during the experience

Record the impact of each cut on the
collection
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Acknowledge Possible
Benefits of Budget Cuts

Provides rationale for shifting priorities to
future needs

Oversized and underused collections can be
pruned

Media no longer in use can be eliminated

A “Sacred Cow” gift collection can be
sacrificed
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What Sacred Cow Collection
Should You Consider Cutting
in Your Library?
Why?
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Temptations to Resist

Don’t stop weeding
– continue with your weeding criteria
– maintain your weeding schedule
Resist cutting out popular materials
 Don’t ignore new formats

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Focus on the Future of the
Collection

“Treading Water” means your collection is
going nowhere

Use the Mission Statement and Long
Range Plan to guide decisions

Don’t be surprised at contention as values
are examined in public
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Exercise # 3
Defending Collection Changes
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Keep the Collection Visible

Issue an annual state of the collection
report
– summarize what happened the prior year;
including items purchased, titles added, etc.
– summarize the year ahead, including % of
budget going to adults, children, reference,
periodicals, spoken, DVDs, etc.
– remind people about any significant events
planned for the collection
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How Do You Make the
Collection at Your Library
Vibrant?
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Ideas for Keeping Your
Collection Vibrant

Allow materials to remain at the branch
where they are returned
– staff and delivery time are saved
– the public enjoy seeing a wider range of titles

Shorten the check out time for certain
popular materials
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More Ideas for a Vibrant
Collection
Set up a rental collection for best sellers
 Issue a press release educating the public
about circulation numbers for the most
popular books


Market your collection with regularly
changing displays
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Maintain Visibility With Support
Groups

Plan presentations to:
– Library Board
– Library Foundation

Other groups?
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Do Something New Each Year
with the Collection

Decide what needs the most outside help

Ask a support group for funding to get the
target collection started

Give the group a lot of publicity

Thank them as explicitly as possible
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Seek Help From Local
Businesses

Encourage businesses to fund additions
related to their area

They may be able to provide programs tied
to their collection enhancement area

Follow good procedural guidelines so
problems will be avoided
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Investigate Collaboration With a
Local School

They may see advantage in hiring your
selection and technical service staff

Collaboration results in added investment
and publicity for your value to the
community
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Appeal to Your Public for Help
Ask them to donate paperbacks in good
condition
 They could give subscriptions to their
favorite magazine
 Set up a wish list of bestsellers at local
bookstores or Amazon.com and ask the
public to give them as gifts to the library

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Exercise #4
Ways to Enhance the Library’s
Importance in Your Community
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Thank You
Please fill out your Evaluation Form
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