This presentation (using Powerpoint) will outline the day to day practicalities of the job of an Electronic Resources Librarian (based on my experience in Dublin City University) in the context of the most recent version of the American Library Association's core competencies for the position. The objective of the talk is to make librarians feel less insecure in their jobs as they attempt to come to grips with the ever changing (technologies, social media, ecopyright etc.) landscape in modern academic libraries. Librarians will be encouraged to comment on their own experiences and how closely they match the speaker's (or not). A debate may ensue regarding just what level of expertise we are supposed to attain in the relative outlined competencies. An open and honest debate may also encourage publishers to come forward with their anxieties regarding ebook licensing, open access business models etc. While the talk is mainly aimed at Librarians, who will be reassured that they are not alone as they attempt to perform at the very best level in their positions and that there is plenty of help out there (from Listservs, usergroups, help documentation etc.), it should also be of interest to publishers and other vendors as they gain an understanding of what it is that librarians (their customers) do all day. Presenter: Stephen Buck, Electronic Resources and Periodicals Librarian, Dublin City University, Dublin, Ireland

1. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
In library school we thought of books
“Known knowns, known unknowns, and unknown unknowns.”

2. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
Content of presentation:
To outline the:
Core Competencies for Electronic Resources Librarians. NASIG
Core Competencies Task Force (July 2013)
and intersect them with practical everyday working experiences
of an EResources and Periodicals librarian

3. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
Aims of presentation:
 To attempt to demystify many of the processes involved in
the management of eresources
 To attempt to convey an understanding of working in practical
library office environment, while being aware of complexity of
the theoretical competencies that are desirable and
recommended.
 To outline real life job description
 To provide sources of assistance

4. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
From Arts/Humanities background
General librarian duties (AL) in small government library
Health sciences Computers & Engineering
EResources & Periodicals

5. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
What are we expected to know?
MLIS – University College Dublin
2 Semesters – 3 months each approx.
Before college various levels of expertise among library
assistants.
 Some do everything very competently
 Others spend hours shelving and are not permitted to do:
“professional work”

6. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
How do we know what we know?
Microsoft Office, for example.
 Word no formal training (had to show cut&paste)
 Excel intermediate training
 Access never used it
 Powerpoint no formal training

7. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
Core Competencies for Electronic Resources Librarians. NASIG
Core Competencies Task Force (July 2013)
From:http://www.nasig.org/site_page.cfm?pk_association_webpage_menu=3
10&pk_association_webpage=1225 (accessed 30/09/2013)
 1. Life cycle of electronic resources
 2. Technology
 3. Research and assessment
 4. Effective communication
 5. Supervising and Management:
 6. Trends and Professional Development
 7. Personal Qualities

8. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
Electronic Resources Lifecycle (Pesch, 2009)

9. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
 1. Life cycle of electronic resources
 Thorough knowledge of ER acquisitions
 Thorough knowledge of ER licensing & legal framework*
 Extensive knowledge of metadata: cataloguing, indexing and
classification*
 Experience with bibliographic and other utilities
 Thorough understanding of records management
 Commitment to maintain awareness of trends/developments

10. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
First essay in college: What is Authority Control?
School days?
Senior Management?
Fascism?
Nazis?
No: something to do with catalogue records

11. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
 2. Technology- conceptual and practical knowledge of:
 computing hardware & mobile devices
 Networking technologies (mobile & wired)
 Standards, protocols and structures
 IP, FTP, OpenURL/z39.50, authentication
(Shibboleth, EzProxy), EDI, OAI-PMH)*
 Database design
 Mark up languages (HTML, XML, wiki)
 Preservation tools

12. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
 2a. Technology- conceptual and practical knowledge of
(continued):
 Software:
 Link resolver, metasearch, data collection, discovery
services, ERMS, admin functions of databases, bibliographic
utilities*
 Future
 Digital preservation techniques & technology
 Data visualisation
 Cloud computing
 Text mining

13. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
A dialogue between:
 a vendor and
 a novice EResources librarian.
What LMS do you have?
What is your FTE?
Do you use Athens?

14. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
 3. Research and assessment- the ERL
 Understands data, distinct & interconnected
 Has ability to manipulate data*
 Broad understanding of Eresources subscribed to
 Uses research methods for collection assessment &
troubleshooting
 Assesses and evaluates specifications, efficacy and cost
efficiency of products & services*

15. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
 The ability to manipulate data
Worries:
 What financial year is it? When does it start?
 How come you have to pay for journals a year ahead and then
reconcile balances for €1000s?
 VAT
 Cost per use: do you divide the cost per the usage or the usage
by the cost?

16. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
 How to lose €18,000 in a day

17. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
 3a. Research and assessment- the ERL (continued)
 Able to identify & analyse emerging technologies and
innovations in order to implement tech improvements
 Is able to apply principles of data collection, analysis and
reporting by: gathering data, monitoring pricing/packages,
writing reports, demonstrating problem solving, organisation
and analytical skills

18. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
 4. Effective communication
 Communicate well in writing & verbally to target audience*
 Making complex/ambiguous phenomenon understandable
 Rising above feelings to provide services to end users
 Working with other units/staff, making & keeping working
relationships
 Framing situations according to others‟ perspectives
 Need for data to inform decision making
 Making clear and comprehensive presentations*

19. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
 How to get reported to the minister

20. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
 Presentations
 10 minutes on my MLIS thesis.
 Slight improvement – from hot face to hot armpits
 Coping strategies – many people expect to be bored.

21. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
 5. Supervising and management
 Ability to supervise, train & motivate staff
 Skillful project management
 Ability to evaluate and modify workflows
 Producing concrete policy statements
 Familiar with systems administration

22. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
 How to upset your periodicals team

23. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
 6. Trends and professional development
 Maintain knowledge of current issues & trends in:
 scholarly communication
 Licensing*
 Copyright, privacy, freedom of expression, freedom of
information, equality, intellectual property etc.
 Recognises relevance of new standards/best practices
 Educates colleagues where necessary/relevant

24. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
 Sometimes it‟s good to check the licence
Hello,
I'm Stephen Buck, the E-Resources and Periodicals librarian in
Dublin City University. Thank you for the license information
below. Please can you clarify something? In the Authorised
Users section of the licence there is no reference to students
and other users in the university, only to staff. Can you advise?
Kind regards,
Stephen

25. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
 Sometimes it‟s good to check the licence
Dear Stephen,
Thank you for your response. We have read your suggestion and
are willing to take it into consideration. However, we can provide
you with new/modified version of License Agreement not earlier
than in the start of September.
Until then,

26. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
 6a. Trends and professional development (cont)
 Maintains knowledge of cataloguing, metadata, indexing and
classification standards beyond that of a generalist.
 Has extensive knowledge of digital tools, standards and initiatives
 ONIX
 SUSHI
 OpenURL
 COUNTER

27. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
 7. Personal qualities
 Flexibility, need to prioritise, changing systems and needs
 High level for tolerance and ambiguity*
 Customer service focus & persistence in service of users
 Skillful time management

28. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
High level for tolerance and ambiguity
Core of job.
*If you can cope with this you can manage anything*
So much depends on other people: response times etc.

29. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
Source
Acquire
Implement/
Maintain
Evaluate
Review
Cancel/
Replace
AGI Usage
Stats
Swets
Awards
Maintenance
Renewals
Costs
Periodicals
Team
Serials
Solutions
ERM
Conul
Binding
Gov Pubs
Summon
New
products
Claims
Invoices
Licences
Conferences
Courses
hosted
Tender
appraisal
EResources & Periodicals at DCU
Access
End
user

30. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
 First day: Job description:
 1. Manage periodicals Team
 2. Budget Codes
 3. Journal Subscriptions
 4. Management of Print Collections
 5. Binding
 6. Government Publications
 7. E Journals (not e-books or repositary)

31. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
 Job Description continued :
 8. Database Management
 9. Staff Meetings
 10. Distribution of Post/emails from suppliers
 11. Queries from Library Staff
 12.Populating ERMS
 13. IRG Meetings
 14. CONUL Committee on Collaborative Storage
 15 Continuing professional development

32. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
 Large portion of day reacting to e-mails.
 Tuesday morning 150 e-mails approx.
 Access lost
 Journal cancellation that shouldn‟t have been cancelled.
 Information desk
 Summon links
 Passwords for stats not working
 Pricing conflicts
 IReL consortium. What resources?

33. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
How expert do you need to be?
How expert do you want to be?
Do you want to publish?
Do you have to publish
UK and Ireland: Permanent
United States: Tenure

34. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
How to make a difference:
 Checking financial sheets
 Access
 Cancellations
 Strategies
 Workflows
 New technologies
 Ideas

35. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
Intota and other web-scale management systems.
Finance looked after
Seamless workflows
 Do the periodicals team need managing?
 Do eresources need a manager?
 What do we do everyday?
 Will we be necessary?

36. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
To sum up
Background: pathways into EResources
The core competencies (NASIG) / Practical work
Real life job description

37. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
Where to get
 User groups, Listservs, UKSG, NASIG
 TERMS, http://6terms.tumblr.com/
 The E-Resources Management
Handbook, http://serials.uksg.org/content/120087

38. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
More information:
 Pesch, O. (2009). ERMs and the e-resource life-cycle [Powerpoint
slides]. Retrieved from http://tinyurl.com/ERLifeCycle
 Managing the transition from print to electronic journals and
resources: a guide for library and information professionals
Carr, Patrick L; Collins, Maria D. D New York : Routledge 2008
 Journals:
 Computers in Libraries
 Journal of Electronic Resources Librarianship
 The Serials Librarian

39. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
The dialogue between vendor and librarian was adapted from:
Cover Pages. Online Resource for Mark Up Language
Technologies. Open Archives Initiative Protocol for Metadata
Harvesting (OX4-PHC) At http://xml.coverpages.org/oams.html
(01-07-2010)
NISO Whitepaper on 'Issues in Crosswalking Content
Metadata Standards„ (15-10-1998) by Margaret St. Pierre and
William P. LaPlant, Jr.)

40. The Unbearable Insecurity of the
Electronic Resources Librarian
Thank you for listening
Stephen Buck
stephen.buck@dcu.ie