As research libraries are being reconfigured in a network environment, two important trends are emerging. The first is to accelerate the sharing of infrastructure, either through collaborative services or with third party providers. The second is to engage more deeply with the research and learning processes of their campuses. As research and learning processes themselves change, the research library has to respond and this makes being responsive and open to learning very important.

1. The Research Library: scalable
efficiency and scalable learning
David Kaser Lecture Series
Lorcan Dempsey / @LorcanD
Indiana University,
7 October 2012

2. “
How terrific to see you are the featured
lecturer this year. Just thought I'd
mention that David Kaser was a most
terrific library school professor. He was
definitely the professor at Indiana who
was most influential in my library career
and also my favorite professor. I think it is
fabulous that you are giving this lecture
this year.
(OCLC colleague)

3. Overview

4. How did you go bankrupt?
Two ways. Gradually, then suddenly.
― Ernest Hemingway, The Sun Also Rises

5. Prelude

6. “
In the wake of increasing enrollment and costs and declining per student state
appropriations, the Board is concerned with the continued ability of public
research universities to provide affordable, quality education and training to a
broad range of students, conduct the basic science and engineering research
that leads to innovations, and perform their public service missions.
NSB: diminishing funding and rising expectations: trends and challenges for public
research universities

8. The network

9. “
Colleges and universities have long competed
against one another, measuring themselves in
comparison to each other and holding tightly to
their idiosyncrasies as defining elements of their
status. But today, the distribution and reuse of
information digitally via the Internet is rapidly
changing the game, rewarding those who
instead aggregate and scale toward a common
infrastructure. It is becoming increasingly clear
that neither the challenges that confront
colleges and universities nor the solutions to
those challenges are unique to each institution.
Chuck Henry and Brad Wheeler
The game has changed
Educause Review, March 2012

10. “aggregate and scale towards a common infrastructure”

11. Beyond the mobile web. Stephanie Rieger. http://www.slideshare.net/yiibu/beyond-themobilewebbyyiibu

12. Beyond the mobile web. Stephanie Rieger. http://www.slideshare.net/yiibu/beyond-themobilewebbyyiibu

13. • Webscale
• Tend to one/two …
– Network effects
– Massive aggregation
– Gravitational pull
• Data driven engagement
– Analytics
– Social
• Platform
– Leverage for developers …

15. 65%
Discoverability Phase 1 Final Report. Hanson et al. U Minnesota. http://conservancy.umn.edu/handle/48258

16. Researchers prefer to
adopt open source and
social media technologies
that are available in the
public domain rather than
institutional license-based
applications ….. First the
social media technologies
facilitate networking and
community building.
Second, researchers prefer
to use technologies that
will enable them access to
resources and their own
materials beyond their
institution-based PhD
research. e.g. Mendeley, Zotero, Endnote

17. What has changed?
1
The library is institution scale where
many of its users operate at network
scale

19. What has changed?
2
Libraries are redundantly managing
local infrastructure which creates little
distinctive local value.

20. Ronald Coase
Pic: Wikimedia

21. Then: high transaction
costs lead to locally Space Systems
assembled collection Collections
Services &
Now: low transaction costs expertise
distribute activities across
the network
Then: vertically integrated
around collection
Now: moving apart in
network environment

22. Unbundling

23. Harvard Business Review (1999)

24. Attracting and building relationships
Develop new
with researchers and learners
services and have them accepted
“Service-oriented”, customization
Speed/flexibility important
Economies of scope important
Engagement Innovation
Infrastructure
Back office capacities that
support day-to-day operations
“Routinized” workflows
Note: Engagement substituted for Customer
Economies of scale important relationship management

25. Space
• Being
reconfigured Social, showcase and sharing
around the user
experience • Ad hoc
rather than rendezvous
around • Meeting place
collections.
• Exhibitions
• Specialist equipment
• Moving from • Specialist staff
Infrastructure • GIS, Writing centre,
to engagement • Digital humanities, …
• Research commons

26. Services
• The service turn
(Scott Walter)
• U Minnesota, ARL
Institutional profile:
– In alignment with the
University's strategic
positioning, the University
Libraries have re-conceived
goals, shifting from a
collection-centric focus to
one that is engagement-
based.

27. MPublishing, U Michigan
The University of Michigan Press, the Scholarly Publishing
Office, Deep Blue (the University’s institutional repository
service), the Copyright Office, and the Text Creation
Partnership,
Salman Rushdie Archive, Emory U
Personal digital papers of Salman Rushdie. Have become
his reference collection.
Scholarly Commons, U Illinois Urbana Champaign
... to serve the emerging needs of faculty, researchers and
graduate students pursuing in-depth research and scholarly
inquiry. Access to expertise, hardware and software.

28. Systems
Focus on engagement
Resource guides, integration with learning
management, widgets, etc
Recommendation (aggregation)
Move to cloud for infrastructure
ILS, ERM, Discovery: move to
cloud-based solutions
Deep collaboration
Shared systems infrastructure:
Orbis Cascade Alliance, 2CUL

29. Outside in Bought, licensed Collections
Increased consolidation
Move from print to licensed
Manage down print – shared print
Move to user-driven models
Aim: to discover
Inside out
Institutional assets: special collections,
research and learning materials, institutional records, …
Reputation management
Increasingly important?
Aim: to *have* discovered … to disclose

30. Outside in collections – increasingly externalised to
collaborative or third party. Reduced local infrastructure.
Inside out collections. Growing engagement around
scholarly communication, data curation, institutional
asset management, reputation/profiles. Leverage internal/
external infrastructure.

31. Rescaling

32. A reminder

33. Space Systems
Collections
Services &
expertise
Scale efficiency: Increase local impact:
Share infrastructure Greater engagement

34. Infrastructure:
scalable efficiences
Rightscale infrastructure for efficiency and
impact in a webscale world …
Engagement and innovation:
scalable learning
Invigorate institution-scale approaches to engagement …
“the rate of learning, innovation, and
performance improvement within the
institution must match (or exceed) that
of the surrounding environment if the
institution is to survive (or thrive)”

35. Infrastructure
• Cataloging
• eJournals
• Preservation
• Systems in the cloud
– (cloud is a question not an
answer)

36. Infrastructure
• The collective print collection

38. Infrastructure
• The collective print collection?
• Preservation of institutional assets?

40. Infrastructure
• The collective print collection?
• Preservation of institutional assets?
• Data driven engagement?
– Social/Analytics?
• A shared Knowledge Base?
• …..

41. Engagement
• Curricular support
• Scholarly communication and digital
scholarship
• Data curation
• Expertise and profile management
• ….

42. Engagement
Libraries need
to do both ..
From the talent side of the equation the Earlier stage in
key requirement for institutional success is cycle
to move from scalable efficiency to scalable
learning. Near-constant innovation is the only
way to respond successfully to near-constant
disruption. Said differently, the rate of
learning, innovation, and performance The New Organization Model:
Learning at Scale
improvement within the institution must by John Hagel III, John Seely
match (or exceed) that of the surrounding Brown and Lang Davison | 6:03
PM March 11, 2009
environment if the institution is to survive (or
thrive). Given that innovation is inherently a
human activity--one performed by talented
individuals--it follows that talent will pull
institutions into the 21st century. http://blogs.hbr.org/bigshift/2009/03/can-your-company-
scale-its-lea.html

43. Engagement - Learning
1. A variety of staff roles
Attorney, creative, technology, pedagogy, subject, ….
2. Marketing, assessment, outreach

45. Engagement - Learning
1. A variety of staff roles
Attorney, creative, technology, pedagogy, subject, ….
2. Marketing, assessment, outreach
3. Deeper engagement with faculty/students
around digital scholarship/communication

47. Engagement - Learning
1. A variety of staff roles
Attorney, creative, technology, pedagogy, subject, ….
2. Marketing, assessment, outreach
3. Deeper engagement with faculty/students
digital scholarship/communication
4. Partnership with campus players …
Elearning, IT, publishing, digital humanities, data
curation, …

49. Platform
…
Strategic Partnerships
The library of the future is engagement-centered and
reinforced by joint ventures and programmatic
partnerships. We imagine the Libraries as an outwardly
engaged organization that creates partnerships and
provides leadership in the pursuit of excellence in research
and learning.
Transformation
…
Our strategy: be regenerative
October 4, 2012, 12:51 pm
By Brian Mathews

50. Engagement - Learning
1. A variety of staff roles
Attorney, creative, technology, pedagogy, subject, ….
2. Marketing, assessment, outreach
3. Engagement with digital
scholarship/communication
4. Partnership with campus players …
Elearning, IT, publishing, digital humanities, data
curation, …
5. Project working (grant)
6. Supporting community/sharing ..

51. Platform
…
Strategic Partnerships
…
Transformation
The library of the future is constantly changing both
physically and virtually. We imagine the Libraries’ core
functions evolving through emerging expertise in
curation, community development, and knowledge
production. We curate digital research data and scholarship;
we develop and optimize communities for collaboration
and the exchange of ideas and discoveries; and we help our
users create new knowledge and provide access to the
world’s digital scholarship.
Our strategy: be regenerative
October 4, 2012, 12:51 pm
By Brian Mathews

53. Engagement - Learning
1. A variety of staff roles
Attorney, creative, technology, pedagogy, subject, ….
2. Marketing, assessment, outreach
3. Engagement with digital scholarship/communication
4. Partnership with campus players …
Elearning, IT, publishing, digital humanities, data curation, …
5. Project working (grant)
6. Supporting community/sharing ..
7. Training trainers (student mentors, …)
8. Personal ‘brand’ management …
Twitter, Mendeley, Academia.edu, ….

54. 1. It is difficult to speak
knowledgably about social
services or provide sensible
support for them if you don’t
have some experience of
network services. Picturing a
rhino: experience is the only
guide.
2. How do you get in the flow of
communications and
interaction? Is your expertise
visible? Can you help
researchers get into the flow
and be visible? The power of
pull.

55. Increasing library impact in a network
environment
• Scalable efficiencies
– Share infrastructure in a network environment
• Scalable learning
– Fuller engagement in the research and learning
process

56. Thank you …