Despite their centrality and importance to users, and their increasing share of the materials budget, e-resources in the workflow are rarely seen for what they are: the mainstream of selection-to-access activity. Collections and Technical Services staffing levels rarely reflect this emerging reality, and library organizations are struggling to restructure their operations and shift capacity and expertise from print to electronic resources.
For nearly 10 years, R2 Consulting has worked with academic libraries and consortia to move in this direction, by optimizing workflows, changing priorities, and adapting staffing models. Through projects with more than 80 institutions, we have seen the full range of challenges (and benefits) presented by electronic formats. We have also seen innovative and effective responses to those challenges--from libraries, agents, publishers, vendors and consortia.
In this session, R2 will describe trends in e-resources organization and management, and discuss some of the techniques and structures that have worked well and not so well. Topics will include prioritization, fund management, decision tracking, licensing, communication and transparency, access management, trouble-shooting, usage statistics, tools/automation, third-party services, and organizational structure.