Personalised Library Services in HE

Phew! I can safely say I have just come to the end of the busiest 2 weeks in my new job so far. I have a lot of blog posts to write, but I'll start with one about the ‘Personalised library services in Higher Education’ symposium I attended last week (22/03/11) - at the very very last minute. The symposium explored the ‘boutique library model’.

There were a variety of presentations and lots of workshops throughout the day, looking at how the boutique model could help libraries to deliver highly personalised services and in turn how this could be used to our advantage to defend our service from potential threats (e.g. cuts). As somebody on the day said, a bit like what Mary Portas does to shops, but applied to the library world…

Examples of libraries that already apply a ‘boutique’ service are Library@orchard in Singapore and Parklands Library in Christchurch, NZ. And just for fun, here’s the Dewey Decimal Boutique Library Hotel based in New York.

Below are some of the points I found of interest from the day.

Jane Secker – Personalised research support

• One size doesn’t fit all – researchers needs all differ greatly.
• A survey sent out to researchers will only go so far. Jane felt that the greatest advantage to her role was that she became a researcher herself. She got to know their mind set. If there is no scope for this, she suggested going to courses that researchers attend (something I've done here in my new role, but will now look for more opportunities to do so).
• Created tailored subject guides so they were specifically aimed at researchers.
• Hosted all resources on one blog (to centralise info).
• Training was embedded into curriculum.

Jane also felt that libraries and research offices need to work together and that library sessions were a great opportunity for researchers to actually get together and network. Quite often they can feel isolated.

Nicola Wright/Cheryl Blake – Case Study

Spoke about creating bespoke PhD postcards which have proved popular and led to many student consultations. Once the student fills out the postcard, the Liaison Lib gets back to them with details about resources that could help them out (giving them enough but not overwhelming them). This led to positive and further conversations with many of the students. 

Tim Wales – Can personalised be upscaled?

Tim spoke about how technology can help every library become a ‘boutique’ service.

• DDA – Fits the boutique model well. Trend setting/highly tailored/unqiue. Downsides include what if students pick useless stuff? What if it ends up too personalised?
• Discovery systems –  Personalistion of VuFind good, Summon not as customisable? Benchmark Amazon as it contains a lot of information but still provides an individual experience (e.g. personal recommendations aspect). Got to admit, this part of the talk went slightly over my head at the time..but definately helped when attending a Digital Services Forum later on in the week at work.

Beatrice Pulliam – Space in USA libraries

This one and the workshop that followed by Chris Powis was really interesting, with Beatrice Pulliam from Providence College, Rhode Island, talking generally about how libraries in the States use space.

• Similarly to Sheffield University’s Information Commons, quite often U.S. libraries are called ‘Library Commons’ - information suites embracing all other services (e.g. multimedia, I.T.).
• ‘Info Station’ – our version of the reception desk. Big difference here – run by students in Beatrice’s library.
• ‘Upper Commons’ with ‘InTeler’ Station – our version of the Enquiry Desk. Stands for Interaction/Teaching/Learning. This one’s staffed by library staff.
• ‘Tech Station’ – I.T.
• Found students can be intimidated to come up to a desk. These ‘stations’ have improved student interaction.
• ‘Living rooms’ – soft seated areas.
• Everything is on wheels! Allowing students to create their own personal study space as furniture is flexible and portable.

This led onto a workshop run by Chris Powis (Northampton University) where we discussed the ‘emotional pull’ of a library and how space can be used to cater for all needs. How can be balance the needs of social learners and those who want complete silence? etc.

Meg Westbury - A voice in the wilderness – personalised library services in a virtual environment

Meg used to work as a virtual librarian at a completely online Library within America – meaning she did all her work at home and she could do it in her pyjamas if she wanted!

• A luxury but a big challenge – could be isolating experience.
• Never once met any of her students in person – students could ‘fall off the radar’ for months and then suddenly appear again.
• Integrated herself into the community (discussion forms etc), blogged, created a wiki and developed online tutorials for the students, delivered webinars and was available at any time – Meg even skyped her students.
• Best practice – take time to know your users and the curriculum.

Emma Thompson – “It’s all about you”:

Another interesting one, Emma (from Liverpool Management School) spoke about how best to market services on a limited budget. Found this talk very relevant and timely.

• Introduced a personal approach, emailing staff first with a “I can save you time” email and then went to see staff in their office.
• Academic staff are the gatekeepers to the students – a recommendation to use the library by them is much more highly regarded – we all need library champions like this!
• Banned the term ‘information literacy’ and cut out all library jargon
• Emphasised time saving element of the library all the time and tried to ‘find a hook’ to interest people.

All in all, a really interesting day with some thought-provoking presentations (thank you organisers!). I also felt I got a lot out of the networking aspect of the day, meeting two OU librarians and comparing experiences of using an online enquiry chat service.

Good blog post on the day can be found here

Tweets from the day here

All the presentations and more info can be viewed here