"Data Governance: Where Technology and Policy Collide" by MacKenzie Smith

MacKenzie Smith. "Data Governance: Where Technology and Policy Collide." In Research Data Management: Practical Strategies for Information Professionals (West Lafayette, IN: Purdue University Press, 2014. 436 pages. ISBN 9781557536648): 45-59.

Author MacKenzie Smith is University Librarian at the University of California, Davis and has a strong background in information technology and digital library issues. In this chapter she addresses a number of governance and policy issues related to the management of data resources. These include legal and policy issues; attribution and citation requirements; archives and preservation; discovery and provenance metadata; data schema and ontologies for discovery and sharing; and access to infrastructure for data analysis.

The legal issues can be very complex. Data that is public and shareable in one country might be under copyright in another. Privacy and confidentiality laws may differ as well. Another source of confusion includes the definition of commercial versus non-commercial use. Technological issues are also challenging. Software that was used to create and analyze data must be available if the data are to be reusable. Metadata should be standardized and easily interpreted. The need to have data management plans is noted, and Smith ends by making a number of recommendations regarding data governance.

Recommendations include the need to have clear statements of policy and enforcement practices; an easy to use and trustworthy infrastructure; reward mechanisms for researchers who share their data; clarification of stakeholders' rights and responsibilities; and a harmonization of data usage agreements.

"The Policy and Institutional Framework" by James L. Mullins

James L. Mullins. "The Policy and Institutional Framework." In Research Data Management: Practical Strategies for Information Professionals (West Lafayette, IN: Purdue University Press, 2014. 436 pages. ISBN 9781557536648): 25-44.

Author James Mullins, Dean of Libraries at Purdue University, has been immersed in the development of data management policy and infrastructure since his arrival at Purdue in 2004. In this chapter, Mullins describes the development of national policy in the area of research data management, and follows that with a case study about Purdue's own move towards managing data.

Mullins begins by describing the realization within the scientific community that research data could and should be shared so that researchers weren't redundantly conducting research to get data that had already been done by another researcher. One of the projects that brought this to light was the Human Genome Project, which generated massive amounts of data. Federal granting agencies were especially interested in preventing the duplication of research, since they were funding many of the studies that were creating redundant data sets.

Studies sponsored by the National Science Foundation (NSF), the Association of Research Libraries (ARL) and others identified the many challenges that research organizations faced, and a movement to require data management plans as part of grant-funding requirements began to grow. Recognizing that there was no infrastructure to support data management, the NSF offered a series of grants to encourage organizations to develop and model such infrastructures. Other institutions, such as the Institute for Museum and Library Services (IMLS) also support research in this area. One such project resulted in the development of the Data Curation Profiles Toolkit (http://datacurationprofiles.org/). ARL got in on the game by creating the E-Science Institute with seed funding from 70 of its members, and has presented workshops and provided other resources on this issue.

The second half of this chapter was devoted to a description of Purdue University's efforts to create research data management services through collaboration with others across the university.

Research Data Management, Edited by Joyce M. Ray

Joyce M. Ray. Research Data Management: Practical Strategies for Information Professionals. West Lafayette, IN: Purdue University Press, 2014. 436 pages. ISBN 9781557536648.

This isn't a full-fledged review of Research Data Management; rather, it's just a short introduction to this book. Joyce Ray, currently a visiting professor at the Berlin School of Library and Information Science at Humboldt University, has edited this volume containing nineteen essays and case studies  which discuss how research data might be managed. The book is organized into six parts, addressing policy issues, planning, managing project data, archiving data in repositories, assessment, and in the sixth part, presenting four case studies. Clifford Lynch provides a concluding essay. The chapters are written by many of today's leaders and thinkers, all well-qualified to write on this topic.

Over the next week or two I will be discussing Research Data Management in this blog space. My university administration has just announced a forum on research data to be held in early May, so this book is very timely.

Changing Role of Senior Administrators, by Kathleen DeLong, Julie Garrison, and Marianne Ryan

Kathleen DeLong, Julie Garrison, and Marianne Ryan. Changing Role of Senior Administrators: A SPEC Kit. Washington, D.C.: Association of Research Libraries, 2012. 174 pages. ISBN 9781594078873.

In my last blog post I opened with a description of what SPEC Kits are; I will just add here that SPEC stands for "Systems and Procedures Exchange Center" and you can find more information about the entire series at http://publications.arl.org/SPEC_Kits.

Changing Role of Senior Administrators takes a look at how senior administrator positions have changed from 2007 to 2012. Only 46 member libraries responded to this survey, with a fairly low response rate of 37 percent. Their findings show that senior administrator titles are becoming more general, with less of an emphasis on specific areas of responsibility like public services or technical services. The tables on pages 18 through 29 demonstrate the changing positions and titles of senior administrators; tables on pages 35 through 51 show how those positions' responsibilities have changed and who their direct reports are.

The survey also addresses the 21st century skills that senior administrators must have, and indicates that these skills are acquired by attendance at professional institutes such as the ARL Research Library Leadership Fellows Program, the Frye Institute, or the Harvard Leadership Institute; reading professional literature, attending professional conferences, and networking. The survey also identifies desirable attributes of senior administrators, with "Changes/shapes library culture" at the top of the list, followed closely by "Functions in a political environment" and "Makes tough decisions."

Survey respondents indicate that they would be likely to redesign any senior administrator position, should a vacancy occur (79 percent), but only 45 percent expect to do so in the next one to three years. If there were a vacancy, they reported that they would expect the successful hire to come from another research library (91 percent), from within their own organization (67 percent), from another type of library (28 percent), or outside the library profession (19 percent).

This is an interesting snapshot of the current state of research library administrations and their viewpoints on how their administrations will change over the next few years.

Library Contribution to Accreditation, by Holly Mercer and Michael Maciel

Holly Mercer and Michael Maciel. Library Contribution to Accreditation: A SPEC Kit. Washington, D.C.: Association of Research Libraries, 2012. 184 pages. ISBN 9781594078859.

The Association of Research Libraries (ARL) conducts six surveys of its membership every year on topics of interest to its members. The survey results and accompanying documentation are published as a monograph, and are acquired by member libraries as well as other academic libraries that find their findings useful. Most SPEC kits include an executive summary, the survey questions and responses, a list of responding institutions, documentation supplied by the responding libraries, and a brief list of resources.

Library Contributions to Accreditation addresses library involvement in regional and programmatic accrediting activities. Response to this survey was on the low side, with 41 of the 115 academic ARL libraries responding. Ninety-five percent of respondents reported that they had been involved in accreditation activities within the last five years. There are six regional accrediting agencies in the U.S.; Canadian accreditation activities are conducted on the provincial level. I was surprised at the number and variety of programmatic accreditation agencies; there were 146 listed in the responses.

The types of data that responding libraries supplied for accreditation were collection holdings, facilities & equipment, financial data, instruction sessions, collections usage, staff qualifications & expertise, reference transactions, ILL transactions, digital projects & usage, scholarly communications activities, and "other data."

One of the survey questions asked respondents to describe what recommendations the accrediting agency had made to the library. In most cases, they had no recommendations, or simply stated that the library was meeting its goals and should continue doing what it's doing.

My interest in this topic came from an Association for Library Collections & Technical Services webinar that I gave November 20, 2013 on "Assessment Strategies for Cataloging Managers." (This webinar will be available free on or soon after May 20, 2014 at: http://www.ala.org/alcts/confevents/upcoming/webinar/112013.) One bit of feedback that I got included this statement: "The content of the material covered was specifically for internal improvement within cataloging/technical services divisions, and not to meet the external requirements of things like accreditation, which requires measurable ways to assess how cataloging contributes to the educational goals of the college." Although the webinar was not intended to address cataloging's contributions to accreditation requirements, this made me curious about whether there are expectations regarding this in our accreditation reports. According to Library Contributions to Accreditation, it doesn't appear that libraries are expected to report on cataloging data or outcomes in their accreditation reports, but I would like to look into this more closely.

Social Media Use in Libraries

I just reviewed Marketing with Social Media (A LITA Guide), edited by Beth C. Thomsett-Scott. It was published by ALA TechSource in 2014, and costs $60.90 on Amazon (ISBN 9781555709723).

I haven't been heavily involved in the use of social media in libraries, but this book makes a good case for how and why it can be succesful. It's clear that whether you use blogs, twitter, facebook, or another platform for your marketing efforts, it takes a lot of time to do it thoughtfully. In preparation for writing my review, I used the subject headings in the LC CIP data block to find other books on the same topic. The top two subject headings were Libraries--Marketing, and Online social networks--Library applications. I used the latter to search in our own catalog, Minerva, and found many other books on the topic:

• Laura Solomon. The librarian's nitty-gritty guide to social media. Chicago: ALA Editions, 2013.
• Charles Harmon, Michael Messina, editors. Using social media in libraries: best practices. Lanham: The Scarecrow Press, 2013.
• Terry Ballard. Google this!: Putting Google and other social media sites to work for your library. Oxford: Chandos, 2012.
• Melissa A. Purcell. The networked library: A guide for the educational use of social networking sites. Santa Barbara, CA: Linworth/ABC-CLIO, 2012.
• Sarah K. Steiner. Strategic planning for social media in libraries. Chicago: ALA TechSource, 2012.
• Troy A. Swanson. Managing social media in libraries: Finding collaboration, coordination and focus. Oxford: Chandos, 2012.
• Laura Solomon. Doing social media so it matters: A librarian's guide. Chicago: ALA, 2011.
• Cliff Landis. A social networking primer for librarians. New York: Neal-Schuman, 2010.

I did a quick search on WorldCat, and found several similar titles published in the past few years:

• Walt Crawford. Successful social networking in public libraries. Chicago: ALA Editions, 2014.
• Denise A. Garofalo. Building communities: Social networking for academic libraries. Oxford: Chandos, 2013.
• Joe Murphy. Location-aware services and QR codes for libraries. Chicago: ALA TechSource, 2012.

These twelve books (counting the one I just reviewed) were all published in the last four years, and I'm sure there are many more on the same topic that we don't have in our collection. I find it interesting that there are three published by ALA Editions, three by ALA TechSource, three by Chandos, and one each by Scarecrow, Linworth/ABC-CLIO, and Neal-Schuman (now part of ALA Editions).  Obviously, a hot topic!

Research Data Management

I recently reviewed a book for Catholic Library World called Delivering Research Data Management Services: Fundamentals of Good Practice. It was published in 2014 by Facet, and was edited by Graham Pryor, Sarah Jones, and Angus Whyte. (242 pages; available from Amazon for $94.95; ISBN 9780856049337). My review won't be published until June, and I don't want to repeat what's in the review, so I will just say that I found this book to be interesting and informative. It consists of five chapters addressing practical considerations for organizations that want to provide research data services, and five case studies of services provided by Johns Hopkins University, University of Southampton (UK), Monash University (Australia), the UK Data Service, and the Jisc Managing Research Data program.

Graham Pryor had previously edited a collection called Managing Research Data (Facet, 2012. 239 pages, ISBN 9781856047562.) It is more of an introduction to this topic, and addresses why research data needs to be managed, the lifecycle of data management, research data policies, planning, roles and responsibilities, and more. I've added this book to my reading list as well as another that I think will also be useful:

Joyce M. Ray. Research Data Management: Practical Strategies for Information Professionals. Purdue University Press, 2014. 300 pages. ISBN 9781557536648.

I'll be looking into the journal literature a little later.

Joint Libraries: Models That Work, by Claire B. Gunnels, Susan E. Green, and Patricia M. Butler

Joint Libraries: Models That Work.

By Claire B. Gunnels, Susan E. Green, and Patricia M. Butler. American Library Association, 2012, 220 pp., ISBN 978-0-8389-1138-9, (paper).

Collaborations and partnerships are ways that libraries have traditionally dealt with challenging economic circumstances. In Joint Libraries: Models That Work, authors Gunnels, Green and Butler discuss joint libraries, a collaborative model that has worked for many communities. They define joint libraries as “collaborations between different types of libraries: public libraries and schools; universities and public libraries; community college and public; city and county, and more.” (p. 2). With many years of experience working in joint libraries, the authors are uniquely positioned to write about them in this book.

Organized into ten chapters, this book provides a thorough introduction to the issues that need to be explored when considering or planning a joint library project. After an introduction to and a history of joint libraries, the cultural differences between academic and public libraries are addressed. The authors delve into management and human resource issues, legal considerations, and technological challenges. Of particular interest are the  many case studies that are presented in Chapter 9. The many configurations of joint libraries described here will provide readers who are considering a joint library approach with many models to explore.

This is a well-written book that explores a topic that has not been widely covered. It includes an index and bibliography, as well as two appendices that present actual joint library agreements, in both cases between a college and a public library. It would be useful for professional libraries where there is interest in the joint library model. 

Previously published:Mugridge, R. L. (2012) [Review of the book Joint Libraries: Models That Work, by Claire B. Gunnels, Susan E. Green, & Patricia M. Butler]. Catholic Library World, 83(2), 146.

Staff Development: A Practical Guide, edited by Andrea W. Stewart, Carlette Washington-Hoagland, and Carol T. Zsulya

Staff Development: A Practical Guide, 4^th ed.

Edited by Andrea Wigbels Stewart, Carlette Washington-Hoagland, and Carol T. Zsulya. ALA Editions, 2013, 219 pp., ISBN 978-0-8389-1149-5, (paper).

Faced with frequent and rapid change in the workplace, library employees must continue to adapt and grow professionally. In this excellent fourth edition of Staff Development, editors Stewart, Washington-Hoagland, and Zsulya have brought together sixteen papers from leaders in the library field that provide the reader with the tools needed to implement a staff development program.  In the introduction readers are encouraged to think of staff development as incremental change, rather than large sweeping change. Staff members develop most effectively over time, by making small adjustments in their behavior, or learning new skills.

Chapters are arranged in a logical order, in four parts. The first section starts with an introduction to the concept of staff development, and is followed by chapters on conducting a needs assessment, setting goals, and the questions to be considered when starting a staff development program. The second section addresses the development process itself, with chapters on developing orientation programs for new staff, achieving consensus on core competencies for library employees, coaching staff, cross-training, customer service, leadership, and succession planning. The third collection of chapters addresses practical considerations, such as how to plan and implement a staff development program, the application of instructional design concepts to staff training, and the use of online videos to support training. Finally, the book concludes with a thoughtful discussion on assessment.

Overall, Staff Development is a well-written and thoughtful collection of chapters that address all aspects of staff development in libraries. It includes references at the end of each chapter as well as an index. It would be an excellent addition to any professional library.

Previously published:

Mugridge, Rebecca L. Review of the book Staff Development: A Practical Guide, 4th ed. Edited by Andrea Wigbels Stewart, Carlette Washington-Hoagland, and Carol T. Zsulya. Catholic Library World 84:1 (2013): 60.

Being a Teen Library Services Advocate, by Linda W. Braun

Being a Teen Library Services Advocate

By Linda W. Braun. Neal-Schuman, 2012, 108 pp., ISBN 978-1-55570-795-8, (paper).

While library services to children and adults have long been established, teens occupy a middle ground that is often neglected. Being a Teen Library Services Advocate offers librarians compelling reasons why teens deserve special attention in the library, and provides guidance to librarians who serve young adults. Author Linda Braun has published widely on teen issues and is a former President of the Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA), so she is well-qualified to write on this topic.

Braun begins by differentiating between marketing and advocacy. Marketing consists of informing others about library services, whereas advocacy entails not only providing information, but also explaining why library services are beneficial to teens and the community. She describes the goals of advocacy efforts and provides a list of questions to help librarians evaluate advocacy efforts.

In subsequent chapters Braun explains how librarians can use collaboration to strengthen their advocacy efforts. She encourages librarians to incorporate advocacy in their everyday activities, and provides advice on leading a formal advocacy campaign. Braun suggests incorporating teens into advocacy efforts, and provides a number of examples of projects in which young adults could participate, such as writing opinion pieces for the local newspaper or posting on social media sites. Braun also shares her insights into advocacy in the state, regional, and national arenas, and explores the differences between advocacy and lobbying, which many librarians are prohibited from doing.

This book is written in a clear and concise style. It includes references at the end of each chapter as well as an index. It would be a very useful resource for any librarian interested in beginning or improving advocacy efforts for teen services and programs. 

Published previously: Mugridge, R. L. (2012). [Review of the book Being a Teen Library Services Advocate, by Linda W. Braun]. Catholic Library World, 83(2), 142-144.