ACQNET v2n105 (November 23, 1992) URL = http://hegel.lib.ncsu.edu/serials/stacks/acqnet/acq-v2n105 ISSN: 1057-5308 *************** ACQNET, Vol. 2, No. 105, November 23, 1992 ========================================== (1) FROM: Christian SUBJECT: ACQNET subscribers to be surveyed (27 lines) (2) FROM: Richard Jasper SUBJECT: "Adding value" and acquisitions librarianship (76 lines) (3) FROM: Andy Stancliffe SUBJECT: "Adding value" and acquisitions librarianship (41 lines) (4) FROM: Richard Jasper SUBJECT: Acquisitions statistics (19 lines) (1)---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun, 22 Nov 92 13:06:49 EST From: Christian Subject: ACQNET subscribers to be surveyed As you can expect, keeping ACQNET going requires a significant amount of time. Not enormous, but significant enough that I wonder if all of the time I spend working on it is well spent. Collecting your postings, putting an issue together, and sending it takes about one to one and half hour per issue. Maintaining the index, directories, and other files adds another two or three hours per week. While I'm pretty confident that the time I spend putting issues together is worthwhile, I don't have the same feeling insofar as the other files are concerned. Rosann Bazirjian, a member of the ACQNET Editorial Board, has volunteered to help me find out how subscribers feel about those files. She has devised a reasonably short questionnaire which I will send to you after sending this issue. We would both very much appreciate getting replies from as many of you as possible, so please take a few minutes to fill out the questionnaire. It is not very long. Please be sure you return the questionnaire to Rosann, not to me. Her various addresses are on the questionnaire. Thank you. (2)---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 20 Nov 92 13:23:15 EST From: Richard P. Jasper (Emory University) Subject: VALUE ADDED LIBRARIANSHIP I'm sorry I missed Charleston and Miriam Drake's presentation. Miriam can always be counted upon to get one's juices flowing! Some impromptu observations: (1) Who else around here really knows what we are trying to achieve in the acquisitions process? My main goal is to make an efficient, streamlined, rational and predictable process out of the acquiring of tens of thousands of largely unique items. We are not a bookstore: We usually are not acquiring single, much less multiple, copies of titles that are urgently needed today. Sometimes we do, but that's the exception. We are not the purchasing department: We are not procuring a predictable and uniform stock that will be consumed and need to be replenished in a predictable fashion. As we have pointed out on a zillion different occasions, books are not paper clips. (2) What value does the Library in general bring to the University community? The Library makes available to the community at large (a) expertise in the methods for accessing, interpreting, organizing and retrieving knowledge and information and (b) we provide a great deal of that knowledge and information within the walls of our facility, although what we have is by no means complete nor representative of the total body of available information or knowledge. The Library's Collection Management organization brings value to the community by serving as the decision-making filter for all the information that needs to be purchased for the community. Individual scholars, although expects in their particular sub-specialties, are the first to acknowledge that they don't usually have broad enough knowledge to balance their needs against those of the rest of the community. That balancing act is Collection Management's responsibility. Acquisitions, then, brings value to the community by being able to effectively implement Collection Management's decisions. (3) How do I, not just Acquisitions, do this? By engaging in a similar kind of balancing act. Professor A's need for immediate action on a title has to be balanced against the overall need to handle the majority of titles in a uniform fashion. By knowing how our needs are different than a bookstore's or an office manager's. And, consequently, by trying to learn who is best suited to meeting our needs. Is a purchasing agent going to know that discount is just one factor that has to be balanced against fill rate, supply time, quality of reports, ease of invoicing etc.? Is a purchasing agent going to understand the interaction of staff constraints, cataloging and public services needs, and other factors on the decision regarding how to acquire? Is the purchasing agent going to be able to serve the University Accounting folks, harried by internal, state and federal auditors, by being able to say, "Look, when a subscription vendor sends you a 'pro forma' invoice it doesn't mean the same thing as when National Paperclip does. And, by the way, NO we're not paying Graham Greene to write manuscripts for us--'manuscript collection' means something entirely different.'"? (4) Do you realize how little you pay me compared to some of these other people and what an outstanding deal you get for it, in terms of depth of knowledge and understanding, in terms of care and attention to detail, in terms of crafting an efficient response to a situation that isn't really all that malleable to standardization? Oh, well... As I said, it's impromptu. Maybe if we get a few more rantings like this, we can't start identifying themes, trends, talking points--and give the calm, cool, collected folks a chance to chime in with a few "Yes, but..." responses. More later...It's quitting time in Atlanta! (3)---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 23 Nov 92 10:55 PST From: Andy Stancliffe (UCLA) Subject: Adding value and acquisitions When Christian asks how acquisitions librarians add value to information, he raises a pertinent issue in this time of budget cuts and downsizing. I wonder if he isn't too quick to dismiss some of the very points he raises. I believe value is "added" to information (in whatever format) when it is purchased. The very fact of purchasing or gaining access to books, journals, databases, etc. makes them available for use to the scholar or user, and must be accomplished in order for the cataloger to make the information more accessible or for the public service librarian to instruct or guide the scholar in how to find it. In fact, the acquisitions librarian is equivalent to a purchasing agent, albeit a highly specialized purchasing agent. Knowing how best to acquire library materials or to access electronic media comes from specialized training and much hands-on experience. Negotiating contracts for approval plans, negotiating discounts, knowing when to order direct, knowing when to prepay and (especially) when not to, balancing the benefits of a good discount with the staff costs involved in working with unsatisfactory service--all of these are aspects of purchasing library books that require an understanding of the book trade and efficient workflows, and are the very areas of expertise unique to acquisitions librarians. Christian also makes the point that value is added when acquisitions staff enter records in the on-line system. I feel the importance of this activity should not be overlooked. In an environment like UCLA, the acquisition-level record is sometimes the only public record for up to 3 years. Many of our foreign monographs lacking cataloging copy are given accession numbers and made available to the public until copy is available. In this case it is the record created by the acquisitions staff that makes the material available. While this value is added by acquisitions staff rather than the acquisitions librarian, it is because of the acquisitions librarian that the staff is able to perform its functions accurately and efficiently. The staff is hired and trained by the acquisitions librarian, and this is where I feel the greatest value is added. Acquisitions training is an ongoing process, and even our brightest, most capable staff consult regularly with librarians about policy and procedure issues. An effective acquisitions librarian empowers the acquisitions staff to perform unique skills. I propose that the value added by acquisitions librarians is found where management and leadership skills intersect with the unique knowledge about the book trade (or its electronic equivalent) needed to acquire information for the Library. (4)---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 20 Nov 92 16:29:00 EST From: Richard P. Jasper (Emory University) Subject: Acquisitions statistics I raise the following question with fear and trembling: What kind of statistics do people in acquisitions keep and why? I am unusual in that (1) I am not at a state institution and we have *very* loose reporting requirements and (2) Emory is much more oriented toward what's been cataloged than what's been purchased. All of which means I can pretty much decide myself what and what not to keep statistics on. [Having said this I expect bolts of lightning and "Thou shalt not(s)..." to crash down from the sky!] I can think of about a million things off the top of my head that I could count. The question is: Do we think there are any basic, standard, you really want to know this above everything else kinds of countables? Eagerly awaiting your puzzled responses...! ******* END OF FILE ****** ACQNET, Vol. 2, No. 105 ****** END OF FILE *******