How to Create (and Keep Creating) a Digital Projects Workflow

1. How to Create (and Keep Creating) a
Digital Projects Workflow
All images taken from sites with no known rights or permissions issues. URLs on request.
Kat Hagedorn
University of Michigan Library
October 26, 2015

2. When it comes to digitization projects, how does
a content stakeholder know:
a. how to get an a-ok on a project?
b. what those digital folks really need?
c. if there’s room in the pipeline for their
work?
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3. Sometimes
you start with
only half of
what you
need.
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4. Sometimes
you need to
do extra
legwork to
understand
what you’re
missing.
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5. We started by
evaluating
other
institutions’
digitization
practices (eg,
Penn State).
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6. Our first draft was
messy.
(It contained
everything we could
think of in terms of
materials formats,
rights conundrums,
repository
choices…)
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7. We were surprised
at how much
wordsmithing was
needed.
Instructions are a
bear to write well.
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8. But out of that
information
overload, after
a couple
iterations, we
got the
workflow
down to a
manageable
series of
steps.
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9. Result is: a
robust FAQ
(eg, how
creating better
metadata
improves
access), and a
rights and
permissions
worksheet.
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10. We are confident
that we have
overcome our
original hurdles.
The time is right
to sit down and
discover what is
next for the 4th
iteration of the
workflow.
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11. Current
concerns:
• multiple
repositories
• digital vs.
digitized
workflow
• just
“holding”
the material
isn’t
enough!
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12. How do we
continue to
discover new
problems?
A survey?
User
(stakeholder)
stories?
Statistics on
start to finish?
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13. Light at
the end
of the
tunnel?
Ongoing
process,
but
worth it.
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14. http://www.lib.umich.edu/digital-
library-production-service-dlps/
starting-digitization-project
Contact: Kat Hagedorn
khage@umich.edu
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