1. A New Service Model
through Technology
IOLUG Spring Program, May 3, 2013
Brian C. Gray
Team Leader Research Services
Case Western Reserve University
Kelvin Smith Library
bcg8@case.edu

2. A New Service Model
through Technology
• Highlights of changes we made
with help of technology
• Other technologies we are using
or trying
• Some other sources of inspiration

3. Case Western Reserve University
• Private, research intensive
• http://www.case.edu/
• Below 10,000 students, 40% undergraduate
• 2,600+ faculty
• Alumni: 100,000+
• Annual research revenue about $400 million
• 2012/13: largest first year class ever, ~1400

4. Kelvin Smith Library (KSL)
http://library.case.edu
• Main library, includes arts &
sciences, engineering, business, & undergraduate
• New strategic plan: April 2011
• http://library.case.edu/ksl/whoweare/strategicplan/
• Staff & budget reorganization to match
• New approaches: small pilots, increased listening
to patron opinions, assessment/data
focus, customization, transparency

5. Kelvin Smith Library (KSL)
Mission: KSL is the knowledge and creativity commons of
CWRU.
Vision: KSL will be the information laboratory for knowledge
collection, connection, creation, and curation.
Values:
• Openness
• Collaboration
• Personalized service
• Agility & innovation through experimentation

6. New Service Models
• Implement Summon
• Phase out the formal reference desk in order
to go “on call” and “get out” of building
• Go to users
• Build relationships
• Grow LibGuides & virtual instruction
• Completely redesign website

7. Highlights From & During
Summon Implementation
• Live in only a few weeks
• Entire website was redesigned
• Every page in site & LibGuides has search box
• Rolled out the same time we phased out the
formal reference desk
• Balanced Scorecard method of assessment
with data shared publicly

8. Old KSL Site (Dec. 2011)

9. New Site (Jan. 2012)

10. Site Announcement

11. • Every webpage has Summon as the header
• Summon & new site go live in parallel
• Educate & market both simultaneously
• Many of our website search boxes hits
were really library research questions, so
we matched the search box to the user
practices

12. Summon Everywhere: LibGuides

13. Balanced Scorecard
• Ensure strategic plan accomplishes intended
outcomes
• Articulate success
• Follow a strategy map
• Specific qualitative & quantitative success metrics
• Create & adopt outcome assessment tools
• Communicate progress through public
dashboards

14. Balanced Scorecard
• Metric for Year 1: 25% of all searches performed
on Summon (totaling up all searches performed
between the catalog and summon, and create a
percentage).
• We hit 28.4%
• Developing a new metric comparing a “core” and
stable set of databases with strong COUNTER
data to compare usage against Summon over
similar time periods

15. New Walk-in Service Model
Old:
• Reference Desk, Circulation Desk, Freedman
Center (multimedia) desk
New:
• Welcome Desk (greeting & IDs only; no services)
and Service Desk (circulation, reference
“triage”, and multimedia) with staff roaming the
computer spaces
• Research Services Librarians called when needed

16. Reference Model Changed
• All reference, collection, & instruction
librarians combined into a single team
(Research Services)
• Service Desk staff take initial questions
• Librarians scheduled virtual and “on call”
• Librarians hit the road & leave the library to
be where the users are
• Focus on faculty relationship building

17. Reference Model Changed
• Service Desk trained regularly in reference
resources and techniques
Summon allowed:
• Non-librarians to answer more questions easier
than previously
• Increased instruction to occur when answering
virtual reference question by being able to focus
on a single research tool

18. Experimental Service Desk:
No Over-Counter Interactions

19. Experimental Welcome Desk

20. New Roles & New Styles
New roles:
• Director of Development
• Marketing & Communications Officer
New communications:
• http://library.case.edu/ksl/annualreport/
• Balanced Scorecard dashboards

21. • Provides all incoming first year CWRU students with
their own Personal Librarian (PL)
• Promote library awareness & successful research
• Be a friend or “ear” outside formal academics
• Promote Case, Cleveland, etc.
• Direct to other services & resources around campus
• Occasional communications & programs

22. Personal
Librarian

23. Active Collaboration Room

24. Freedman Center
for Digital Scholarship

25. CaseLearns New Media Workshops
• PowerPoint
• Digital images
• Twitter
• Desktop Publishing
• Video
• GIS
• Various Adobe software
• Google tools

26. Alumni Online Library
• Databases, e-journals, e-books
• Chat, text messages, & other reference
support
• Coming Soon: Webinars
• Coming Soon: Video & other tutorials

27. Public WOW: Real-Time Display
of the Behind the Scenes

28. Coming Soon: CRM
• Customer Relationship Management
• Assist with succession planning
• Provide better services
• Document “value” from user perspective
• Support “team” models to service
• Considering Microsoft Dynamics

29. Local Inspiration: Cleveland
Museum of Art, Gallery One

30. Future Plans
• Issue Balanced Scorecard dashboards
• Virtual & point-of-need instruction tools
• Instruction assessment
• Digital Scholarship tools & resources
• Grow alumni virtual relationships
• Grow faculty relationships: CRM, etc.

31. KSL Successes
• Best colleagues anywhere – “team” does
really mean something in my library
• Willing to experiment
• Willing to collaborate
• Exploration
• No when to walk away from failures or
underutilized services

32. A New Service Model
through Technology
IOLUG Spring Program, May 3, 2013
Brian C. Gray
Team Leader Research Services
Case Western Reserve University
Kelvin Smith Library
bcg8@case.edu