Primary Research Group Publishes New Study on Serials Management: Prevailing & Best Practices in Electronic & Print Serials Management, ISBN 1-57440-076-2

The report examines management of both electronic and print serials and includes discussions of the following issues: selection and management of serials agents, including the negotiation of payment; allocation of the serials budget by department; resolution of access issues with publishers; use of consortiums in journal licensing; invoice reconciliation and payment; periodicals binding, claims, check-in, and management; serials department staff size and range of responsibilities; serials management software; use of open access archives and university depositories; policies on gift subscriptions, free trials, and academic exchanges of publications; use of electronic serials/catalog linking technology; acquisition of usage statistics; cooperative arrangements with other local libraries; and other issues in serials management.

(PRWEB) December 15, 2005 -- This report looks closely at the serials procurement and management practices of eleven libraries: The University of Ohio, Villanova University, the Colorado School of Mines, Carleton College, Northwestern University, Baylor University, Princeton University, the University of Pennsylvania, The University of San Francisco, Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, and the University of Nebraska Medical Center.

A few of the report’s main findings are summarized below:

Use of Subscription Agents
Interestingly, there was little consensus on how many subscription agents to use and what to use them for. Some participants believed that there were significant savings in consolidating services in one single subscription agent, while others felt that these savings were negligible or even non-existent. Contracts appear to be less standardized than may be commonly believed and negotiating skills are important in achieving the best results in terms of price and performance. In general, the subscription agents get relatively high marks, though larger libraries seem less satisfied than smaller ones, perhaps reflecting the additional costs borne by subscription agents to serve the more arcane needs of major research universities. Since consensus did not really exist, we suspect much more information sharing by librarians, when this is not limited by contract, may be quite beneficial. There was no standard measure of the “give and take” of dealing with the major subscription agents, and no ready way to calibrate the economies of scale of service consolidation, or of the relative bargaining power of the actors.

Some libraries stressed that renewing as many subscriptions as possible at the same time, and pre-paying, were effective ways to hold down costs. Small and medium-sized libraries have tended to eliminate the use of a foreign subscription agent for foreign periodicals, but the major research libraries emphasize using a range of suppliers.

Trends in Serials Spending
Libraries are under pressure from two sources: the incessant pressure from journal price increases and the gradual decline in print as an information vehicle, particularly for journals, especially scientific journals. These two trends put librarians often in the position of offering fewer services yet requesting greater funds. In an increasingly tight economy, this is a situation which requires a great deal of explanation and diplomacy.

Librarians need to explain that the print plus electronic journal subscription regime is increasingly being replaced by one which really offers only electronic access. All this is happening as prices continue to rise. The librarians that deal with this situation most successfully tend to have careful, well thought out publicity and communication plans aimed at showing their key constituents in their university community the true situation that the library faces.

Most librarians expect that the shift from print to electronic journal access will continue over the next five years. For many, a key issue will be: when will faculty be familiar enough with electronic access so that the loss of print access will not disturb them? The willingness to go without print access varies considerably by academic field and, to some extent, by the type of college. Faculty at larger, more research oriented colleges are somewhat readier than those at less research oriented institutions to go without print access. However, the true determining variable of this readiness appears to be academic discipline and not size or type of institution. Faculty in the hard sciences are much more accustomed to electronic access and much readier to do without print access than faculty in almost any other discipline. In the second tier of readiness are those in business and finance and, some would say, psychologists. After this, the situation is much murkier. Librarians tend to view faculty in the humanities as the most resistant to the elimination of print access. Perhaps the disciplines that librarians show the most uncertainty about are the social sciences, such as economics, anthropology, sociology, and psychology, among others. Most librarians appear to believe that social scientists over the next five years will be increasingly willing to forego print access and will demand greater electronic services. However, most view it as something of a guessing game to determine exactly when they are “ready” to give up print journal resources without too much fuss. Business-related fields (finance, economics, management, statistics) seem a little more ahead of the curve than others, as does psychology, but most librarians still seem to be a little wary of taking the paper away from the sociologists and anthropologists.

And even in the hard sciences there are pockets of what one might call “resistance” to complete elimination of print access. In chemistry, for example, lagging issues remain over archival access, since chemists stress the need to refer to precedent, perhaps more than other scientists for whom older texts are less often used or cited.

Allocation of the Serials Budget
Strict formulas for allocating the library budget across departments seem to have been abandoned by most study participants. Historic tradition is probably the biggest determinant of future levels of support for specific academic fields, and most skirmishing appears to take place over funding levels for new or emerging disciplines. Librarians appear to have fewer problems when they have more control over budget allocations than when they have less control, and those that have given up such control tend to want to regain it.

Electronic Serials Management Software
Most libraries in the sample have purchased or are planning to purchase some form of system for managing electronic periodicals. Some questions linger about compatibility with existing systems, and system compatibility is a major issue in purchasing. Verde and ERM are popular alternatives.

Staffing & Departmental Organization
When the serials department or section of the acquisitions department is responsible for all or a large percentage of the library’s electronic acquisitions, man-hour demands quickly accelerate. Many libraries, perhaps particularly serials departments, are struggling with the issues of purchasing, installing, tracking, policing, and instructing on the use of electronic databases, particularly journals. The rapid development of electronic resources in serials, through the increasing use of electronic journals, the expansion of electronic periodicals in student reserve services, the expansion of text linking software, and other trends, has led many libraries to separate the task of overseeing electronic periodicals from that of print periodicals. Not all librarians agree with the development scheme. Some view this as an artificial separation that compels libraries to duplicate services by separating the skills involved in electronic subscription acquisition and management from those involved with print subscriptions. According to this view, these skill sets are so related that they should be done by the same individual or work unit. Only mechanical tasks such as periodical check-in and binding might be usefully separated out into their own specialized work units or departments.

Policies Towards Gift Subscriptions and Academic Exchanges
Academic exchange programs, once so important for many universities, appear to be increasingly viewed as not worth the trouble. Factors include an apparent decline in university publishing, abandonment of exchange programs by the former East Bloc countries. Fiscal troubles in Canada and Western Europe have also led reductions in university-sponsored publications, reducing the incentive for exchanges.

The Role of Subscription Agents in Handling Electronic Periodicals Subscriptions
The librarians interviewed really had no consensus on whether or not to use subscription agents to manage major electronic journal contracts. Probably more than 50% seem to want to save the money and manage the subscriptions directly, and the general view appears to be that the subscription agents are getting better at such management themselves. However, this was by no means a universally held view.

The price of the report is $80.00. Review copies are available for publications that regularly cover library and information industry developments. For further information contact James Moses at 212-736-2316.

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