Collection Development In Times Of Shrinking Budgets

When Diana Cunningham asked me to speak to you today, she told me your theme,“Capital Ideas: Surviving & Thriving in Uncertain Times.” She indicated that myexpertise in collection development would fit in well with the theme. Shortly after Iagreed to speak, I had to submit a brief blurb for your conference brochure. I hadbeen mulling over some topics, but they hadn’t jelled just yet, so I panicked for a fewminutes. Trying to think of a catchy angle, I thought of the parallels betweenreducing a library’s acquisitions budget and actually going on a diet. So I wrote acouple of sentences, and submitted them, which is what appears in your program.But after I started to work on this presentation, I realized that the analogy reallydoesn’t work that well. To lose weight, there are two basic activities: eat less andexercise more. Sure, eating less corresponds to reduced spending on acquisitions,but exercising more just doesn’t translate into a library activity. You can’t get alibrary to exercise.Another problem with the analogy is that for many Americans, dieting is necessarybecause they are overweight. In order to stay healthy, many of us are voluntarilyreducing our intake of food. The reduced spending in our libraries is hardlyvoluntary, and besides, I would hardly call our libraries overweight in information.I’ve never heard of

anybody

complaining that a library had too much information.So after I finished putting this presentation together, I’ve given it a moreappropriate title: “Collection Development in Times of Shrinking Budgets.”Since we’re talking about collection development, who here is actually called acollection development librarian? Not that many. I want to be sure we’re all on thesame page, and talking about the same things. So, what exactly is collectiondevelopment? I started to make a list of what people know about collectiondevelopment:Everybody generally knows how to do it Everybody does it differentlyBut you really don’t know how anybody else does it …unless you do it with themBut, most people do it by themselvesAfter staring at these points for a while, I realized I had actually discovered whycollection development is like sex. Now, while I think that is a very important discovery, and I hope to someday win a prize for this, it really isn’t relevant to what we’re here for today. Let’s just say that if you have responsibility for selecting andacquiring resources for a library, you’re involved in collection development.

2I wanted this to be more than just a typical “how I do it good” presentation. While Ihave 29 years of experience in collection development, all of those have been at medical schools. I needed ideas that could work in libraries of different sizes,budgets, and clientele. Like a zombie, I needed more brains. So I posted a request forideas and tips on my blog, on medlib‐l, on the Hospital Library Section list, and theCollection Development Section list. I received over 35 replies, and I supplementedthose with other suggestions I found on the Internet.In many of the responses, people told me that they had been told to “Do more withless.” How many of you have had that told to you? I really dislike this facilestatement. It’s a lame attempt to put a positive spin on a negative reality. I find it not only patronizing, it also implies that we’ve not been wise in our choices up to now.This says, “OK,

now

you’re going to have to work.” In actuality, you can’t do morewith less.What we’re really faced with is “Doing less with less.” This is a realistic descriptionof our situation, without the sugarcoating of a platitude. I don’t think we should hidethis reality from our users. If we are forced to make cuts, and our users never feelany pain, this just reinforces the administration’s view that our budget can be cut again and again, and no one will notice. When you let your users know that you aredoing less with less, they will realize that when the

library

is affected by budget reductions,

they

are affected. I call this the “grumble factor.” Without a grumblefactor, your users won’t know that services and resources are being reduced, andthey won’t fight for you. However, this doesn’t mean we shouldn’t optimize ourselection and acquisition procedures. So let’s jump in to our tips. I’ve placed theminto four broad themes:PartnersB(u)y the numbersBuy lessBuy smarterPartners

•

Joining consortia was by far the most popular suggestion I received from myinquiry. Libraries both large and small are able to get more resources, andspend less money, when they join a consortium. Not all consortia are huge,like NERL. Many consortia I heard about were small. Some of these were localconsortium where libraries at different hospitals organized themselves;some were statewide; some were organized by their NN/LM; and some werelibraries at different locations of a single hospital system. Kitty Wrigleyworks at one hospital in a 13‐hospital system. She lobbied the system topurchase Micromedex for all of its members, resulting in a savings of tens of thousands of dollars. She is also constantly looking out for new buyinggroups. While she works in Illinois, she was able to use the Michigan LibraryConsortium to purchase Serials Solutions for her library.

•

State library. Right here in New York we have the great example of NOVELNY:http://www.novelnewyork.org/health.phpFree to any NY stateresident, using the number from your New York State Drivers License or NewYork State DMV Non‐Driver Photo ID Card. You can get access to ProQuest Platinum and the Health and Wellness Resource Center at no charge.

•

Departments. Many librarians reported they were able to partner withdepartments in their institution to share costs on big‐ticket items. This worksparticularly well for specialized tools or expensive e‐books that would onlybe used by a certain department. Jonathan Lord reported he was able tonegotiate 50% shared funding for several specialized resources such as:Natural Standard, AccessSurgery, Psychiatry Online, and others.

•

Individual users. Mary Pat Harnegie reports that at the Cleveland Clinic,professional staff members are required to donate a copy of their newlypublished books to the library. Over the past 5 years, the library has receivedover $28,000 worth of books. (Mary Pat is reporting on her success with aposter at the 2009 Midwest Chapter meeting.) The library also sends out arequest in the staff newsletter for staff physicians to donate their “gentlyused” books to the library. When residents are leaving in June, they may bemore than willing to donate books they don’t need anymore, and don’t want to move.B(u)y the numbers. Use statistical data to guide your buying and retention.

•

Track usage. One thing that electronic publishing does very well forlibrarians is to track usage of our purchased resources. All of the majorjournal publishers can supply COUNTER statistics, and most of the societypublishers as well, particularly if they’re on HireWire Press. Launched in2002, COUNTER is an “international initiative serving librarians,publishers and intermediaries by setting standards that facilitate therecording and reporting of online usage statistics in a consistent, credibleand compatible way.” Go toprojectcounter.org/to find which publishersare COUNTER‐compliant. Like journals, most database providers can alsoprovide usage stats. When faced with cost cuts, I always prefer to canceldatabases to journals. There are now many resources, including freeGoogle Scholar, to let you discover journal articles. And, when times get better, you can always reinstate a database subscription, with no loss of years. With journal cancellations, you’ll usually have to buy the yearswhen you had no subscription.

•

Cost/use. Once you have your usage statistics, it’s fairly easy to calculatethe cost per use with a spreadsheet. Determining cost per use can helpyou make better, objective decisions on possible resource cancellations.

•

When you’re tracking usage and calculating cost/use, you are lead to thisinevitable conclusion: use it or lose it. We shouldn’t be buying resourcesthat aren’t being used.

•

Big deal cancellation allotments. Many academic libraries participate inso‐called big deal purchases with the giant medical publishers. While thedeals are beneficial in keeping price caps at a barely tolerable maximum,