Materials Services Division Managers' Meeting Minutes for October 15, 2009

Materials Services Managers Meeting

October 15, 2009; 8:00 a.m.; Downtown Library, 3rd Floor Director’s Conference Room

Attendees: Janet Brooks, Chair, Heidi Johnson, Karen Marriott, Charla Aucone/DN Library

Absent: Pauline Rodriguez-Atkins

Agenda

Welcome Guests

Charla Aucone was welcomed to the meeting. Janet encouraged Charla to ask questions or join the discussions.

Tech Processing Update

The average daily run in August was 819 items, in September 859 items, and so far in October, 872 items. The dept. processed a total of 17,204 items in August, 18,032 in September, and as of Oct. 14, almost 8,000 items already. Technical Processing currently processes non-rush items from the run 2 days ago; also, the part-time MSD techs will start helping out with the processing of new items for a while. TP will try to keep up with the greatly increased workload to the best of staff’s abilities by utilizing all of their available resources. 

In August, TP received an average of 47 boxes of materials a day, the same for September, and so far in October, an average of 58 boxes per day. Materials receipt has continued to increase for the months of August and September. After receiving two shipments with more than 100 boxes two days in a row in October, one right after not accepting deliveries due to Focus on Monday, Heidi is predicting another increase for the month of October, too. Thanks go to the MSD techs for helping in Technical Processing to unbox many of these materials; their aching backs are testimony as to just how many boxes. 

Thanks to cooperation between IT, the Business Office, and Technical Processing, Metropolitan Library System now supplies B&T’s accounting dept. with automatically generated e-mailed check breakdowns for all payments to B&T’s 401 materials accounts. Hopefully this will improve postings of MLS’s payments to the correct invoices. All B&T accounts continue to be current as Heidi contacts the accounting dept. every month to have credit memos applied to open invoices. Ingram accounts continue to be current as well. 

Tanaz Derakhshan was selected as TP’s new Data Entry Technician. Her first day with the system was on September 8 and since then, she has already learned a lot about the dept.’s and MLS’s operations. Heidi is planning for future visits for Tanaz to Materials Selection and the Business Office to find out more about their work processes and how they fit in with and relate to TP’s. 

Melanie Levick attended Resistance to Change committee meetings on Sep. 9 at DN and Sep. 23 at DC; the next meeting is scheduled for Oct. 21, again at DC. Kevin Colwell attended the August Commission meeting on the 27th at Belle Isle to accept his 5 year service certificate. 

Heidi attended a meeting on Sep. 16 between Karen Marriott, Jimmy Welch, and Todd Olberding (all MLS) with Bruce Delp and Jack Martin from Southwest Solutions about some issues and possible solutions with the new SC. Part of this meeting took place at the SC. 

Heidi also attended the new performance appraisal workshop on Sep. 25 at DN. On Oct. 1, she participated in part 2 of the Collection workshop DN. Afterwards, she attended a meeting between Jim Welch from IT, Lloyd Lovely and Denise Ryan from the Business Office, and her supervisor Karen Marriott about supplying automatically generated e-mail check breakdowns for all payments to B&T’s 401 materials accounts for MSL. The Business Office was quite pleased with this new function as it will eliminate the need for the Business Office to make copies of all B&T invoices to include with payments. The Business Office estimates a time saving of at least an hour. 

Heidi was contacted by Chris Carroll in Development Services to attend the Endowment Trust meeting in March (originally this was planned for January’s meeting) to present an overview of the new Technical Processing Dept. once it has moved into the new Service Center. 

All staff attended Focus 2009 and all staff, especially several new staff members, were quite impressed and pleased with the day’s proceedings. Everyone agreed that the day was well spent.

Cataloging/ILL Update

Nicholas Thompson is now full time. 

Stormy Lee has adjusted her schedule to 7:00-3:30. 

Materials Selection Update

Staff

Materials Selection Technician, Lisa Coker was nominated for the Outstanding Service Award. 

Anna Todd will be taking her comprehensive finals at OU on Oct 23. 

Marilyn Backus’ oldest son and his wife had a baby in September. 

Julia has helped out in ILL several times in the past month. 

Julia McConnell was out for a death Oct 14-16. 

Janet and Kim had a meeting with Technicians on Sept. 25 and review some portions of the new appraisal/standards and went over expectations for their work. 

Library Visits

During September selectors made an annual visit to DC, Book Centers and Books by Mail. They also made a 6-month collection review of ED. 

During October, Selectors are doing an annual visit to VI and a 6-month visit to MC 

In November, they are scheduled to do an annual visit to RE, which depending on the schedule for their move, may be changed. The selectors are also scheduled to do a 6-month collection review of SO. 

Ext. Weeding

Janet, Melissa, and Ruby worked with Jerrod at JN, weeding their collection. Over 12 boxes of material were withdrawn from the collection. Electronic System Reserves/709s 

Janet and Karen met with Jimmy on Sept 29 to view a prototype program he developed for handling system reserves electronically. This program should allow MSL staff to filter out the items that need attention quickly. 

Janet and Kim are testing the program and have reported back a few minor things that Jimmy has corrected. They will continue to try out the program through October and hope to have it available to all staff the first of November. 

Jimmy has started to work on the electronic version of the customer suggestions. This program will help MSL manage the large number of suggestions they continue to get and cut back on the amount of printing and filing that is done with the forms. 

Order Lists/Service Center

Janet and Kim have been in contact with Heidi about managing orders in the next couple of months. They are continuing to monitor list sizes and anticipating how to help with the move to the service center. Heidi should let MSL know when we need to start cutting back on the number of items sent out. 

Staff did a more thorough check of the system reserves for AV during October and ordered anything that might potentially go out of ratio before TP/CAT are settled in the new service center. These orders are going out in the next  week or so, and should be received before the middle of November. 

During the meeting Janet and Heidi decided that beginning with the next order list, MSL will limit the lists to 4000 items. Beginning the first of November, MSL will limit AV orders to absolutely necessary items, such as those needed for reserves or to meet customer demand. Fiction replacements will be worked as usual during November. Orders can go out as part of the 4000 items each week, or held to go out in mid January. 300 replacements will be worked in MSL during December and not go out until mid January. This should avoid any large orders coming in to Tech during the move to the service center.

Meetings/Workshops

Janet attended several training sessions for the new appraisal system and also trained MC staff. Kim attended the appraisal training on Sept. 25. 

Several staff have been taking Word 2007 and Excel 2007 classes. 

Janet, Melissa and Anna attended various sessions at Encyclomedia on September 17 and 18th. 

Janet attended a Safety Committee meeting at CH and did a safety audit of the building. 

Janet and Kim attended the Supervisory Skills Workshop on Sept 22nd. 

Melissa and Janet facilitated portions of the Collection workshop on Sept 24, Oct. 1 and Oct 8. 

Janet and Anna attended the author Ellen Hopkins’ presentation at Hillsdale Bible College on Sept 22nd. 

Janet did a presentation at Tinker AFB for daycare workers on choosing appropriate books for children. 

Janet and Anna attended an OLA/IFC meeting in Bristow on Sept. 25. 

Melissa attended the Children’s programmers’ meeting on Oct. 7. 

Kim attended the OSA committee meeting on Oct. 8. 

Ruby and Kim attended the Adult programmers meeting on Oct. 14. 

Janet will attend the OLA Program meeting in Sulphur on Oct. 16. 

Janet’s scheduled to attend the Tech Support meeting on Oct. 27 

Janet is scheduled to attend the 1st Amendment Congress on Oct. 28 and 29th. 

Administration Update

New delivery schedule will begin 1/5/10. 

New book titles with reserves will be coded as NBK with gold dots and routed from TP. 

RE is experiencing additional delays to their opening. Still hopeful for a December opening, but there is no definite date. 

Service Center is on schedule. Sorter will be installed 11/16. Furniture moves in around 11/9-11/23. Could potentially move in December, but that is not firm at this time, due to factors surrounding RE. 

The construction contract for NW is scheduled to be awarded in January. 

Storage of NW material at TP is becoming an issue. 

Pauline is scheduled back part-time the week of Oct. 20. 

New appraisal system goes into effect Nov. 1. 

DN Holiday Open House scheduled for Dec. 10. 

Harlen Coben selected for Literary Voices speaker. 

Long Range Plan update in the commission packet. Can enter items that meet the LRP goals anytime throughout the year, using the link on the Intranet.

Miscellaneous  

There were no miscellaneous items. Next meeting: November 19th at CH. Heidi will chair.