Catching Time by the Tail: An Analytic, Strategic, and Aspirational History of LTS

1. Catching Time by the Tail: An Analytic, Strategic, and Aspirational History of LTS Jim LeBlanc CUL Career Development Days April 6, 2016

2. Topic for Job Candidate Presentations (LTS, 2009): What will be the role of technical services in an environment in which Google will have achieved its goal to digitize all the world’s books within the next five years?

3. LTS Since 2005

6. To “create a surplus of fastcat / copycat / authorities time for response to critical needs beyond cataloging of newly received materials, [and to] establish cataloging priorities” (Ross Atkinson, “CTS Cataloging Adjustments, June 20, 1994)

7. LTS Backlog Reduction

8. A “feat that is almost imaginable” (Sarah Thomas, October 7, 2004)

9. A “tremendous service for our readers, who can [now] easily find the works we acquired for their use” (Sarah Thomas, October 7, 2004)

10. Integrated Tool for Selection and Ordering for the Cornell University Library (ITSO-CUL)

12. Catching Time by the Tail: An Analytic, Strategic, and Aspirational History of LTS Jim LeBlanc CUL Career Development Days April 6, 2016

13. LTS = Access

15. New Physical Items Cataloged (2006-2015)

16. Print Serial Titles Received (2006 – 2015)

17. E-Journal Titles Total (2006 – 2015)

18. Physical Items / E-Journals (2006 – 2015)

19. Some new operational activities since 2005: • Image cataloging (15,761 items cataloged since 2009) • Data curation (nearly 200 projects and consultations since 2011) • Web archiving (nearly 15,000,000 documents in 2014/15) • Increased collaboration with DCAPS

20. LTS Staffing, 2005/06 – 2014/15 • Number of staff devoted to current LTS responsibilities in 2005 = 97 • Number of staff in LTS today = 68 • Net decline in staff over last ten years = 30% (exactly the same as the net decline in processing of new titles in physical formats!)

21. To “create a surplus of … time for response to critical needs beyond cataloging of newly received materials”

22. LTS batch processing since 2005: • 54,000,000+ total transactions • 2,000,000+ new catalog records added • 18,000,000+ catalog records edited/enhanced • 33,000,000+ catalog records exported

23. Firm orders placed: 20,000+Estimated labor savings: 1.5 – 2.0 FTE

24. Some strategic goals: • Regular review of practices & staffing • Seeking solutions to local problems at the consortial or national level • Influencing national cooperative and vendor practices, tools, and policies • Approval plans • OASIS and other acquisitions & selection tools • Patron-driven acquisitions • Emerging formats

25. Some strategic goals (contd.): • Participation in user experience evaluation & research regarding access, especially to licensed electronic & other digital resources • Participation in development of WorldCat Entities, BIBFRAME & other linked data initiatives (including LD4L and LD4P) • Sustain the 2CUL Technical Services Strategic Alliance

26. More Than a Hundred Hands

27. A “feat that [was] almost unimaginable”

28. Thank you