Northeastern University (Boston, Mass.) & Alma

1. Northeastern University (Boston, Mass.) & Alma Amira Aaron Associate Dean, Scholarly Resources IGELU Oxford, September 2014, Session 10

2. About Northeastern University • Global research university • Over 26,000 FTE in urban Boston location • Additional sites in Seattle & Charlotte, NC – will be others • Large online presence for courses & professional education • Main library (SNELL) & Law Library • Member of the Boston Library Consortium • Over 92% of purchases are electronic – Buy very little print • Former III Millennium user for many years • Heavy user of local and consortial demand-driven acquisitions for e-books

3. Alma Early Adopter • Contract signed December 2011 – Went live July 2013 • Alma benefits that we considered: • Cloud system – no local maintenance, upgrades, etc. • Open, modern platform – flexible, service-oriented architecture • Reporting and analysis tools, including usage information • Do away with print and electronic silos – wanted concentration on electronic processes • Separate back-end and discovery layers • Promise of cooperative efforts & sharing of data with others • Promise of better workflows and integration with vendors • Difficult migration from Millennium (second customer with very little documentation or detailed knowledge)

4. THE REALITY - Positive • General: • System in the cloud, and being able to access Alma from anywhere, is a definite positive! • “Real-time” information for allocations, expenditures, encumbrances & available balances – fiscal functionality • Automated processes & workflows • Alma/Banner connection works well – eliminates manual keying • Managing funds – ease of use; add/update allocations to funds is streamlined, ability to identify records to disencumber • Set functionality – copying and sharing sets, new functionality of turning a logical set into an itemized set for updating • Ability to apply custom normalization rules for batch record enhancement and import • Analytics is powerful and has the potential to be an excellent tool.

5. THE REALITY - Positive • Some specifics: • Link to LC MARC format documentation within Metadata editor • Alma maintains a record of the notices sent to patrons • Simple process for adding a proxy borrower to a patron’s account • Easy access navigation buttons for circulation transactions • Linking functionality in Alma – e.g., linking orders, portfolios and licenses • New ability to display licensing terms in Primo • Ability to export lists from the system • Ability to run jobs on large batches of records for updating • EDI invoicing works well • Simple to input a manual invoice • Usage statistics – SUSHI or import – promised Analytics report on cost per use (almost there)

6. THE REALITY – Less Positive • General • Integration of various formats (URM) not yet realized; silos still exist – inability to reach all data from all functions of Alma • Electronic resource functionality not yet fully developed (disappointing that SFX functionality was not replicated) – licensing functionality is especially weak • Authorizations are not granular enough and often not logical – need a read-only authorization! • System is still very rigid as to making changes, corrections or editing records • Inconsistency in necessary actions, terms and data presented across the system • Material types are still confusing and too many different lists! • Limits of 5000 for export & loading to create sets are not adequate • Documentation is still often incomplete, confusing or inaccurate • Need a list of known issues to save everyone’s time!

7. THE REALITY – Less Positive • Some specifics: • Batch processes, such as Patron User loads, too brittle – one error aborts the load – should just get reported out • Reliance on MarcEdit and Excel to perform tasks previously done in ILS – additional time and staff training • Analytics - not reliable - still can’t report consistently on some important fields (e.g. “reporting code”) or combine print/electronic; problem with various counts • Audit trail is harmed by data, such as receipt date and original location, being deleted when an item is deleted • Course reserves – entire workflow is daunting – easy to miss steps and make mistakes! Suppressed records still show as on reserve. • Not able to customize notices at Library or Desk levels. • Order record data sets functionality is lacking • Unable to link at article level for local/standalone portfolios • Title searching via “Search External Resources” is difficult

8. Conclusions Thus Far • Moving to Alma as an early adopter has ultimately put the Northeastern University libraries in a very good place • After a difficult two years, we are starting to realize the potential of Alma in many areas, including staff savings • Both Alma and Primo are improving rapidly – sometimes almost too rapidly for us to keep up with! • It has been a definite learning process, both for us as a customer and for Ex Libris • We are somewhat concerned about support issues and the ability of Ex Libris to keep up with the tremendous growth of Alma, both staff support and the technical infrastructure • It will be exciting to see where we go from here and if the promise of cooperative use of Alma and sharing of data can be realized in the future