2017 Charleston Library Conference

In the summer of 2016, the Carnegie Mellon University Libraries hired several library faculty, some of whom held PhD’s but not an MLS. Along with being liaison librarians, library faculty at Carnegie Mellon are also responsible for collection development for their subject areas. Since the new hires with PhDs had no experience in collection development, I felt it was important to help these subject specialists get some basic collection development training. In consultation with the Acquisitions Staff, we created a workshop to inform the new library faculty about how to use the ILS, how to submit orders, how to use GOBI and the approval plan among other processes. In a recent discussion, the idea of creating a comprehensive approval plan profile for these subject specialists would help library faculty understand the approval profile, how they can utilize it to its fullest potential, all the while making GOBI the database easy for them to use. That program would result in library faculty that grasp and use GOBI for Collection Development and are efficient in their way of doing so. Doing this type of leg work and training when a new hire in the library starts means that they are trained and confident in the system early on.

In this presentation, we’ll share how we partnered with our library vendor Collection Development Managers to develop this workshop. Through tutorials, focused in-person and webinar training sessions, and ongoing work on the profile between library vendor and subject specialists, the new library faculty had resources and support to become experts at using GOBI and the approval profile in their specific collection areas.