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**Please excuse cross-posting***

Please join the ALCTS Technical Services Workflow Efficiency Interest Group
(TSWEIG) at the 2018 ALA Midwinter in Denver, CO.

Date and time: February 12, 2018 (Monday), 1:00-2:30 PM

Location: Colorado Convention Center, Room 304, Denver, CO


*If We Can, You Can!*
*By Jessalyn Zoom, Library of Congress*The History and Military Science
Section responsible for cataloging copyright and Electronic Cataloging In
Publication monographs at the Library of Congress saw steady increase in
production in the last three years.  The section staff achieved the
milestone each year with fewer professional librarians than previous
years.  The presenter will share her experience of developing efficient
workflows, utilizing staff’s strengths and skill sets, and developing staff
members and expanding their horizon.  The presenter is convinced that
becoming a subject expert herself has been helpful to properly guide her
staff members during the work process and ensure the quality of the work.


*Simply visualizing technical services infrastructure using draw.io
<http://draw.io/> *
*By Gina Solares, University of San Francisco*Our libraries operate within
a complex and interconnected technical environment. Mapping your technical
services infrastructure can help staff see how their work is connected and
can help you identify areas of weakness or inefficiency. I will discuss how
Gleeson Library at the University of San Francisco used a free online
diagram software, draw.io, to create a simple visual chart of acquisitions,
cataloging, and systems infrastructure. This chart was then used to
highlight budget needs, technical challenges, and work dependencies in
communication with staff in and outside of technical services.


*The (workflow) map is not the territory*
*By Liz Woolcott & Robert Heaton, Utah State University Libraries*Utah
State University’s Technical Services Division engaged in workflow mapping
with a set of clear purposes in mind: justify upcoming changes to the
division’s structure, make improvements to processes, and open up
communication across departments. We successfully engaged staff across the
division in creating flowcharts of 44 major processes but were less
successful in commuting those collaborations into an infrastructure for
ongoing process improvements. The technical work of standardizing symbols,
using mapping software, and forming cross-department groups was an
important aspect of the initiative but not the most difficult one. In this
process, we had to get vulnerable, looking critically at our own
communication styles, organizational culture, and unit structures,
including opening these up to others’ critiques. We share some of the
lessons we learned in relation to bringing the map back to reality, putting
the resulting documents to work in trainings, refining existing processes,
making organizational changes, communicating with stakeholders, and
evaluating current and potential services.

*Automation of creating Korean records for orders*

*By Hyoungbae Lee, Princeton University*Using AutoIt Macro, which is
available for free, and Microsoft Excel plugin, which is also available for
most office environment, I developed a streamlined workflow to make the
acquisition process of Korean materials easy and time-saving. It is
important to enter correct bibliographic information for each title, even
though minimal, at the time of ordering and also helpful for user searches
while the orders stay pending for 2-3 months. From the perspective of
technical services, on the other hand, it takes much time and effort 1) to
collect appropriate bibliographic information, 2) to perform romanization
according to ALA-LC rules, and 3) to generate MARC records out of the
gathered information. It is often difficult to obtain both quality and
efficiency at the same time, but developing an automation tool will be a
good solution for that goal. The automation tool will include three modules
that can be done just with a several mouse clicks:  1) a module to collect
bibliographic information from the web browser into Excel spreadsheet, 2) a
module to romanize the Korean text in Excel, and 3) a module to convert the
Excel document into mrc file. Once one decided which book to order, it
takes less than 10 seconds to have mrc file ready to be imported to
cataloging software.

We look forward to seeing you at the meeting!

Lucas and TJ

Co-chairs:

Lucas Mak
Metadata and Catalog Librarian
Michigan State University Libraries
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TJ Kao
Continuing Resources Metadata Professional
George Washington University
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