This Ain’t Your Papa’s Allocation Formula! Team-Based Approaches to Monograph Collections Budgets

Abstract

In 2009, the University of Guelph (UG) Library’s Organizational Renewal Initiative created new strategic teams to replace its existing liaison-based service model. The five new teams were charged with the delivery of service clusters (traditional and emerging) in alignment with the University’s academic mission. The new Information Resources (IR) team of specialist librarians and professional staff are charged with deepening their skills and engagement within specified team objectives/accountabilities, collection development, management, and assessment. The team-based ethos of the new IR Team has reshaped how the institution allocates, budgets, and orients its work for monographic collections. Factors which have shaped UG’s unique approach to this core team activity include increased consortial licensing, evolving publishing trends, the growth of multi-institutional research teams and discipline clusters within the University, evolving research and teaching modalities, an increased focus on accountability, and the demise of formal university governance bodies. Monograph budgeting has shifted from departmental budget allocations to broader, cross-institutional allocations in response to resource format changes and shifting strategic priorities. A paradigm shift from allocation metrics towards post hoc adjustments based on curricular need and efficiency is described. Time-series linked examples of current UG Monograph budget structures illustrate this budgetary evolution, and external systems and tools to actively manage monographs budgeting and expenditure processes will be discussed. Strategies from a Selector’s point of view and that of the Team Head to adapt, change, guide, and modify budgeting practices also are analyzed. Two significant challenges to the team-based process (monitoring expenditures and improving stakeholder communications) are identified. Introduction and Background The University of Guelph (UG) is a medium-sized comprehensive university located in Guelph, Ontario, Canada, with traditional strengths in agriculture, veterinary medicine, life sciences, and the applied social sciences. The University was founded in 1964 through the amalgamation of three existing colleges: the Ontario Agriculture College, the Ontario Veterinary College, and the Macdonald Institute (a women’s college specializing in home economics). Since 1965, the University has grown from an initial complement of 350 faculty, and 1,700 students to a current campus population of seven colleges, 780 faculty, and over 24,000 FTE students. As an organization, UG has identified the following strategic values: student focused, experiential learning; residentially intensive student life experiences; and a curriculum that offers a significant range of e-learning and distance learning course modalities. The University is strongly committed to the integration of learning and research within a highly collaborative and interdisciplinary (within and beyond the university) environment. Prior to 2009, the UG Library system maintained a traditional structure that had at its core an academic liaison librarian model. Most professional librarians were generalists with multiple departmental responsibilities and a wide range of job roles—these included information services accountabilities, such as reference and instruction, as well as collection development responsibilities and other projects as assigned.” “Matrix management” reporting lines meant that liaison librarians reported to the Head of Information Resources for that part of their collections duties (on average, 25% of assigned