Karen M. Drabenstott
Associate Professor
School of Information
University of Michigan
Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1092 USA
Voice: (734) 763-3581
Fax: (734) 764-2475
karen.drabenstott@umich.edu
New topic -- "Outsourcing is the Answer. Now, What Was the Question?"
Many thanks to the entire CRISTAL-ED membership for suggesting so many good topics and coming forward to volunteer for guest editor duties. We now have nine topics scheduled between today and mid-September. During the summer, please send me topic suggestions that come to mind. As you know, I am always looking for guest editors. My E-mail address is karen.drabenstott@umich.edu.
We now turn to the topic "Outsourcing is the Answer. Now, What Was the Question?" Outsourcing is a topic that has been suggested time and time again during our Open Topics discussions. We are fortunate to have Barbara Winters serving as our guest editor for this topic. She has co-authored (with Arnold Hirshon) the monograph entitled, Outsourcing Library Technical Services: A How-To-Do-It Manual for Librarians, and has made numerous presentations about outsourcing of library services at library meetings across the United States. Barbara is the director for central services at Wright State University Libraries in Dayton, Ohio. She has worked in libraries for 22 years and has 17 years of experience in technical and automated services operations.
Please welcome Barbara Winters as our guest editor for our discussion on "Outsourcing is the Answer. Now, What Was the Question?"
Barbara Winters
Director, Central Services
Wright State University Libraries
Dayton, Ohio 45435
Voice: (937) 873-2380
Fax: (937) 873-4109
BWINTERS@LIBRARY.WRIGHT.EDU
It took me awhile to select the title for this topic because I wanted to pick one that summarized my goals for the discussion. And, I do think I hit upon just the right title for that purpose. Many people are assuming that outsourcing is a panacea or the answer to all our staffing problems in libraries. But they are forgetting what the original questions are.
I have participated in many discussions related to outsourcing of library operations in professional meetings over the past four years, and I must say that my concerns related to outsourcing are not the ones that I hear librarians talking about.
I think we as a profession must be more worried about how to improve library services, whether outsourcing is a logical solution to accomplish this goal, and what the longterm impact on society at large of massive outsourcing efforts than we are about saving our own jobs in the immediate future. ALA and SLA meetings, at least, tend to focus on How and Why to outsource rather than to present a forum for debate on the underlying but unspoken assumption that outsourcing is inherently good or bad -- the Whether of outsourcing. Fortunately, my monitoring of Volume 55 of CRISTAL-ED leads me to think that others do, in fact, share my concern.
For this discussion, then, I would like for us to undertake an online debate about the Whether questions.
The time is ripe for an open debate on this topic. I look forward to hearing your considered opinions. Please join me in the fray. Feel free to base your remarks either on experience or on a more philosophical approach to the topic.
Diane M. Lewis
Serial Records Librarian (also Exchange & Gift Librarian)
U.S. Geological Survey Library
National Center - MS 950
Reston, Virginia 20192
(703) 648-4399
dilewis@igsrglib01.usgs.gov
In my experience with outsourced government libraries, I can say that one of the things that typically goes out the window is service to the public. Contractors must make money, so they cut wherever they can. And that usually means public services. Researchers within the particular agency become the focus, to the exclusion of the citizen user.
Just try calling up a contractor-run Federal government library and asking a reference question, you'll see what I mean. In contrast, a library such as the one I currently work in, counts 50% of its service as provided to the public. As I write, there are rumbles within this agency about whether they want to fund this level of "unreimbursed" service.
My slant on this dilemma is that, as taxpayers, we fund these mammoth government library collections. Restricting access to them by providing inferior service to citizens should be illegal.
Barbara Winters
Director, Central Services
Wright State University Libraries
Dayton, Ohio 45435
Voice: (937) 873-2380
Fax: (937) 873-4109
BWINTERS@LIBRARY.WRIGHT.EDU
It sounds like Diane's saying that outsourcing automatically results in reduced service. (Diane, please let me know if I'm reading something into your post that is not really there.) I know that some librarians agree with this theory. Others, however, have stated that outsourcing should only be done when improved library services are the result, thus making the opposite assumption.
What about this? Do others think that diminished services are a "given" with outsourcing? Or are diminished services only the outcome of IMPROPERLY outsourced library operations?
Terry Calhoun
splendid@umich.edu
"My slant on this dilemma is that, as taxpayers, we fund these mammoth government library collections. Restricting access to them by providing inferior service to citizens should be illegal."
Many accolades are due the progenitor of the above statement!
Ronald Naylor
University of Miami Libraries
rnaylor@umiami.ir.miami.edu
I wish we could find a word other than outsourcing. In the first place, it's jargon. In the second, it carries too many negative connotations. For years, most libraries have sent their journals for binding to a commercial bindery. But they never said they were outsourcing their binding.
When any organization -- library, airline, auto manufacturer -- contracts with another organization to provide the first with a service or product, the first organization understands that the only reason the second organization is undertaking to supply the product/service is that the second organization considers that it can turn a profit. Thus the contract between the two must allow for that profit but must provide safeguards against diminishing the product/service to maintain the profit. The most effective safeguard is a close oversight by the first organization of the product/service that is delivered by organization number two.
I am sure that there are many examples of successful contracts between organizations that lead to good service and reasonable profits. I'm equally sure that there are many examples of bad results. Good results reflect significant management investment in the oversight process by the first organization. Poor results reflect the converse.
And what I have not been convinced of is that when the necessary management oversight is provided, organization number 1 actually saves money by not continuing to produce the product/service itself.
More on this tomorrow.
Robert Slaney
Librarian
College of the Mainland
1200 Amburn Road
Voice: (409) 938-1211
Texas City, TX 77591
slaney@tenet.edu
Outsourcing > downsizing > negative staff morale > poor service. Lets keep the jobs at home!
Shirley Richardson
Catalog Librarian
Angelo State University
San Angelo, Texas 76909
Voice: (915) 942-2221
Fax: (915) 942-2198
Shirley.Richardson@mailserv.angelo.edu
It depends upon what is outsourced and to what degree. It is true, however, that businesses exist for the sole purpose of making profits. Whatever does not contribute to the "bottom line" is likely to be given short shrift. Also, they will often hire people without the qualifications really needed to perform the job as it should be performed.
This illustrates the fallacy involved in outsourcing cataloging, for example, without leaving enough qualified professional staff in place to oversee the operation, check the quality of the work performed, and coordinate authority control. Cataloging is not an obsolete skill, or such a "no-brainer" that people can just walk in off the streets and be told in 25 words or less how to do it. Teaching people how to input a subject heading is fairly simple; teaching them when to input a subject heading and how to choose the right one(s) takes a very long time.
There are more important issues involved in outsourcing than saving a few dollars. Quality is at least equally important.
Tahirih Mitchell, MLS
U.S. Geological Survey Library
Reston, VA
tmitchell@isdmnl.wr.usgs.gov
I work with Diane Lewis and I feel her points are valid. There are a large number of federal libraries in this area and we constantly hear about poor service coming out of them. I can give you several examples but without elaborating, I (and my colleagues have talked to librarians working for contractors) have heard about reduced hours; limited services; strict inflexible policies and the like. I will give you one example: a librarian I talked to at the NOAA Library works for a contractor who has told the reference staff they are NEVER to say "I don't know" to a patron (even if it's the truth). That seems incomprehensible to me. Obviously, some reference questions cannot be answered or maybe only partially and sometimes "I don't know" is the right thing to say.
David Drummond
Director
Safety Department
University of Wisconsin-Madison
30 N. Murray St.
Madison WI 53715-2609
Voice: (608) 262-9707
Fax: (608) 262-6767
David.Drummond@mail.admin.wisc.edu
Ronald Naylor began to explore the positives in outsourcing and used bookbinding as an example of outsourced activities. Although many activities are outsourced "to cut costs," there is no essential relationship between cost and outsourcing. Household analogies:
So why outsource? There are three common reasons, all largely positive:
Regrettably, some managers outsource entire functions because they lack the backbone or know-how to lead change. Weak managers also don't act until a fiscal crisis requires budget and staffing cuts. Outsourcing has become confused with cost-cutting as a result.
Furthermore, poor managers of people are often weak managers of contracts. As Naylor nicely pointed out, both contractors and individuals benefit from positive, attentive management.
This subject does make the juices flow!
James H. Sweetland
School of Library & Information Science
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
Box 413
Milwaukee, WI 53201
Voice: (414) 229-6840
Fax: (414) 229-4848
sweetlnd@csd.uwm.edu
My turn --
Obviously, libraries have outsourced a lot of things; for example:
So, why the recent concern? I suggest the following:
First, it appears modern outsourcing is actually completely eliminating the function. For example, few of the libraries who "outsourced" their cataloging had *no* catalogers at all on the staff; modern versions of outsourcing seem to eliminate the function entirely from the agency.
Second, especially in the case of Hawaii, we are now apparently giving up control of some of our basic functions.
And, third, which may be the real kicker -- past versions of outsourcing were often ways of dealing with increased demand without hiring more staff and modern outsourcing is a way of dealing with decreased staff with the same or increasing demand.
And, lastly, the even bigger kicker -- how much is modern outsourcing a way of cutting costs, as opposed to improving service/increasing quality, etc. Or, getting LC catalog cards assumes that a very good cataloger with access to the largest and best collection of bibliographic tools possible must be able to do better than our part-time small town public library's cataloger. But, there is less concern about such issues in at least some of the current discussion about outsourcing, rather the line seems to be "save money and it won't be much worse than now."
Or, consider this -- If a public agency, with no taxes or stockholders to pay, and with overhead partly covered by local government (or the university), has trouble hiring good people at, say $25,000, how can it expect that a for-profit agency will be able to hire good people at the same rate, and not charge even more, while still making a profit? Economies of scale do not necessarily explain everything.
Or, perhaps the present concern among librarians with outsourcing is the realization that they may lose their jobs, and then have to do the same job for lower pay (or, in many cases, the same pay but much lower fringe benefits). Enlightened self-interest is merely a survival skill in the current economic climate.
(A good discussion topic, and some good ones coming, too, IMHO)
Shirley Richardson
Catalog Librarian
Angelo State University
San Angelo, Texas 76909
Voice: (915) 942-2221
Fax: (915) 942-2198
Shirley.Richardson@mailserv.angelo.edu
Another area of concern is that, when managers decide to outsource their cataloging entirely and eliminate the department, there is no one left to check the quality of the work done by the underpaid, often underqualified outsourcing staff. Considering that so many library education programs no longer even require a basic course in cataloging, who will be left among the staff to know what is wrong and why it is wrong? Most of my public service colleagues have no idea of current cataloging rules, standards, and practices. So without us poor drudges slaving away in the back room, how will the catalog be maintained in any semblance of order? Of course, there are concerns about job loss, or being "recycled" into public services, but there are also the issue of quality and continuity to be considered.
Tahirih Mitchell, MLS
U.S. Geological Survey Library
Reston, VA
tmitchell@isdmnl.wr.usgs.gov
Since I have been job hunting of late, I can attest to the problem, i.e., being offered professional jobs at lower rates of pay and with less benefits than in the federal sector. Also, lack of job security is another issue -- what do you do when the two-year contract is over -- find another two-, three- or five-year one?
There are exceptions -- a friend recently got a job with a salary two grades higher than that of an entry-level federal librarian job (which is a GS-9).
Ben Speller
North Carolina Central University
School of Library and Information Sciences
Durham, NC USA
speller@nccu.edu
I assume the issue is, "When is it operationally effective and cost-efficient to seek a contractor to provide mission related services?" Regardless of whether it is in-house staff or contractors, quality advocates can not assume that cost will not eventually have to be an issue. There is always going to be the issue of when a service's or operation's cost to the organization has exceeded a realistic expectation. Managers and workers have to deal with this in for-profit organizations. Not-for-profit service related government supported organizations are now having a reality check on this matter.
Some organizations are facing this situation because managers have not established and monitored productivity standards.
Trisha L. Davis
Head, Continuation Acquisition Division
The Ohio State University Libraries
1858 Neil Avenue Mall, 040N
Columbus OH 43210-1286
(614) 292-6314
davis.115@osu.edu
I wholeheartedly agree with Shirley Richardson's concerns. Even the best managed outsourcing program may fail if the library has no one qualified to monitor and maintain it. Such a responsibility requires not only a solid understanding of cataloging rules, but familiarity with the library's goals for the catalog, training in cost analysis and budget management, and the ability to negotiate problems and contracts. What are LIS programs doing to prepare students for this type of management challenge?
Barbara Winters
Director, Central Services
Wright State University Libraries
Dayton, Ohio 45435
Voice: (937) 873-2380
Fax: (937) 873-4109
BWINTERS@LIBRARY.WRIGHT.EDU
Can James Sweetland elaborate on "the real kicker" where "past version of outsourcing were often ways of dealing with increased demand without hiring more staff"? I think the experience of many technical services librarians, at least, would be rather that there's been no adjustment downward with staffing when there's DECREASING demand. For example, my observation is that -- as materials budgets are cut, and serials budgets are "eating up" monograph budgets -- few technical services managers are reducing staff but are instead reducing expectations of existing staff.
I need for Ronald Naylor to explain more what he means by his final paragraph:
And what I have not been convinced of is that when the necessary management oversight is provided, organization number 1 actually saves money by not continuing to produce the product/service itself.
James Sweetland seems to question whether a for-profit agency can really achieve economies of scale. Arnold Hirshon asserts,
Despite the assertions of some authors, vendors *do* have a greater economy of scale than most internal library operations. In most library technical services departments, the library hires fulltime permanent staff to work throughout the year. However, technical services work tends to be cyclical....As a result, there are times when backlogs build up (whether in acquisitions or in cataloging) and other times when the library scrambles to find projects in which to engage the staff....By contrast, vendors are geared up for constant levels of production because the vendor can predict and balance its workload. The vendor can fill in highs and lows of production with work from different customers (_Outsourcing Library Technical Services: A How-To-Do-It Manual for Librarians_. New York: Neal-Schuman, 1996, p. 19).
Management.
David Drummond and Ronald Naylor make good points about strong and good cf weak and bad managers, and the place they play in outsourcing decisions. Hirshon points out that a well-run in-house operation is better for a library than a badly managed outsourced one, but a well-managed outsourced operation can be much better than a badly or even adequately managed in-house operation. "Outsourcing should be used strategically and tactically, not universally" (p. 23).
The specific examples we are using still tend to focus on outsourcing of cataloging operations. Let's move away from that a bit. What about whole libraries being outsourced (as Diane Lewis describes)? Is there a chance that, instead of REFLECTING societal changes libraries will be CREATING societal changes? Think, for example, of whether libraries will be offering alternative press materials when vendors are doing selection (given that vendors are known for providing materials from the "plain vanilla," high discount publishers) and the impact that would have on society.
I agree wholeheartedly with Ronald Naylor. Let's find a word other than "outsourcing." That word does, indeed, have negative connotations for a management technique that librarians have been using for decades.
James H. Sweetland
School of Library & Information Science
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
Box 413
Milwaukee, WI 53201
Voice: (414) 229-6840
Fax: (414) 229-4848
sweetlnd@csd.uwm.edu
Since Barbara Winters asked: "Can James Sweetland elaborate on 'the real kicker' where 'past version of outsourcing were often ways of dealing with increased demand without hiring more staff?'"
My own experience:
In one library where I was an administrator, a 1958 study, followed by a 1970's study predicted that the acquisitions rate would roughly triple by 1980. It did. The studies also projected a need for about double the cataloging staff. The staff actually was the same size in 1980 as in 1960. But, in the meantime, OCLC was used for cataloging, and, notably, to replace the catalog card typists. We never got the 8 typist positions projected, but then we didn't need them. And, nobody was laid off due to OCLC, instead the projected backlog didn't happen.
How many libraries found that using online database services like DIALOG. ORBIT, BRS, etc. allowed them to actually increase the services provided in reference? I'm thinking about providing custom-made bibliographies, something only the larger special libraries did in the '50s and '60s, but which became common later on.
Now, about the other point you raise: are staffs being cut with declining need? (e.g. fewer acquisitions, but staff stays same size). Possibly. But, look at a reasonable time series: how many staffs didn't get bigger as the demand got bigger? Libraries seem to have a habit of accepting more work without complaint and then when the degree of overwork slacks off, feel they are better off.
Consider the "good old days" -- approval plans allowed increased acquisitions without the need for increased numbers of selectors. So, now that the acquisitions rate is dropping, should we lay off all the selectors? (Consider the Hawaii public library system for a moment.)
James Sweetland seems to question whether a for-profit agency can really achieve economies of scale.
Not true. I of course agree that there are such things as economies of scale, and that they don't relate to the profit status of the organization. My point was, rather, that outsourcing contractors don't *necessarily* rely on these. Cases in point, again from my experience:
Library decided to outsource photocopy machines. It contracts with the lowest bidder, naturally. The service declines, because:
Library's parent organization decides to contract out security. The building still needs at least one live human being all the time. The former system involved a state, union employee; the contractor uses a minimum wage worker. Of course it costs less. But, there is very high turnover, "extra" jobs (like calling the elevator repair person) aren't done, etc.
My point here was that you cannot assume that the contractor is using better management, economies of scale and the like to do it cheaper than you do. It may be that the contractor is just, in fact, cutting corners.
Or, in theory outsourcing is not necessarily bad. But, similarly, it is not necessarily good. When someone tells me he can do a good as job as I can for less money, I'm going to ask myself are both parts of this claim true (as good as, and cheaper) before hiring him/her. Looking a gift horse in the mouth does not mean I won't accept a gift, but I still will look in the mouth first.
Shirley Richardson
Catalog Librarian
Angelo State University
San Angelo, Texas 76909
Voice: (915) 942-2221
Fax: (915) 942-2198
Shirley.Richardson@mailserv.angelo.edu
It is true that technical services work *can* be cyclical; however, with tasks such as cleaning up our online catalog, authority work, etc., we don't have to "scramble" to keep busy. There are also in-house training sessions to prepare staff to deal with more extensive problems. Backlogs can occur temporarily when materials pour in faster than we can process them, but are usually cleared out quickly.
Certain types of outsourcing can be useful, for example: having a vendor catalog areas in which the library staff has no expertise, such as music or foreign languages, and certainly such vendors as OCLC provide "outsourced" cataloging for the other materials. Even so, without some people on the staff who understand the rules, standards, and practices of cataloging, as well as the library's local practices and preferences, no vendor is likely to provide a workable database for long. There are just too many factors involved in keeping up an online catalog for a long-distance vendor to coordinate. If outsourcing is used, it seems to me that instead of trying to eliminate staff, it should be used to supplement and augment the work of the in-house staff. Otherwise, the "economies" will be hollow ones which may well come back to haunt the library like the Ghost of Christmas Past.
IMHO, outsourcing should be used to compensate for any weaknesses in the cataloging staff, in order to allow them to concentrate on the areas where their strengths lie.
Barbara Winters
Director, Central Services
Wright State University Libraries
Dayton, Ohio 45435
Voice: (937) 873-2380
Fax: (937) 873-4109
BWINTERS@LIBRARY.WRIGHT.EDU
I need to draw our discussion of outsourcing to a close -- at least for now. Karen Drabenstott has said that we can do a follow-up later; please let her know if you are interested in doing this.
My thanks to all of you for your good and thoughtful comments. I especially want to thank James Sweetland for his posting, because it basically summarized our whole discussion. There seems to be agreement that outsourcing is AN alternative, but only one alternative among many. It is a local decision and not the solution to all problems in all types of libraries. The Hirshon/Winters monograph discusses the need to reengineer before outsourcing. But, enough about that monograph!
I will interject my own bias at this point: I believe that library managers should be constantly analyzing their own operations, improving their own processes, and exploring the desired outcomes of their services through whatever method works for them; otherwise, I believe they can expect that outsourcing may be imposed from outside the library because it CAN look like a panacea to administrators, Boards of Trustees, et al.
Again, my thanks to you for your thought-provoking comments.
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