It’s so cool

WorldCat Selection connects publishers, librarians and selectors for seamless e-ordering of new library materials

By Tom Storey

Friday the 13th in February 2004 turned out to be a lucky day for Scott Wicks, Director of Library Technical Services at Cornell University. The rollout of
a new library system he spearheaded went off without a hitch after a year of intense development and testing. It was called the Integrated Tool for Selection and Ordering at Cornell University Library, or ITSO CUL for short.

Today, after successful implementation on campus, the Cornell software is the concept behind a new OCLC service that promises to save libraries time and money in selecting and ordering new materials.

Based on ITSO CUL, WorldCat Selection, which debuted in December 2006 with Cornell staff as the first user, allows selectors of library materials to view new title data from multiple vendors in one central, comprehensive system. Libraries are able to get WorldCat records for newly purchased materials into their integrated library systems (ILS) early in the technical services process, as well as share selection decisions with others in their institutions.

Holding symbols can be automatically set in WorldCat at the point of order or added later in the cataloging process. Libraries using the service also can opt to receive upgraded WorldCat records at no additional charge using the Bibliographic Record Notification service.

Wicks estimates that the ITSO CUL software accounts for 40 percent of Cornell’s firm orders and saves the library approximately $100,000 per year in staff costs. He hopes OCLC libraries experience similar productivity enhancements and reduced costs with WorldCat Selection.

“A thorough business case analysis indicated that while demand existed for the product, our library was not well-positioned to be a software developer for other institutions,” Wicks said. “Partnering with OCLC, we will grow this software to its full potential for the library community.”

Selection is part of OCLC’s effort to make WorldCat a leading tool for collection management and help member libraries work more efficiently and collaboratively in the selection process.

For many libraries, current selection and ordering workflows are cumbersome and labor-intensive. Libraries order from numerous companies and must use each vendor’s system independently, which requires rekeying and importing data from multiple sources. Some libraries still use vendor-provided printed forms and paper slips to select and order materials.

In OCLC market research, libraries identified the most inefficient parts of their selection and ordering processes: paper orders, standing orders, the selection process, cross-checking titles, manual transmission of orders to acquisitions, out-of-print searches, and communication between selectors and staff to get the orders into the ILS.

WorldCat Selection provides paperless selection of materials and recycles the bibliographic data used in the review process to support ordering and cataloging. It enables all selectors at an institution to see everyone’s selection decisions, which helps avoid unintentional duplication or material acquisitions. The data exported to the ILS includes data such as vendors, funds, prices and notes to help with the process of creating purchase orders.

Here’s how WorldCat Selection works:

• Material vendors notify OCLC of notification items for libraries that subscribe to the service.

• OCLC loads the items into WorldCat Selection.

• Selectors log into WorldCat Selection to view notification items for their collection area, viewing WorldCat records with additional institution-only data from multiple vendors in one system.

• Selectors take actions, such as select, reject, forward to another selector or defer.

• Acquisitions staff export WorldCat MARC records for all selected items from all selectors and all vendors, load them into the ILS and complete the order
  electronically from the ILS.

Selection offers three levels of user authorization: administrators set up institution-wide options including mapping data to tags in MARC records and defining call numbers and keywords used to distribute records to selectors; selectors view presorted items in their subject interest and take actions such as select, reject, forward, defer; acquisitions exports selected records into the local library system.

Existing partnerships between libraries and their materials vendors do not change. Libraries continue to partner with materials vendors to create profiles of new materials to be selected for library notification.

Three library materials vendors, Harrassowitz, Casalini Libri and Aux Amateurs de Livres International, began participating in the service in December. Additional vendors will be added in 2007. (Go to the Selection Partners Web page to view a listing of vendors.)

In the future, data from WorldCat Collection Analysis will be imported into the Selection service so items that represent collection gaps can be distributed automatically to selectors for consideration.

“We believe that this collaboration between Cornell, OCLC and materials vendors has the potential to help institutions further streamline their technical services processes as well as reduce costs,” said David Whitehair, OCLC WorldCat Selection Product Manager. “Ultimately, the WorldCat Selection service will benefit all library users who depend on new materials to advance their work and enhance their library experience.”

Visit the WorldCat Selection Web site to learn more.

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