Re: [CODE4LIB] Academic libraries - Will dev for pay models?
Just personally speaking I think the idea of University Libraries charging for services to other units can be a good thing. We have a very good relationship with out IT department but they are now reaching a point where storage costs are such that they are having to charge departments that use more than a certain amount on network shares. About those archival TIFFs... Similarly libraries have an economic responsibility to try to be entrepreneurial centers of profit instead of loss. It may not be tasty but it is a pill we have to swallow. I think there are good opportunities for libraries to realize substantial revenue by charging for things like data storage and organization. That said, I do think that this will differ widely by University. When I was at Loyola New Orleans our library advertising campaign was taken on as a project by marketing students. No money changed hands. If we had asked the marketing department to put together a team to develop a campaign I imagine it would have been different. Edward Iglesias On Wed, Jun 6, 2012 at 7:23 PM, Simon Spero sesunc...@gmail.com wrote: Having done my time working for in both the research and administrative side university computing, I would also have to ask if the development is within the library's competence, or if it is something that would normally be handled by one of the other groups. If it's administrative computing, charging for special projects seems to be quite common. It often ends up with departments going it alone, or contracting with commercial firms to do the work. If it's something like developing web applications, and the library IT group is staffed up to handle the extra work well without impacting core library activities, then it is worth making a bid for the work; I would advise using a cost-plus model, and using a very agile process, with very short POD-cycles (short PODs make cost-plus an easier sell). Watch out for central IT to make counter moves; for example, they may start a whisper campaign that the library IT groups must be overstaffed if they can have all these spare bodies lying around. Preemptive top-cover at the level where the whispering would be targeted would be wise. This is easier if central IT has a poor reputation, and if it is the would-be customer who seeks leave to approach library IT. If using the library IT dept appears clearly cheaper than the outside consultants would otherwise be, then the top-cover should be easy. The university librarian should confirm the top-cover, and should keep them informed to avoid surprises. Always leave the top-cover with a covered line of retreat, but make sure that they have a sufficient stake in the upside to keep them from pulling out early. Also, as Jonathan says, make sure that support arrangements are baked in to the initial agreement. If you're set up for long term preservation services, adding long term support for keeping a slice of server running should be something you're set up for anyway. If any of this involves implementing a Data Management Plan, get involved during the grant development, as funding for implementing the DMP can be requested. If there are a number of people who at one point worked for central IT but now work for library IT, ensure that they are present or geared up in ready reserve for any meetings where ambush is a real possibility. Also ensure that they use sources for proper IPB. // Reboot, Hell - we just got here. On Wed, Jun 6, 2012 at 5:14 PM, Jonathan Rochkind rochk...@jhu.edu wrote: It seems odd to me for the library to charge individual departments for special projects. Although I realize it can make sense and be reasonable in some cases, I think there are some dangers.
Re: [CODE4LIB] Academic libraries - Will dev for pay models?
On Wed, Jun 6, 2012 at 3:24 PM, Eric Larson elar...@library.wisc.edu wrote: We do an honorable amount of project estimation and time-tracking here, too. s/honorable/horrible/ ;-) -n
Re: [CODE4LIB] Academic libraries - Will dev for pay models?
I understand that people have issues with charge back models, but at some institutions that's just the way it works whether you like it or not (I can name a few universities like this off the top of my head). And my guess is that the more heat colleges and universities take for their tuition prices, the more this will become the norm (just my two cents). That being said charging back to other departments isn't the only reason you might be interested in creating cost calculations. - *Open Positions*. We had an empty position here in the library. After doing cost and timeline calculations for a couple of projects we realized how much more productive we could be once we hired that position. We were also able to figure out how much it was costing us by having that position's manager fulfill the role. - *Working for Other Libraries*. There are other libraries in the area that are looking to do things that we are already staffed to do. - *Grants*. One project we're in the process of estimating right now is applying for a grant. Doing organized, well thought out cost and timeline calculations can help strengthen a grant proposal. - *Showing Off Your Work*. Quite often libraries look around, realize they have done work, but find it hard to articulate what that work is, what it cost them, and what benefits they received from that work. At one institution I worked for they chose to ditch BlackBoard for Moodle. Technically they paid me more than their subscription for BlackBoard, but the added features they received were worth it. Cost estimates, project charters, and requirement documents would have helped prove that. Personally I think libraries should be doing these types of calculations for every project (yes I recognize that's probably not possible). The more we are required to prove that what we're doing is beneficial to the communities we are part of, the more we will need this type of information. Rosy On Thu, Jun 7, 2012 at 9:51 AM, Nate Vack njv...@wisc.edu wrote: On Wed, Jun 6, 2012 at 3:24 PM, Eric Larson elar...@library.wisc.edu wrote: We do an honorable amount of project estimation and time-tracking here, too. s/honorable/horrible/ ;-) -n
Re: [CODE4LIB] Academic libraries - Will dev for pay models?
I think that a kind of inverted freemium model would most closely align with the librarian ethos. Instead of having a small number of services available for free and a larger number once a customer pays, libraries would offer the majority of services for free (as we are already funded for this by the University), but special services and customization would be done for a fee. Using the example of Omeka; With a general installation it's fairly self-service and low maintenance for the library, so it is easy to offer. But if a department wanted a some serious customization to it, which would require development time, maintenance, etc, then you have to consider what the cost of that customization is going to be. That is time where library staff is not supporting the core services you provide to the majority of users. Really, it's just a way or prioritizing. We'd like to do everything for everyone, but we can't so, we need to draw a line somewhere. I'd rather have a way for those things beyond the line to get done instead of just saying Sorry, we don't have the resources. Charging a fee, at that point, seems reasonable. And since the model already exists, and people understand it and use it (how many academics already pay for extra Dropbox space out of their own pocket?), I think it could easily integrate into library operations without much resistance. Chad Chad Nelson Web Services Programmer University Library Georgia State University e: cnelso...@gsu.edu t: 404 413 2771 My Calendar From: Code for Libraries [CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] on behalf of Edward Iglesias [edwardigles...@gmail.com] Sent: Thursday, June 07, 2012 8:32 AM To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Academic libraries - Will dev for pay models? Just personally speaking I think the idea of University Libraries charging for services to other units can be a good thing. We have a very good relationship with out IT department but they are now reaching a point where storage costs are such that they are having to charge departments that use more than a certain amount on network shares. About those archival TIFFs... Similarly libraries have an economic responsibility to try to be entrepreneurial centers of profit instead of loss. It may not be tasty but it is a pill we have to swallow. I think there are good opportunities for libraries to realize substantial revenue by charging for things like data storage and organization. That said, I do think that this will differ widely by University. When I was at Loyola New Orleans our library advertising campaign was taken on as a project by marketing students. No money changed hands. If we had asked the marketing department to put together a team to develop a campaign I imagine it would have been different. Edward Iglesias On Wed, Jun 6, 2012 at 7:23 PM, Simon Spero sesunc...@gmail.com wrote: Having done my time working for in both the research and administrative side university computing, I would also have to ask if the development is within the library's competence, or if it is something that would normally be handled by one of the other groups. If it's administrative computing, charging for special projects seems to be quite common. It often ends up with departments going it alone, or contracting with commercial firms to do the work. If it's something like developing web applications, and the library IT group is staffed up to handle the extra work well without impacting core library activities, then it is worth making a bid for the work; I would advise using a cost-plus model, and using a very agile process, with very short POD-cycles (short PODs make cost-plus an easier sell). Watch out for central IT to make counter moves; for example, they may start a whisper campaign that the library IT groups must be overstaffed if they can have all these spare bodies lying around. Preemptive top-cover at the level where the whispering would be targeted would be wise. This is easier if central IT has a poor reputation, and if it is the would-be customer who seeks leave to approach library IT. If using the library IT dept appears clearly cheaper than the outside consultants would otherwise be, then the top-cover should be easy. The university librarian should confirm the top-cover, and should keep them informed to avoid surprises. Always leave the top-cover with a covered line of retreat, but make sure that they have a sufficient stake in the upside to keep them from pulling out early. Also, as Jonathan says, make sure that support arrangements are baked in to the initial agreement. If you're set up for long term preservation services, adding long term support for keeping a slice of server running should be something you're set up for anyway. If any of this involves implementing a Data Management Plan, get involved during the grant development, as funding for implementing the DMP can
Re: [CODE4LIB] Academic libraries - Will dev for pay models?
Hey Eric, At GW we've been doing some cost estimates for projects. Essentially we pull together the team, figure out the different tasks that need to be accomplished, determine who will be working on those tasks, estimate hours necessary to do the work, and then use salaries to calculate the cost. Right now we're primarily doing this for digitization projects, but I've had experience doing this at other jobs (not in libraries) with dev projects. There are a couple of caveats to this though: - *estimating time takes practice to perfect*. a lot of the time people aren't really sure how long something is going to take until they've started thinking about how long things actually take. and really, you'll only know how long things take if you keep track of your time. that can open up a can of worms, but in this case i like to frame it as you're just doing it to ensure that a project isn't more work than you expected. - *ensure that you're organized up front*. as anyone can tell you, scope creep kills a project. before you begin estimates you'll want to make sure that you know what the scope of the project is. its important to sit down with the group you're charging and really discuss the project. we use tito's project one pagers to outline what it is that we're doing and what it is that we're not doing. sitting down and talking to the stakeholders helps us really understand what they want, and provides us with the opportunity to say no if something is impossible, takes too long given the deadline, or whatever. If you want, I have some spreadsheets that I use to create estimates. I'm happy to send them your way. And if you want I can skype with you or something and talk you through what they each do (because I don't think its readily apparent). Let me know, Rosy --- Digital Project Manager Gelman Library The George Washington University f: 202.994.7439 On Tue, Jun 5, 2012 at 4:17 PM, Eric Larson elar...@library.wisc.eduwrote: Any academic libraries out there doing consulting or application development work for hire on their campuses? -- not freebie work, but where actual money exchanges across campus accounting lines. I would be curious to hear how you go about pricing out your services, or if you have a selection process for the work you choose to perform. Cheers, - Eric -- Eric Larson Web Application Developer Shared Development Group University of Wisconsin-Madison Libraries elar...@library.wisc.edu
Re: [CODE4LIB] Academic libraries - Will dev for pay models?
Hi Rosy, Thanks for your reply. I would greatly appreciate seeing your spreadsheets. We do an honorable amount of project estimation and time-tracking here, too. We always draft a Memorandum of Understanding -- an agreement for what work the library will provide on the project and a timetable for completing said work -- with our digital collection project clients. We try hard to stay focused on the deliverables in that document, but there's always some feature creep in development work. We do not have plans to charge back for development services, but wondered if other schools worked in such a way. The recent success of our new library catalog launch and future digital collection platform (Hi Blacklight folk) has momentarily increased interest in our born- digital digital collection efforts. There's also a campus-wide effort here at UW-Madison to raise awareness for Educational Innovation opportunities that might generate new revenue streams for the university. We're not used to charging for our services in the library, but some hypothetical partnerships could present the opportunity. I'm sure other public institutions are doing similar what-if revenue exercises: http://edinnovation.wisc.edu/ Thanks again and I'll ping you off list to chat more. Cheers, - Eric On Jun 6, 2012, at 11:28 AM, Rosalyn Metz wrote: Hey Eric, At GW we've been doing some cost estimates for projects. Essentially we pull together the team, figure out the different tasks that need to be accomplished, determine who will be working on those tasks, estimate hours necessary to do the work, and then use salaries to calculate the cost. Right now we're primarily doing this for digitization projects, but I've had experience doing this at other jobs (not in libraries) with dev projects. There are a couple of caveats to this though: - *estimating time takes practice to perfect*. a lot of the time people aren't really sure how long something is going to take until they've started thinking about how long things actually take. and really, you'll only know how long things take if you keep track of your time. that can open up a can of worms, but in this case i like to frame it as you're just doing it to ensure that a project isn't more work than you expected. - *ensure that you're organized up front*. as anyone can tell you, scope creep kills a project. before you begin estimates you'll want to make sure that you know what the scope of the project is. its important to sit down with the group you're charging and really discuss the project. we use tito's project one pagers to outline what it is that we're doing and what it is that we're not doing. sitting down and talking to the stakeholders helps us really understand what they want, and provides us with the opportunity to say no if something is impossible, takes too long given the deadline, or whatever. If you want, I have some spreadsheets that I use to create estimates. I'm happy to send them your way. And if you want I can skype with you or something and talk you through what they each do (because I don't think its readily apparent). Let me know, Rosy --- Digital Project Manager Gelman Library The George Washington University f: 202.994.7439 On Tue, Jun 5, 2012 at 4:17 PM, Eric Larson elar...@library.wisc.eduwrote: Any academic libraries out there doing consulting or application development work for hire on their campuses? -- not freebie work, but where actual money exchanges across campus accounting lines. I would be curious to hear how you go about pricing out your services, or if you have a selection process for the work you choose to perform. Cheers, - Eric -- Eric Larson Web Application Developer Shared Development Group University of Wisconsin-Madison Libraries elar...@library.wisc.edu -- Eric Larson Digital Library Consultant UW Digital Collections Center elar...@library.wisc.edu Connect with us on… •The Web: http://uwdc.library.wisc.edu •Facebook: http://digital.library.wisc.edu/1711.dl/uwdc-fb •Twitter: http://twitter.com/UWdigiCollec •RSS: http://uwdc.library.wisc.edu/News/NewsFeed/UWDCNews.xml
Re: [CODE4LIB] Academic libraries - Will dev for pay models?
It seems odd to me for the library to charge individual departments for special projects. Although I realize it can make sense and be reasonable in some cases, I think there are some dangers. I mean, the library is already funded to provide services to the rest of the university, right? EVERYTHING we do serves other schools and departments, that's what we do, almost all our customers are internal. Different universities have different ways of accounting for this -- the individual schools or departments may already have budget line items moving cash from their budget to the libraries, or the university may just take care of it. But either way, it's usually flat rate, pay for the libraries budget. The Business School doesn't get better service than the Philosophy Dept because they've got a bigger budget; nor are schools/departments usually 'charged back' because their undergrads use the reference librarians more than other depts/schools. Likewise, some features we develop serve some department/schools more than others. If we realized there was a need to search/facet by MeSH (NLM Medical Subject) headings, and we weren't doing that yet, but we had the capability to do it -- would we only add that feature if the Medical School paid us? I realize that all of our universities are increasingly trying to subject their components to market discipline, making everything be a fee-based transaction. I think our professional ethics should be to resist this -- it's true we can't do everything we might want and need to prioritize -- but I think our professional ethics in a university library should be against giving better service to those parts of the university which can pay more. But, really, I just put this out as something to think about. I realize that in some cases it can make sense, and be reasonable and ethical. But I think care is warranted. Another thing to beware of with software development in particular -- is that software going to be running on your servers, are you expected to maintain it as well? We who develop software realize that software is hardly ever one and done, software (like libraries, Ranganthan's last law) is a growing organism, it takes constant care and feeding. Even if no features are ever added (and certainly people WILL ask for changes), it takes constant operational care just to keep the thing running, including patching dependencies for security vulnerabilities, as well as simple operational/hardware expenses, etc. If you charge per project the end, but are responsible for maintaining the software indefinitely, that doesn't work even from a strictly budgetary perspective. With digital collections, for instance, if possible I think it'd make a lot more sense to support as part of the libraries mission and general budget, say, an general Omeka installation that anyone can use to create their own 'exhibition', and/or a general Repository that anyone can use to store their digital artifacts, rather than charge individual projects per-project to develop (and then charge more per-year to maintain/support?). Even just on basic financial sustainability grounds. On 6/6/2012 4:24 PM, Eric Larson wrote: Hi Rosy, Thanks for your reply. I would greatly appreciate seeing your spreadsheets. We do an honorable amount of project estimation and time-tracking here, too. We always draft a Memorandum of Understanding -- an agreement for what work the library will provide on the project and a timetable for completing said work -- with our digital collection project clients. We try hard to stay focused on the deliverables in that document, but there's always some feature creep in development work. We do not have plans to charge back for development services, but wondered if other schools worked in such a way. The recent success of our new library catalog launch and future digital collection platform (Hi Blacklight folk) has momentarily increased interest in our born-digital digital collection efforts. There's also a campus-wide effort here at UW-Madison to raise awareness for Educational Innovation opportunities that might generate new revenue streams for the university. We're not used to charging for our services in the library, but some hypothetical partnerships could present the opportunity. I'm sure other public institutions are doing similar what-if revenue exercises: http://edinnovation.wisc.edu/ Thanks again and I'll ping you off list to chat more. Cheers, - Eric On Jun 6, 2012, at 11:28 AM, Rosalyn Metz wrote: Hey Eric, At GW we've been doing some cost estimates for projects. Essentially we pull together the team, figure out the different tasks that need to be accomplished, determine who will be working on those tasks, estimate hours necessary to do the work, and then use salaries to calculate the cost. Right now we're primarily doing this for digitization projects, but I've had experience doing this at other jobs (not in
Re: [CODE4LIB] Academic libraries - Will dev for pay models?
Having done my time working for in both the research and administrative side university computing, I would also have to ask if the development is within the library's competence, or if it is something that would normally be handled by one of the other groups. If it's administrative computing, charging for special projects seems to be quite common. It often ends up with departments going it alone, or contracting with commercial firms to do the work. If it's something like developing web applications, and the library IT group is staffed up to handle the extra work well without impacting core library activities, then it is worth making a bid for the work; I would advise using a cost-plus model, and using a very agile process, with very short POD-cycles (short PODs make cost-plus an easier sell). Watch out for central IT to make counter moves; for example, they may start a whisper campaign that the library IT groups must be overstaffed if they can have all these spare bodies lying around. Preemptive top-cover at the level where the whispering would be targeted would be wise. This is easier if central IT has a poor reputation, and if it is the would-be customer who seeks leave to approach library IT. If using the library IT dept appears clearly cheaper than the outside consultants would otherwise be, then the top-cover should be easy. The university librarian should confirm the top-cover, and should keep them informed to avoid surprises. Always leave the top-cover with a covered line of retreat, but make sure that they have a sufficient stake in the upside to keep them from pulling out early. Also, as Jonathan says, make sure that support arrangements are baked in to the initial agreement. If you're set up for long term preservation services, adding long term support for keeping a slice of server running should be something you're set up for anyway. If any of this involves implementing a Data Management Plan, get involved during the grant development, as funding for implementing the DMP can be requested. If there are a number of people who at one point worked for central IT but now work for library IT, ensure that they are present or geared up in ready reserve for any meetings where ambush is a real possibility. Also ensure that they use sources for proper IPB. // Reboot, Hell - we just got here. On Wed, Jun 6, 2012 at 5:14 PM, Jonathan Rochkind rochk...@jhu.edu wrote: It seems odd to me for the library to charge individual departments for special projects. Although I realize it can make sense and be reasonable in some cases, I think there are some dangers.
