Eahil Dublin 2009 Workshop

Collaborative Work Parallel Paper Session (Thursday 4 June 2009 11.00-12.30)

Strategic Innovation Fund Graduate Information Research Skills

Presenters: I Harpur, R Kennedy (IE)

Author(s): Marie Redden, University College Galway; Niall McSweeney, University College Galway; Isolde Harpur Trinity, College Dublin; Margo Connick, University College Cork; David Macnaughton, Trinity College Dublin; Richard Bradfield, University College Cork; Ronan Kennedy, University College Galway

In April 2007, a Higher Education Authority (HEA) Ireland sponsored inter-institutional pilot project on developing generic skills for research students was launched in Ireland. The purpose of the project, which is endorsed by the Dean of Graduate Studies in each of the three universities (National University of Ireland Galway, Trinity College Dublin and University College Cork ), and which will be of three years duration, is to develop generic training modules for PhD. This paper looks at the collaboration between librarians in establishing a 7 unit Information Literacy module. This module is both online and face to face. The challenges, successes and failures of this unique project will be explored in this paper.

Cross Cultural Work nurturing the skills - thinking outside the borders

Author & presenter: Christine Goodair, International Centre Drug Policy, St George’s, University of London, United Kingdom

Technology and globalisation enables us to work with people from all over the world but what skills and understanding do you need to ensure your global team excels at cross-cultural working? This paper, drawing on the experience of working on two co-operative, cross border web, time limited, based European projects in the field of Addictions information will explore the lessons learnt from cross –cultural projects.

A brief description of the projects will be given which is the Evidence –based Electronic Library for Drugs and Addiction (EELDA) evidence based information driven website on drug addiction, and the European Association of Information Services on Alcohol and other Drugs (Elisad) Addictions Gateway of evaluated European website resources on addictions. Issues considered will include, the environment and drivers for the projects, funding, project management, working styles, managing different professional work teams, skills development, language and culture, professional matters such as developing a taxonomy in English for use in fourteen languages, benefits and barriers, cross cultural leadership, key observations regarding how to make partnerships work, and the sustainability of projects following their endings.

Critical success factors for such work will be discussed with an exploration of the professional and personal benefits to us all. The paper will conclude with relevant key learning for those planning cross cultural, international information projects and reflect on networking with other key information and research bodies such as SALIS (Substance Abuse Librarians and Information Specialists), our sister organisation in North America.

A National Document Supply Co-operative Among Healthcare Libraries in Ireland

Author & presenter: Muriel Haire, Irish Nurses Organisation, Dublin

Summary: Since 1991 the majority of Irish Healthcare Libraries have been involved in a successful Journal Co-operative Scheme. In 1982 the Health Sciences Libraries Section of the Library Association of Ireland was founded. This section provided a forum for healthcare librarians to discuss common issues and needs one of which was budgetary constraints and expenditure relating to interlibrary loans. Librarians were sending their inter-library loan requests mainly to document supply agencies outside the country at a financial cost per item supplied. A few librarians started to look towards the possibilities of co-operation between healthcare libraries knowing that a percentage of their requests could be supplied from other Irish libraries quicker and at less cost, but the necessary bibliographic tools, schemes and systems did not exist.

In 1991 the Irish Healthcare Libraries Inter-Lending Co-operative (IHLILC) was established as a non-profit making document supply service (primarily journal resources) between healthcare libraries located throughout the Republic of Ireland. There were 11 founding libraries, ranging from one-person operated small libraries to the larger university libraries. The scheme was successful from the start. The rationale behind the scheme proved valid. Many documents could be supplied within the country, at a faster response rate and at a lower cost, the real cost involved being to fulfil requests received from other libraries. The goodwill of library personnel and willingness to help each other were essential for the working and development of the scheme.

From 1991 to date the scheme has grown from 11 member libraries to 71 members. The number of journals in the scheme has increased from 1,009 to 8,169. Total number of article requests within the co-operative has risen to 25,226. Between 1991-2005 the Journal listing was paper-based and distributed to all members annually. In 2005 work commenced on developing an online system which went live in 2006 with all libraries switching over to only using the online system in 2007. This presentation will demonstrate how co-operatives such as this one can work very successfully especially in this time of financial constraints worldwide and how this scheme has assisted both the smaller and bigger libraries. Possibilities, challenges and obstacles of co-operatives such as this one will be discussed.

The essential elements for the continuity of the co-operative are everyone’s spirit of goodwill, their motivation to help each other, and to share the workload between everyone. As long as these elements are alive, the co-operative will continue to work.

The collaboration of the library in the pursuit of Eurosurveillance impact factor

Presenter: Ana-Belen Escriva

Authors: Ana-Belen Escriva, Medical Librarian , Ines Steffens, Managing Editor Eurosurveillance, European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) Stockholm, Sweden

The Eurosurveillance editorial team has been implementing changes to its journal to enhance its quality to become a leading publication in communicable diseases. The ECDC Library collaborated in this aim by finding the Eurosurveillance unique characteristics with the purpose to submit the journal for evaluation in September 2008 for having an impact factor. We analysed the website about the journal selection process by Thomson Scientific together with their literature published about the quality and selection process of the journals. We obtained information to design a set of quality and quantity indicators to apply to Eurosurveillance according to the Thomson Scientific requirements: basic journal standards, editorial content, international diversity and regional scholarship, and citation analysis.

The indicators pointed the Eurosurveillance accomplishment of those characteristics considered as core in the evaluation process such as timeliness and internationality. In addition, the indicators highlighted those unique features that make Eurosurveillance unique among other journals in the same subject field: the rapid peer reviewed communications; the Euroroundups; the innovative research in specific nfectious and emerging diseases; the articles concerning infectious diseases events and trends in Europe and worldwide; and the potential threats to health for the EU population.

The information obtained from the indicators allowed us to elaborate a comprehensive description of Eurosurveillance to submit in Thomson Scientific evaluation form, focussing on the journal unique features.