User Group Meeting - ALA Midwinter January 22, 2007

Location: Seattle PL, January 22, 2007

Time: 10:30 AM to noon
Attendees: 86

I Introductions and awards

Nancy Huling, co-chair of the QuestionPoint Users Council (formerly known as the Transition Task Force) called the meeting to order shortly after 10:30 AM. After introductions, George Needham (OCLC Vice President, Member Services) presented special awards to two QP members:Buff Hirko (formerly the Washington statewide coordinator) and Caleb Tucker-Raymond (coordinator of L-net, the Oregon statewide service). Both Buff and Caleb were recognized for their outstanding contributions to QuestionPoint and to the field of virtual reference.

II. Best Practices and 24/7 Reference Policies: Tips and discussion

The first item on the agenda was the 24/7 Reference Best Practices: http://www.questionpoint.org/policies/bestpractices.pdf

There was discussion of how these Best Practices relate to the 24/7 Reference Policies http://www.questionpoint.org/ordering/cooperative_guidelines_247rev3.htm

Susan McGlamery, the manager of the 24/7 Reference Cooperative, explained that since the Cooperative provides a shared reference service on behalf of its member libraries (currently comprised of over 1200 libraries), common best practices ensure a uniform level of service. Two documents govern the Cooperative: the 24/7 Reference Policies and the Best Practices. The Policies were first formulated when the Cooperative began, in 2000, and are periodically reviewed and revised by the 24/7 Reference Advisory Board. The policies contain a mission statement and information on governance, performance standards, quality, and responsibility of Cooperative members. The Best Practices document was adopted in June 2006 and provides a detailed set of recommendations for how to conduct a typical chat session in the Cooperative. Although the Best Practices were specifically designed for the use of the Cooperative, several non-Coop members praised the Best Practices document and said that it is very useful: that it is excellent as a training aid and reference.

Discussion of the Best Practices focused on the following topics:

1. Descriptive Codes vs. Resolution Codes

A list of descriptive codes is provided in the chat monitor (upon closing the session) and when viewing a completed session from the Question List. The descriptive codes are designed so that libraries can code questions from their users with tags that express characteristics of the session. Typical codes are: business, research, circulation, etc. Any library may use the codes to describe sessions with their own patrons – this is optional, not mandatory. However when Cooperative librarians are answering questions for other libraries’ patrons, then please do not use the codes. The codes may be used differently by different libraries, so only use them for sessions with your own patrons.

It is mandatory to use the Resolution Codes, which are found only in the chat monitor. The following Resolution Codes were discussed [item 6 in the Best Practices]:

• Lost Call: This code should only be used if patron is not responding during the session and no email address is provided. If an email address is provided and the librarian does not think the question has been answered during chat, then the code Follow Up by Patron Library should be used, even if patron was non-responsive during the session. There was a suggestion that “No Email” be added to Lost Call (ie Lost Call/No email)
• Practice: When the Practice code is used, sessions will still appear in the question list but will not be counted in the statistical reports. This code is missing from item 6 and will be added to the Best Practices.

It was suggested that more information regarding resolution codes be added to the Best Practices, for instance what happens if Lost Call is used (the session goes to the Closed list).

2. Greeting and Cooperative Statement

There was a comment that the suggested greetings in the Best Practices are too long and patrons will not read them [item 2 in the Best Practices]. The goal is to both (1) welcome the patron and (2) let him know you are not from his library. This sets expectations with the patrons. So, the exact wording of the suggested greeting does not need to be followed, so long as the necessary information is conveyed.

This led to a discussion of the importance of all libraries in the Cooperative communicating to potential users that in many cases questions will be answered by librarians from other libraries. Each library that participates in the Cooperative should have a statement on their website which explains the nationwide cooperative answering service, so patrons will not be surprised when they get a librarian from out of state.

3. Policy Page update and Librarian Notes

Cooperative librarians rely heavily on each member library’s policy page. It must be kept up to date so that Cooperative librarians can provide the best service to all users [see item 3 in the Best Practices].

If you are answering for another library and see a broken link or can’t find information in the library’s policy page, you can do any of the following:

• Refer it to Quality;
• Send a note directly to the library (see the reference email contact field), or
• Add a librarian note, directly in the transcript

The librarian note is seen only by other librarians and not by the patron. You can comment on anything in the note: that you were unable to locate a specific piece of information on the library’s website or policy page, or that a database was down, etc.

If your library has a name for your catalog, please add that to your policy page, ie Homer or Melvyl. Often patrons refer to “Homer”, and the chatting librarian may not know what that is.

4. Communications with patron

Item 5 in the Best Practices provides guidelines on interpersonal skills, and there were suggested revisions and additions to both items 5 and 6, as follows:

• Refrain from using jargon with the patron, i.e. “Boolean”
• Example in Item 4: Change “catalog” to “library catalog” not just “catalog”.
• Librarians should avoid imperative language (“why don’t we try”, not “you should search”).
• When suggesting search strategy, emphasize efficiencies of a particular approach: “You can save a lot of time…”
• Don’t hesitate to let the patron know if a search will take time to find an answer. Suggested message: “This is a very interesting a complex question that may take us a bit of time to work through, do you have time right now?”
• How to deal with chatty patrons: Thank them for their time and explain that if there is nothing further on their question, you have other calls you must attend to.
• Don’t ask patrons to email the library. The patron’s library will already see the session in their Question List, so if the patron then emails the question this means the library is getting the same question twice.

5. When to close if patron not responding

There were questions regarding best practices on when to close a session if the patron is not responding. The Flash Chat software now has indications of patron server activity (as of the early December install). Thus, when a green light appears next to the patron’s name, the patron’s computer is connected to the QP server and all is well. If the indicator is yellow, the QP server is getting no response from the patron server. If this lack of connection happens for 2 minutes, then the patron indicator will turn red. Once the librarian sees a red indicator, then the session can be closed.

There was a suggestion for a software enhancement: that the patron should receive an indication when the librarian has sent a chat message, for instance if the patron has minimized the chat, then it should flash in the tool bar. This is on the list of suggested enhancements for the Flash Chat.

6. Shift changes

It was suggested that the Best Practices should contain a recommendation on what to do if a librarian is in the midst of a session and there is a shift change. The 24/7 Reference Advisory Board will take this up.

7. Closing the session: closing message

When chatting with a patron outside your library, be sure and use the scripted closing message of the patron library, not your own closing greeting. So, when handling a patron from Massachusetts, for example, then use the closing greeting for Massachusetts. When handling a chat session for another library, the scripted messages for the patron library are available in the scripts area – they appear on the left hand side under the tab for Scripts. If you cannot readily find a closing script for the patron’s library, then use a generic closing statement, such as “Thank you for using our service!”

III. QuestionPoint update

Susan McGlamery and Jeff Penka gave a brief QuestionPoint update. Now that all QuestionPoint libraries are on the same platform, there will be a more deliberative schedule for software enhancements: twice a year. The next install is scheduled for June 2007. This will give the QP Team time to communicate and prepare documentation, and all users will have time to assimilate the changes.

The QP team is looking at opening up the Global Reference Network (GRN). Although designed as a librarian–to-librarian referral network, usage has been dropping over the past several years. Revisiting the GRN could enable the QP network to potentially field questions directly from patrons. Laura Gottesman of the Library of Congress answered specific questions about the GRN.

There was a request for follow up on the Instant Messaging research that the QP Team is undertaking.

The meeting was adjourned at 12:15 PM.

Comments

[Greg Hatch]

As a reminder, I'd like to suggest that a note be placed near the "Descriptive Codes" selector indicating that they should only be assigned by the patron's home library.

[Emily Papagni]

In section 3, on Policy Page update and Librarian Notes, you're suggesting adding a librarian note directly into the transcript. We normally caution librarians to not use this for problems that may require an administrator's attention, such as updating a policy page. We all do our best to monitor transcripts, but not every transcript is read, so there is a risk that a librarian note within a transcript will never be seen. To ensure that a problem is taken care of, it seems best to contact the reference email contact or policy page contact listed in the policy page, or refer to Quality.

[Susan McGlamery]

Emily has a great point - although it is important for libraries to review session transcripts, realistically it is difficult to review every session from a busy service. Using the reference email contact in the policy page template (or referring the issue to Quality) is probably the best way to alert a library of an issue with their policy page.

However, we do encourage libraries to review as many sessions as possible. This is our primary way of ensuring that the quality of the service continues to improve.

[Stephen Francoeur]

Thanks so much for posting these notes online! It would be great if a message went out on the QuestionPoint list telling folks not to add descriptive codes if the patron is from another library.

Regarding resolution codes, I've noticed that often there is no resolution code assigned by the librarian or the system failed to record it. I have a theory about why this may be happening. Once you have selected a resolution code and then click the "Add" button, if you don't wait for 5-6 seconds before closing the session, your resolution code won't register with the system. I would like to know if this theory makes sense.

Finally, to help my colleagues here at Baruch College, and at Brooklyn College, Hunter College, the CUNY Graduate Center (who are part of our subscription group), I've created a screencast with instructions about how to select a resolution code:

http://qpatcuny.pbwiki.com/f/QP--selecting%20resolution%20code.swf

[Wren Spangler]

Regarding this sentence from II. 2.: "There was a comment that the suggested greetings in the Best Practices are too long and patrons will not read them [item 2 in the Best Practices]."

The suggested greeting might be too long, but in my experience, patrons do read my script because they normally respond with "thanks" or "okay."

I start out by saying "Hi, " to welcome the patron. I've been customizing my script as a way to ensure that I check the Patron Information Screen at the beginning of each session. For example, here is the script I use to fulfill the guideline of letting the patron know I am not from his library:

My name is Wren, and I'm a reference librarian with the QuestionPoint chat service. Your King County librarians have asked us to staff this 24-hour service when they are unavailable. I'm reading your question right now to see how I can help you...

My script normally reads "Your librarians" and I simply take a look at the Patron Info Screen and insert the library's name to personalize my script. If I'm busy helping multiple people and don't have time to type in the library's name, I can send the script as it is written ("Your librarians have asked...").

It's been working well for me.
--Wren