New White Paper from OCLC on "Meeting the E-Resources Challenge"

As a library cooperative, OCLC works closely with member institutions to help inform our strategic direction and respond to community matters. OCLC's E-resource Advisory Council (EAC), is a group of library leaders who are helping to guide the cooperative in advancing its electronic resource management strategy. The group began its third term in August with an expanded membership base to continue work on strategy and related solutions. Over the last two years, the council has helped inform the development of OCLC solutions for the acquisition, exposure, management and access of libraries’ electronic collections.

This new report explores the challenges that managing e-resources represents and which further extends the conversations of the EAC across the community - helping libraries find new ways to address these issues. The report presents case studies of the experiences shared by the members of the EAC, structured around key tasks in the e-resource management workflow, including: selection, acquisition, describing, discovery, access and renewal of licensed content. The study also examines the core tasks that make up this workflow and gives examples of the typical challenges encountered. Each case study considers what an ideal future might look like, and reflects on some of the developments that might be required to bridge the gap. Download the full white paper here.