Happy Anniversary!

Today marks the one year anniversary of the Darling Library's switch to WorldShare Management Services (WMS) for our Integrated Library System (ILS).

If you have been a regular reader of this blog, then you know that WMS is not just new to us, but a new kind of library system. As early adopters of this next gen library service we have been called upon to give our opinions about it. Besides email and phone calls, our library staff has had librarians from five libraries come to visit. We have been invited to give three presentations, two webinars, a poster session, and write a case study due to be published in the July issue of the Journal of Web Librarianship. So, we've had plenty of opportunities for reflection.

This Saturday at the ALA Annual Conference I am giving my perspective to librarians who are curious about WMS. They want to know whether it has paid off. What is the return on investment (ROI)? How can they justify taking a flying leap into the cloud?

Without going into the whole 15 minute presentation, I will just say that the ROI for us has been at least as much in terms of intangible payoffs as financial. It has allowed staff to spend our time and talents on more student focused services using Web 2.0 technologies to make library services more intuitive and convenient. We think that's worth it.

Previous posts about WMS:

• April 25, 2011 Taking a Flying Leap into the Cloud
• June 20, 2011 WMS is A-Live
• June 24, 2011 Search Hope International University and beyond
• July 1, 2011 Search Hope International University and beyond: Relevance
• August 1, 2011 The more things change, the more they stay the same
• August 30, 2011 How to Set Up Your Library Account (video tutorial)
• September 2, 2011 How to find books in the Darling Library: A brief introduction
• September 6, 2011 Basic Search of the Library Catalog (video tutorial)
• December 6, 2011 The Library Catalog is Mobile!
• February 3, 2012 Course Reserves
• February 24, 2012 Mobile Library
• April 30, 2012 Books in the library are confusing
• May 24, 2012 Mt. San Jacinto College Librarians Visit Hope