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By Mark Boarman, Research and Reference Librarian, The Ohio State University Science and Engineering Library Communication within a large, dispersed organization presents challenges, and by any rights and measures, The Ohio State University Libraries (OSUL) is just such an organization. Our Science and Engineering Library (SEL) covers five floors; the newly renovated Thompson Library (THO) covers eleven publicly accessible floors, not counting mezzanine levels in our stacks tower. Department library locations are scattered across a campus the size of a small city, and branch campus and affiliated libraries are located in six sites throughout the state.*
Vocera is a voice over IP (VoIP) system that incorporates small, light, largely hands-free communication badges and a computer system that has voice recognition capabilities and a user database. Badge users can contact other Vocera users, groups of Vocera users, or telephone lines from their Vocera badges. Badge users can be contacted even if they are away from their desks but are within SEL or THO. They can call OSUL staff members outside the badge user group by pressing the call button on the badge and saying the name of the person they wish to call. The system identifies the person from its database and calls his or her desk telephone. In addition, those outside the group of Vocera badge users can contact users simply by calling the Vocera telephone number and saying the name of the person they wish to contact. (Picture: Tristan Suefert, student reference assistant, with his Vocera badge at the information desk at Thompson Library.) The Vocera system has been used in hospital settings and in public libraries, but OSUL is the first rollout of Vocera in an academic research library. In hospital settings, Vocera has demonstrated an ability to reduce staff travel and communications times. In SEL and THO, we are using 50 Vocera badges. The current distribution of badges covers faculty, staff, and student employees. The majority of badges are assigned to circulation and reference departments, but security, building services, collections, stacks maintenance, and interlibrary services are included, too. We continue to experiment with Vocera and to expand training to OSUL staff, including increasing the recognition that those outside the group of Vocera badge users can contact members of the Vocera group via telephone connections to Vocera. For example, staff at our technical services center, located about two miles from the central campus, can call Vocera badge users in SEL and THO even if the badge users are out of their office and away from their desk telephones. Vocera is a disruptive technology and established habits are often difficult to break, but we expect the continued training and reminders of Vocera’s novel capabilities will further reduce contact time and increase Vocera use even beyond what we have seen to date. As a result of the Vocera implementation and armed with extensive data recorded for reference transactions, we have been able to close two information desk service points, one at SEL and one at THO. These closures have reduced the number of hours we have had to assign faculty to desk staffing. As Vocera call traffic increases through awareness training, we fully expect the system to deliver us further increases in efficiencies and decreases in times to locate and contact staff. It is our expectation that Vocera will improve patron to staff contact times, allowing us to follow Ranganathan’s admonition to save the time of the library user. *Lima, Mansfield, Newark, and Marion branch campus; OARDC and ATI in Wooster; and Stone Lab Library on Lake Erie. _____________ Questions can be directed to Mark Boarman, Research and Reference, The Ohio State University; 221 Thompson Library, Columbus, OH 43210. Email address: boarman.1@osu.edu |
In 2009, OSUL initiated a test program with Vocera in its Science and Engineering Library and later in the Thompson Library. This project was funded in part through an Institute of Museum and Library Services LSTA grant awarded by the State Library of Ohio. The implementation in THO coincided with the creation of a new telephone call center.