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Questions & Answers from the Redesign Team
October 7, 1994

The Redesign Team has been meeting for two months now. In a desire to keep SUL staff apprised of the Team's efforts, two brief progress reports have been issued by the group (see SUL News Notes for August 19, 1994 and September 16, 1994). Members of the Team will meet with different SUL constituencies in the coming weeks to hold more in-depth discussions about the topics the team has discussed thus far. In preparation for these sessions, the Team has compiled this report to elaborate on the myriad of issues under consideration now. This document reflects the general direction that the Team has been taking in redesigning the SUL acquisition-to-access process. However, no final decisions have been made at this point. The Team anticipates that it will be working until at least mid-November before issuing a final report on its findings and recommendations in December.

The Redesign Team:
Constance Brooks
Dianne Chilmonczyk
Willy Cromwell
Catherine Gardner
Steve Gass
Karen Kalinsky
Katharine Martinez
Bo Parker
Catherine Tierney
Karen Wilson
Patricia Burch, Stillwater
Consulting Group
Gerry Finch, Stillwater
Consulting Group

What is Redesign or Reengineering?

In Reengineering the Corporation, a book by Michael Hammer and James Champy, "reengineering" is defined as follows: "The fundamental rethinking and radical redesign of business processes to achieve dramatic improvements in critical contemporary measures of performance, such as cost, quality, service, and speed."

The Redesign Team is charge with applying these principles to the functions that must be supported in the acquisition-to-access process. In this process the Team is developing a new design that questions traditional thinking, examines fundamental approaches, creates dramatically different processes, and achieves improvements in the areas of cost, quality, service and speed. One of the emphases of Hammer and Champy is that information technology allows us to rethink assembly line processes and highly specialized tasks.

What has the Redesign Team accomplished thus far?

The team has made considerable progress in a number of areas:

A. One major achievement has been understanding the present technical services work flow. A one-page diagram has been created to describe the current acquisition to access process. It points out how many times an item is handled and/or searched in the present process. A copy of this "Acquisition-to-Access Process Map" (with an accompanying key for individual processes) is appended to this report.

B. A subcommittee of the team has been compiling statistical information and cost data about various categories of material processed by SUL. This cost information will provide a baseline in evaluating the options for redesigning the existing operation.

C. The committee has examined a number of options for implementing processing changes for more efficiency, greater productivity, and overall fiscal savings. While these measures are not a complete redesign, they can be viewed as steps in the right direction.

D. A subcommittee visited Blackwell North America (BNA) and OCLC to learn more about large-scale processing of material in other settings.

What are the team members' observations of SUL's current technical services operation?

The current process was designed an assembly-line process with a lot of attention to bibliographic detail and specialized tasks. The team recognizes that staff exhibit a high level of professionalism and take enormous pride in their work. The teamwork that occurs in various parts of the assembly line was also evident. As might be expected, the spatial fragmentation, due to current building locations and some processing sequences, often leaves something to be desired. Patron expectations, automated systems requirements/inflexibilities, and long-established staff practices were also viewed as responsible for dictating a number of existing policies and procedures that could be examined for improvement. The committee realizes that some kinds of material require more specialized treatment (e.g. small press items), while other categories of material (e.g. trade publications) can be moved along the assembly line quite rapidly. Two strong impressions of the entire group were the number of times single items were handled and the number of duplicate bibliographic searches that occur in the acquisition-to-access chain. The lack of automation in some areas, such as serials control, also stood out as a major cost issue.

What objectives have guided the thinking of the Redesign Team members?

In response to the charge from the director, Team members compiled a list of "principles" or "objectives" that underlie much of the redesign effort. Essentially, they can be grouped as follows:

Process Elements

Minimize physical "hand-offs" and item-by-item handling
Eliminate duplication and unnecessary steps
Automate manual tasks when possible
Perform tasks where it makes most sense
Create a state-of-the-art working environment

Management and Culture Elements

Promote mutual buy-in, support, shared objectives, and teamwork throughout the organization
Maintain/improve customer satisfaction
Encourage risk-taking and innovation

Performance Goals

Substantially reduce costs ($750k minimum)
Identify and meet defined quality and service standards
Produce essential management information
Maintain/improve national leadership presence/programmatic support

What information has the team gathered in terms of current costs?

The team has not examined all costs yet. However, one of the most striking cost comparisons brought to the team's attention is the different costs for acquiring firm order and approval plan books. The per item labor cost for acquisitions processing for firm order monographs ($30) is estimated to be approximately three times the per item cost for approval plan monographs ($10). It is important to note, too, that these technical services figures do not include costs incurred in the collection development areas. Given the fact that the Acquisitions Department's processing for firm order and approval plan monographs generated an estimated 126,000 transactions in FY94 alone, two-thirds of which were for firm orders, the cumulative effect of this cost differential is quite significant. This cost analysis has led the team to examine ways of increasing the number of orders directed to approval plan vendors.

What did the team learn from site visits to BNA and OCLC?

We went to these vendors to observe processes. We were impressed with each vendor's efficiencies and customer service focus. At BNA, for example, 8,000 to 12,000 books arrive each day and are shipped out the door to customers within a week. The manner in which this volume of material is ordered, received, paid for, inventoried, shelved, and retrieved by BNA staff provides a good idea of how another organization manages its work flow. The degree to which both BNA and OCLC are able to offer special, customized service to specific clients was also observed. The Redesign Team was looking for any areas of duplication that are performed by both the vendor and SUL staff. In addition, the team took considerable notice of the facilities, equipment, and staffing arrangements used by both vendors.

What would this "freeway" concept that the team is discussing achieve?

The team has invested a good amount of its time in trying to identify ways in which to move library material through the acquisition-to-access process in the least costly and fastest way possible, while still retaining accurate records. The "freeway" metaphor has been used to describe the route on which materials can travel inexpensively and expeditiously. SUL already has a number of activities occurring in the freeway mode: approval plans, push-button cataloging, PUB processing, Marcive cataloging for documents, etc. Ideally, material on the freeway's "fast lane" would be handled as little as possible. Conceivably, some monographs could arrive at SUL already cataloged and physically processed for shelving. Other items, such as gifts, might start out in the freeway's "slow lane," but move into the push-button cataloging fast lane. The team has been debating many issues associated with making the freeway concept work effectively. These issues include consolidation of orders with fewer vendors, using deposit accounts for payment of invoices, outsourcing some cataloging and end-processing, and decentralization of certain functions within SUL.

Starting at the beginning of the acquisition-to-access process, what kinds of changes does the Redesign Team envision for selectors?

The team is exploring a variety of options, including increased dependence on approval plans, decreased use of firm orders, and electronic selection and ordering. The group is also studying the feasibility of having selectors review approval books just before the books would be released from technical services for shelving. It may be economically advantageous to move the review process to the end of the processing cycle instead of at the beginning. One benefit to selectors that could be offered in a redesigned environment, that is not available now, is the opportunity to review all new firm order titles as well as approval books. Methods of streamlining fund assignment for selectors, and the related book plating process, are also being discussed.

Is it possible some technical services functions might be decentralized?

One of the values established by the team has been to have processes occur at the place where it makes most sense. At this time, most of those activities occur in the central technical services area. In the future, it might be better for some processes to be performed by a vendor, before an item arrives at Stanford, or by a branch or unit outside of central technical services. Individual branches or clusters of branches conceivably could be given the opportunity to handle receiving, physical processing, and catalog maintenance functions in a decentralized fashion.

Clearly,

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