Library staff activity and recent developments

Over the past few months, staff in the Library have been compiling requirements for the new library management platform, to replace our current Voyager system.  This system is the backbone to the services provided to Library staff and all library users (around 30,000 of them!), in managing the purchase, cataloguing, access of resources, and managing library user records, including fines.

In describing the functionality we require from a new system, we have been focussed on the need for a new system to deliver our collections and services appropriately for our current and future users – in particular, concentrating on improvements in the management of electronic resources, and deriving information from the system to guide our decision making.

This exercise in describing our requirements is now complete and has been given approval from our project board. On 20th June, we were therefore able to issue the Invitation To Tender (ITT) on the University’s procurement system: https://in-tendhost.co.uk/edinburghuni/.

Library systems suppliers now have until 31st July to respond with their proposals, following which there will be another period of intense activity as the project team evaluates the systems during late summer and early autumn. Planning is currently underway for this evaluation phase, including on-site demonstrations from each supplier based on real-life scenarios.

As well as the success of issuing the ITT, the project board also undertook a formal review of the project using the University’s Major Project Governance Assessment Toolkit. The results from the assessment were positive, highlighting the strengths of the project, and areas which need more refinement as the project progresses and a supplier is chosen, such as implementation and communication plans.

To celebrate these achievements, an event was held in the Playfair Library, to thank everyone involved with the project – shown in the image below.

Laura Macpherson
Head of Collections Development and Access