Developing staff skills in e-resource troubleshooting: training, assessment, and continuous progress

Abstract

Electronic resource troubleshooting is complex, sophisticated work that often falls to a very small number library staff, even in large institutions. Seeing a need to expand the group of staff capable of diagnosing and resolving e-resource access issues, librarians at the University of Minnesota Libraries developed a training program for E-Resource Management staff. The training program comprised a ten-part workshop, a post-workshop troubleshooting project using real-world examples drawn from user activity logs, ongoing meetings for continuous skill development, and assessment of participant knowledge levels at various stages of the training program. As a result, staff participants demonstrated an increased familiarity in troubleshooting skills and knowledge. This chapter describes the planning, design, and implementation of the training program and offers suggestions for how others might create their own training programs.