GUIDELINES FOR TECHNICAL SERVICES IN PRIVATE LAW LIBRARIES

Joni L. Cassidy

President, Cassidy Cataloguing Services, Inc.

Carol J. Dawe

Technical Services Librarian, Katten Muchin & Zavis

GUIDELINES: CATALOGUING

1. The cataloguing function in small, medium and large libraries should be performed or managed by an on-staff degreed librarian or through a qualified cataloguing service.
2. The Library of Congress classification scheme and subject headings should be used with or without modification in small, medium and large libraries. In California, the LA County Law Library's Scheme is also acceptable for those libraries who are already using it as their classification system because it is viewed as an accepted alternative standard of classification.
3. Small, medium and large libraries should have access to a bibliographic utility.
4. The current national catalog code should be followed in the provision of descriptive cataloguing in small, medium and large libraries. At present, this is AACR2R, which may be supplemented by use of the Library of Congress Rule Interpretations. In an online environment, it is strongly suggested that software which is compatible with MARC bibliographic records and which follows the MARC standards that are detailed in the USMARC Format for Bibliographic Data should be chosen. Any MARC standards followed by the bibliographic utility in use such as OCLC, RLIN, WLN, etc. should also be followed.
5. Authority control should be provided within the local catalog of small, medium and large libraries. (This is implied by adherence to AACR2R. At minimum, this means that the form of each heading will be uniform so that all titles properly collocate. At most, it could mean that a structure of cross references and authority notes are provided in the catalog for the user. Authority work is essential to a catalog, especially as it grows. Split files work against the user's location of all pertinent titles).
6. All libraries should maintain some kind of procedures/decisions file to ensure continuity of choice in cataloguing. Use of national catalog documentation such as AACR2R, Library of Congress Rule Interpretations, USMARC Format, Library of Congress Subject Headings, LC Subject Cataloging Manual, Library of Congress Classification, and LA County Class K for California libraries may substitute for a local cataloguing manual, if national standards are followed. Any local variations on such national standards should be recorded in the local manual.

GUIDELINES: SERIALS CHECK-IN, ROUTING, FILING, BINDING & ACQUISITIONS

7. Serials check-in, in large libraries should be automated using a commercially available system and is also strongly recommended for small and medium libraries.
8. All libraries utilizing commercially available automated serials check-in should take advantage of them to produce holdings lists and management reports to better advertise and manage serial holdings.
9. The use of a commercially available software package to facilitate routing will be the standard for large libraries and is recommended for medium ones.
10. Changes to the routing list should be made in 1–3 days for large, medium and small libraries.
11. Depending on the volume of the mail, distribution by the library staff should be completed within 2 to 4 hours of its arrival in the library.
12. The use of a filing service is strongly recommended for large and medium firms.
13. It is recommended that large libraries perform the binding process on a monthly basis, that medium libraries do so on a quarterly basis and small libraries on a semi-annual basis.
14. The period from which a book is recommended for purchase, to the time that it is ordered, should be 2–4 weeks for large and medium libraries, and 1–2 weeks for small libraries. From the time the book arrives from the publisher to the time it is available for use, should be no longer than 1–2 weeks for smaller libraries and 2–3 weeks for larger libraries. In other words, the entire process should take no longer than 4–6 weeks, barring back-ordering or other complications involving the publisher.
15. A written collection development policy is standard for large and medium libraries and recommended for smaller ones.

GUIDELINES: DEPARTMENT MANAGEMENT

16. A technical services procedures manual should be created and utilized as a standard in medium and large libraries. As above, a cataloguing procedures manual, at the very least, should be in place in small libraries.
17. The recommended standard for conducting office searches in small, medium and large libraries is monthly.
18. Shelfreading should be conducted by large libraries at least once per year; medium libraries at least two times per year and by small libraries at least four times per year.
19. Statistics on technical services function and procedures should be compiled by the Supervising Librarian at regular or periodic intervals to show the amount of work done and the time required to perform tasks.

CHRONOLOGY OF GUIDELINES DEVELOPMENT

The Guidelines for Technical Services in Private Law Libraries are the product of three years' work by dedicated technical services law librarians across the country. Their evolution spanned three annual conventions of the American Association of Law Libraries.

The purpose of the survey that was the basis for their development was three-fold. First, to gather information about private law firms as regards technical services operations. Who has online catalogs? Who is using Library of Congress classification? Who has the authority to purchase library materials and to whom do they report?

Secondly, to learn about the technical services law firm librarian. Who is working in and running firm libraries? Do they have an M.L.S.? What are their special skills? What tasks do they perform and how?

Lastly, to improve law firm libraries by learning from others doing the same job. The survey, and its subsequent Guidelines, were meant to offer standards to help firm librarians improve their library operations and better serve the needs of their firm as a whole.

Winter 1991—New York Technical Services Roundtable compiled a survey regarding technical services practices and distributed it to Roundtable members, mostly New York City private firm librarians. The results were tallied and survey questions refined.

Summer 1991—The PLL/TS-SIS Roundtable on Technical Services in Law Firm Libraries met at the AALL annual meeting to finalize survey questions for a national survey and to discuss distribution and tallying procedures.

Winter 1992—The national survey regarding technical services practices in private law libraries was published in every AALL chapter newsletter, as well as in PLL Perspectives, the newsletter of the Private Law Libraries Special Interest Section of AALL. It asked 47 questions.

Winter/Spring 1993—National survey results were tallied and results published in PLL Perspectives. There were 255 respondents. 89.8% of those responding were from law firm libraries (including 9.8% from branch libraries), 8.2% were from corporate libraries and 2% other or no response.

Spring 1993—With these results in mind, an Advisory Board^* of academic, private, county and independent law librarians was created to develop a list of standards (guidelines) to propose to the PLL SIS at the AALL annual meeting. Each guideline reflects actual practice in a majority of the libraries surveyed.

Summer 1993—The Guidelines for Technical Services in Private Law Libraries were presented, discussed and amended at a Technical Services Town Meeting held as part of the AALL annual meeting.

Winter 1994—Finalized Guidelines were submitted to, and approved by the Private Law Libraries Special Interest Section Executive Board.

GUIDELINES, SURVEY RESULTS AND COMMENTARY

NOTE: There were “non-responses” to each question. They prevent the total percentage points from adding up to 100. Percentages have been rounded for simplicity.

FIRM SIZE	NUMBER OF ATTORNEYS
0–25	8.2%
26–50	27.1%
51–100	25.9%
101–200	23.5%
200–400	12.5%
400+	2.4%

FIRM SIZE	NUMBER OF VOLUMES
under 5,000	9.0%
5,000–10,000	23.9%
10,000–20,000	32.9%
20,000–50,000	26.7%
50,000+	5.5%

JOB TITLE OF SURVEY RESPONDENT
Librarian	51%
Library Director	29%
Assistant Library Director	6%
Technical Services Librarian or Cataloger	6%
Research, Reference, Corporate, or Tax Librarian	2%

SIZE OF PROFESSIONAL STAFF
1 professional librarian	54%
1–3 professionals	29%
4+ professionals	8%

PERCENTAGE OF COLLECTION CATALOGED
0–25% completed	17.3%
26–50% completed	7.5%
51–75% completed	16.5%
75–100% completed	56.1%

GUIDELINE NO. 1. The cataloguing function in small, medium and large libraries should be performed or managed by an on-staff degreed librarian or through a qualified cataloguing service.

SURVEY RESULTS: 75.3% of respondents have an M.L.S. and 14.9% are using a cataloguing service, so it appears that the majority of private law libraries are already implementing Guideline no. 1.

COMMENTARY: Quoting from the report of the American Library Association Cataloguing and Classification Section Task Force on Education and Recruitment for Cataloguing will further justify this recommendation: No part of librarianship is so thoroughly governed by rules as is cataloguing. […] The existence of so many codes can lead to the mistaken conclusion that the work is straightforward and could be performed by a properly programmed machine or an adequately trained gibbon. Cataloguing should instead be compared to another rule-bound profession—the law—a field few would call menial.

In her article The teaching of cataloguing in U.S. library schools, Roxanne Sellberg went one step further. She wrote: When the belief that any M.L.S. graduate can perform original cataloguing is abandoned, libraries too small to employ specialists must be offered an alternate source. Private or public cataloguing services should be established, so that small libraries can pay for […] original cataloguing by skilled specialists.¹ That sentiment is incorporated into the wording of Guideline no. 1.

GUIDELINE NO. 2. The Library of Congress classification scheme and subject headings should be used with or without modification in small, medium and large libraries. In California, the LA County Law Library's Scheme is also acceptable for those libraries who are already using it as their classification system because it is viewed as an accepted alternative standard of classification.

SURVEY RESULTS: 61% of survey respondents are using LC classification and 71% are using LC subject headings.

COMMENTARY: Familiarity is the best defense of this recommendation. Associates recognize LC from law school. Paralegals and other support staff recognize it from college. Librarians should know it from library school, and, if universally adopted, library support staff will be familiar with LC from previous positions. Imagine how much easier staff training would be if you could assume this body of knowledge the way that word processing supervisors can assume a typist's knowledge of the QWERTY keyboard.

The LA County Law Library's classification scheme was included as an alternate “standard” for California libraries because it is a widely used, fully documented, published source. It is constantly revised and updated, as is LC's scheme.

GUIDELINE NO. 3. Small, medium and large libraries should have access to a bibliographic utility.

SURVEY RESULTS: Guideline no. 3 was extrapolated from the fact that 50% of survey respondents have access to a bibliographic utility. Most access OCLC in one form or another. The next largest segment accesses RLIN (search only).

GUIDELINE NO. 4. The current national catalog code should be followed in the provision of descriptive cataloguing in small, medium and large libraries. At present, this is AACR2R, which may be supplemented by use of the Library of Congress Rule Interpretations. In an online environment, it is strongly suggested that software which is compatible with MARC bibliographic records and which follows the MARC standards that are detailed in the USMARC Format for Bibliographic Data should be chosen. Any MARC standards followed by the bibliographic utility in use such as OCLC, RLIN, WLN, etc. should also be followed.

GUIDELINE NO. 5. Authority control should be provided within the local catalog of small, medium and large libraries. (This is implied by adherence to AACR2R. At minimum, this means that the form of each heading will be uniform so that all titles properly collocate. At most, it could mean that a structure of cross references and authority notes are provided in the catalog for the user. Authority work is essential to a catalog, especially as it grows. Split files work against the user's location of all pertinent titles).

COMMENTARY: Guidelines 4 and 5 make up the meat of this document. Together, they represent the commitment to adhere to full national bibliographic standards: AACR2 Revised used in conjunction with LC Rule Interpretations, the authority control that comes with them, and the MARC formats.

Michael Gorman was one of the engineers who built the AACR2. So, I'll rely on his words to justify its use:

In the first of the Anglo-American cataloguing codes (1908), the rules for description occupied fewer than 14 pages (out of 75). […] The 1908 rules for description had the merit of brevity—a brevity that was possible when standardization between libraries was felt to be of little or no importance. […] The question of standardization is central to the understanding of cataloguing rules and the necessity for those rules. The time is long past when a library could busy itself about its own concerns without reference to any other library. Standardized cataloguing was born in the United States when the Library of Congress began to distribute its catalogue cards at the turn of the century. Libraries in droves wished to take advantage of the economies offered by purchasing cataloguing rather than creating cataloguing. The one drawback to this arrangement was that the Library of Congress did not, and could not, catalogue everything. If any coherence were to be possible in the local catalogue, items that were catalogued locally had to conform to the standards set by the Library of Congress. It was centrally provided cataloguing that gave the first impetus to cataloguing standardization.²

In the early days of online cataloguing, a lot of people bought into the idea that cataloguing was no longer going to be necessary in machine-readable environments. That has not turned out to be true. You need standard access points in order to manipulate the record.³

There is another reason, less obvious though no less compelling, for standardization. It lies in the use by individuals of more than one library. A catalogue entry is a complicated thing. It uses conventions (layout, punctuation, abbreviations, etc.) that are far from natural language. Though they are well known to those of us who work in libraries, those conventions are something that the average catalogue user has to learn. That learning task is rendered very difficult, if not impossible, if the conventions vary from library to library or even within one catalogue. Standardization in cataloguing, then, is demanded when libraries share cataloguing and to enable the library user to comprehend the catalogue entry.²

To evaluate the benefits of adhering to MARC formats, we should view MARC as the common language of the library automation community. Viewed in the context of one language spoken by all library professionals, it may be easier to see the advantage to community-wide adoption of this standard.

Writing about the National Library of Medicine's automated retrieval system for prints and photographs, NLM librarian Lucinda H. Keister says, The value of the standardized MARC visual materials format catalog record is that it is nonidiosyncratic and transportable to other systems, predictable in its display and values, both in tagged and catalog card display.⁴ This collection and its cataloguing demonstrates the value of using a standard format, MARC, for a non-traditional project.

Knowing full well that software improves at a rapid rate and you will want to upgrade someday, it would reflect sound professional judgment to load MARC records and maintain them in MARC so that future export would be a routine procedure. The American Library Association's Statement of Professional Ethics, 1981 includes the following: Librarians must provide the highest level of service through appropriate and usefully organized collections. The storage of bibliographic records in standard MARC formats constitutes “usefully organized” as it guarantees future access to the bibliographic data, regardless of hardware or software upgrades.

Automation consultant Richard Boss wrote, The database is the most important part of an automated library system. While hardware may be replaced from time to time (the norm is every 5 to 7 years) and while software is periodically rewritten to transfer it to other hardware, improve its performance, or enhance it functionally, the bibliographic files, if well designed, will outlast several generations of hardware and software. […] The bibliographic file represents a considerable investment and should be of high quality and transferable.⁵

GUIDELINE NO. 6. All libraries should maintain some kind of procedures/decisions file to ensure continuity of choice in cataloguing. Use of national catalog documentation such as AACR2R, Library of Congress Rule Interpretations, USMARC Format, Library of Congress Subject Headings, LC Subject Cataloging Manual, Library of Congress Classification, and LA County Class K for California libraries may substitute for a local cataloguing manual, if national standards are followed. Any local variations on such national standards should be recorded in the local manual.

SURVEY RESULTS: 29% of survey respondents have and maintain a technical services procedures manual.

GUIDELINE NO. 7. Serials check-in, in large libraries should be automated using a commercially available system and is also strongly recommended for small and medium libraries.

GUIDELINE NO. 8. All libraries utilizing commercially available automated serials check-in should take advantage of them to produce holdings lists and management reports to better advertise and manage serial holdings.

GUIDELINE NO. 9. The use of a commercially available software package to facilitate routing will be the standard for large libraries and is recommended for medium ones.

COMMENTARY: Guidelines 7, 8 and 9 are validated by law library consultants, Julius J. Marke and Richard Sloane in the revised edition of their much quoted text Legal research and law library management. They write, Possibly the worst mistake a law librarian (or any librarian) can make is to avoid automation. The second worst mistake is to fall for the line: ‘We can build you a system in-house.’ This is usually a recipe for disaster.⁶

SURVEY RESULTS: 49% of survey respondents have an online catalog, some in addition to card or book catalogs. 41% have automated serials check-in systems. 42.2% use a software package for routing and an additional 4.2% have their routing managed by the word processing department of the firm. 25% have automated their acquisitions tasks.

GUIDELINE NO. 10. Changes to the routing list should be made in 1–3 days for large, medium and small libraries.

SURVEY RESULTS: 77.9% of survey respondents make routing changes in 1–3 days.

GUIDELINE NO. 11. Depending on the volume of the mail, distribution by the library staff should be completed within 2 to 4 hours of its arrival in the library.

SURVEY RESULTS: 80.8% of survey respondents see to it that mail is distributed in under 4 hours from the start of the business day.

GUIDELINE NO. 12. The use of a filing service is strongly recommended for large and medium firms.

SURVEY RESULTS: 56.8% of survey respondents have services filed within one week of update arrival. An additional 26% has filing completed within two weeks.

GUIDELINE NO. 13. It is recommended that large libraries perform the binding process on a monthly basis, that medium libraries do so on a quarterly basis and small libraries on a semi-annual basis.

SURVEY RESULTS: 31.9% of survey respondents never bind. 7.1% do it monthly, 26% do it quarterly and 29.9% do it annually.

GUIDELINE NO. 14. The period from which a book is recommended for purchase, to the time that it is ordered, should be 2–4 weeks for large and medium libraries, and 1–2 weeks for small libraries. From the time the book arrives from the publisher to the time it is available for use, should be no longer than 1–2 weeks for smaller libraries and 2–3 weeks for larger libraries. In other words, the entire process should take no longer than 4–6 weeks, barring back-ordering or other complications involving the publisher.

SURVEY RESULTS: 29.8% of survey respondents manage to get through this process in 1–3 weeks. 54.9% reported it took 3–6 weeks in their libraries. 12.9% took over 6 weeks to complete this process.

GUIDELINE NO. 15. A written collection development policy is standard for large and medium libraries and recommended for smaller ones.

SURVEY RESULTS: 14% of survey respondents have a written collection development policy. 82.7% have a book budget. 31% work independently in terms of acquisition decisions and policy making. 29% work with a library partner, 21% work with a library committee and 13% work with a managing partner.

GUIDELINE NO. 16. A technical services procedures manual should be created and utilized as a standard in medium and large libraries. As above, a cataloguing procedures manual, at the very least, should be in place in small libraries.

SURVEY RESULTS: 29% of survey respondents have and maintain a technical services procedures manual.

GUIDELINE NO. 17. The recommended standard for conducting office searches in small, medium and large libraries is monthly.

SURVEY RESULTS: 29.5% of survey respondents perform office searches monthly. 30.3% get to it quarterly or semi-annually. 10.6% do it annually.

GUIDELINE NO. 18. Shelfreading should be conducted by large libraries at least once per year; medium libraries at least two times per year and by small libraries at least four times per year.

SURVEY RESULTS: 17.4% of survey respondents shelfread annually. 26.9% do it quarterly or semi-annually. 23.3% do it monthly or weekly.

GUIDELINE NO. 19. Statistics on technical services function and procedures should be compiled by the Supervising Librarian at regular or periodic intervals to show the amount of work done and the time required to perform tasks.

OTHER STATISTICS GATHERED BY THE NATIONAL SURVEY

OUTTASKING: 49.4% of survey respondents access a bibliographic utility. 14.9% use a contract cataloguing service. 21.2% use a subscription service. 4.2% have their routing function managed by the word processing department and .8% use an outside vendor. 79% of those surveyed send their support staff to library association seminars to augment in-house training.

When asked what they would do differently if they could “start anew” on a retrospective conversion or cataloguing project, 12% answered they would have used an outside contractor and 16% would have used a bibliographic utility.

EDUCATION AND PROFESSIONAL PREPARATION: 75.3% of survey respondents have an M.L.S. (Master's of library science) degree or equivalent. Only 63% answered “yes” to the question of whether or not the M.L.S. prepared you for your job. The highest percentage of respondents would have liked more academic coverage in the areas of automation and staff supervision.

TRAINING: 76% of survey respondents conduct group meetings to discuss policies and procedures. Only 35% provide a period of training for new employees and just 38% offer one-on-one training in new or difficult areas.

ACCOUNTABILITY: 22% of survey respondents can order unsupervised within the confines of a pre-approved budget. 41% can act alone within a certain dollar limit. 22% always have to check with someone else before purchasing an item.

MIS DEPARTMENTS: The functions performed by MIS departments include maintenance of firm hardware, troubleshooting computer problems, development of programs for firm projects, evaluation of software and database training. 18.4% of survey respondents have an MIS specialist on their library staff.

SUBJECT OR VERTICAL FILE COLLECTIONS: 59.2% of survey respondents maintain subject, or vertical file collections which include clippings.

IN-HOUSE REPAIRS: 71.4% of survey respondents do some in-house repairs of damaged library materials. But, only 2% keep records of any financial savings from those repairs.

CLAIMS: 85.8% of survey respondents claim missing issues by telephone or in writing, or both. 37.3% have created forms to facilitate communication with publishers.

SAVING THE ENVIRONMENT: 84% of surveyed libraries recycle and 64% donate unwanted books.

FOOTNOTES

^* The members of the Advisory Board were: Suki Scott, Rogers & Wells (NY), PLL Technical Services Standards Committee Chair; Joni L. Cassidy, Cassidy Cataloguing Services (NJ); Carol J. Dawe, Katten Muchin & Zavis (IL); Michele Finerty, Orange County Law Library (CA); Ellen McGrath, SUNY at Buffalo Charles B. Sears Law Library (NY); Jean Pajerek, Cornell Law Library (NY); Jeanne Reynolds, Kemp, Smith Duncan & Hammond (TX); Gary Vander Meer, Northern Illinois University School of Law (IL); Marie Whited, Library of Congress Law Library (DC).

1. Sellberg, The teaching of cataloguing in U.S. library schools, LIBRARY RESOURCES & TECHNICAL SERVICES (Jan. 1988).
2. Michael Gorman, TECHNICAL SERVICES TODAY AND TOMORROW, at 65 (1990).
3. Gorman, Michael Gorman: the first editor of AACR2 looks at the future of cataloguing, 1991 OCLC NEWSLETTER 25–30 (July/Aug. 1991).
4. Raya Fidel, CHALLENGES IN INDEXING ELECTRONIC TEXT AND IMAGES, at 15 (1994).
5. Richard W. Boss, THE LIBRARY MANAGER'S GUIDE TO AUTOMATION, at 77 (3^rd ed. 1990).
6. Julius J. Marke & Richard Sloane, LEGAL RESEARCH AND LAW LIBRARY MANAGEMENT, at Sect. 44.03 (Rev. ed. 1990).