September 2006/LibPAS Set to Start Beta Testing

LibSatLibrary Customer Satisfaction Management Service continuously gathers customer satisfaction data enabling public libraries to benchmark their quality of service on a day-to-day, weekly, monthly, quarterly, or yearly basis and conduct comparisons between any two periods of time.

Right now, LibSatLibrary Customer Satisfaction Management Service Subscribers can internally benchmark their locations against each branch in their system or externally against the aggregate customer satisfaction data from all LibSatLibrary Customer Satisfaction Management Service Subscribers. Counting Opinions is working to extend this feature to enable benchmarking of the services provided by one library against those provided by another with a view to sharing "best practices".

The challenge, however, has been to determine a basis for comparison when benchmarking one Library against another. This is where Performance Indicator (PIPerformance Indicator(s), also Data Element(s)) data can help. By combining quantitative PIsPerformance Indicator(s), also Data Element(s) with qualitative LibSatLibrary Customer Satisfaction Management Service Survey questions, you create the basis for meaningful comparison.

Examples of PIPerformance Indicator(s), also Data Element(s) data includes situational and operational components such as population served, active card holders, library square footage, collection size, staff head count, hours of operation, etc. While this comparative data is available from various sources, it is not currently accessible and available to be combined online with existing LibSatLibrary Customer Satisfaction Management Service Data. As a result it has been Counting Opinions' worry that there would be an amount of extra effort required by LibSatLibrary Customer Satisfaction Management Service Subscribers to input and maintain the additional information.

So how do you bridge the gap and create the means to conduct comparative analysis and benchmarking without imposing an added work requirement on each Library system?

The answer is LibPASLibrary Performance Assessment Service™.

LibPASLibrary Performance Assessment Service is a Library Performance Assessment System designed to enable Public Libraries to achieve greater efficiency in collecting, rolling-up and reporting data to stakeholders such as the Provincial and Territorial Governments and other organizations who gather this type of information.

Some of the data that you collect and submit to each organization is similar, but you are still required to separately collect, tabulate and submit this data. Additionally, accessing the final results for the collected PIPerformance Indicator(s), also Data Element(s) data requires a waiting period from several months to several years, thus significantly lowering the value to the Library. And finally, combining the results from these separate collections, or performing benchmark analysis, is essentially impractical for any one library to consider.

LibPASLibrary Performance Assessment Service provides a secure interface enabling Library Systems to enter each PIPerformance Indicator(s), also Data Element(s) data element only once for each reporting period. LibPASLibrary Performance Assessment Service automatically tabulates (rolls-up) branch level results and calculates key ratios based on the data entered. The result is a significant savings in time and effort typically required to prepare and submit this type of data to several independent stakeholders. But the real value of LibPASLibrary Performance Assessment Service is the ability to access the results immediately, online and in real-time. This enables Libraries to conduct benchmarking as and when the information is posted by each Library.

If your Library is interested in participating as a LibPASLibrary Performance Assessment Service beta test site, please do not hesitate to contact Ian Reid.