June 14, 2021
Matrix Management and Combined Workflows
As remote working becomes part of normal practices as the UK comes out of lockdown, HE institutions are examining ways to reorganise their teams and processes to reflect these changes. Tasks and services shift to accommodate capacity and new priorities. Efficiencies need to be made in workflows, to ensure that the benefits of both time-limited onsite or offsite work are maximised. This often includes repurposing roles, merging responsibilities, and removing long-established historical barriers between different teams; both at the people and system level.
In this webinar on 10th June 2021, Alex Hall (Library Resourcing Co-ordinator) and Sue Abbott (Digital Library Manager) from the University of Exeter discussed how they have used matrix management to organise their Information Assistants and their workloads in the library; and how this has functioned over the past year while staff were working from home.
Elle Lund (Library Content Assistant) also presented on how Lancaster University Library have merged their interlending and purchase request workflows, with the behind the scenes decision tree that informs where a request goes; and how their recent implementation of RapidILL now fits into their joined-up processes.