Staffing Repositories
Staffing levels
Estimating the time required for administration is highly variable and dependent on your deposition rates and approach to content mediation. Regardless of the approach used it is likely that staff time will be required for fielding practical queries from authors/depositors, quality checking, adding metadata or even making deposits. Depending on mechanisms for developing learning and teaching content, and where responsibility sits within the institution, repository staff may or may not be involved in developing, reformatting or packaging content, and applying appropriate licences for use and re-use. Checking copyright ownership of materials which are made up of a range of items can be very time consuming and should be done before the deposit stage, however checks at the deposit stage may also be required.
Advocacy materials often state that it only takes 10 minutes to deposit one simple item such as a pdf document. Complicated items, however, can take much longer (for instance, if you need to merge separate files for figures in with the body of a paper). For a research repository with fully mediated deposition, 30 minutes per item would also make allowance for other administrative activities such as copyright checking. This estimate can perhaps only be halved for an author self-archiving system. Deposit in a learning and teaching repository can take longer if you include content packaging and copyright checking.
In addition to administering deposits, consideration should be given to promotional activities.
Repository Roles
Staff requirements for a repository vary greatly between institutions depending on the remit of the repository and on existing and available resources. In some repositories the skills, knowledge and abilities required may be expected of a single repository post with the assistance of general IT personnel. However, many institutions spread the work over two main posts:
- A Repository Manager - who manages the 'human' side of the repository including content policies, advocacy, user training and a liaison with a wide range of institutional departments and external contacts
- A Repository Administrator - who manages the technical implementation, customisation and management of repository software, manages metadata fields and quality, creates usage reports and tracks the preservation issues
- Other institutions spread the work over several posts or over several departments; typically including library cataloguers, subject librarians, other library, teaching and administrative staff, learning technologists and educational developers, copyright officers as well as IT services
Repository skills set
A study conducted by SHERPA identified the skills, knowledge and abilities required of staff to develop and manage a successful institutional repository. The study did not try to identify the skill set required of a particular post as it was recognised that the skills and responsibilities of individual repository roles within an institution would be dependent on each repository's requirements and scope. Summarised below are the main skills identified:
Management
The ability to manage the set-up and development of the repository including strategic and financial planning and liaison with relevant groups and individuals.
Software
Familiarity with relevant web-based systems and repository software along with the ability to implement and modify systems and software to meet the needs of the repository and institution.
Metadata
Familiarity with relevant metadata standards and the ability to monitor and ensure metadata quality is maintained.
Storage and Preservation
An awareness of current best practice and the ability to liaise with other departments to ensure storage and preservation procedures meet best practice.
Content
Familiarity with current IPR issues along with the ability to develop content policies and engage with key stakeholders to maximise quality and quantity of content.
Liaison
The ability to liaise with various groups, departments and individuals both within the institution and externally to promote the deposit and use of items in the repository.
Advocacy, Training and Support
The ability to meet the needs of the repository and its users in terms of advocacy of OA and the repository, training in the deposit and use of the repository and support for users requiring assistance or information.
Current Awareness and Professional Development
Familiarity with current trends in the repository and research community and an awareness of developments in repository software and associated technologies.
Recruitment Toolkit
Many repository projects are JISC funded and recruiting staff for such projects can be difficult and can pose severe risks to project timescales and outputs.
To help with this problem JISC commissoned Brunton Consultancy Ltd to prepare a toolkit for recruiting to JISC projects with a specific focus on the digital repository area. The toolkit deals with the whole recruitment process from planning through advertising to interviewing and the job offer. Any JISC project dealing with digital repositories planning to recruit should read the toolkit as it is full of good advice, useful resources and templates. While the toolkit is focused on digital repositories, most of the advice offered will apply to every JISC project that is planning to recruit.
