Service Quality Improvement Council

Minutes
February 23, 2000

Present: Sue Crockford-Peters, Emily Horning, Kenny Marone, Fred Martz, Danuta Nitecki, Sandy Peterson, Rich Richie, Andy Shimp, Paul Stuehrenberg (Chair)

Absent: Katie Bauer, Suzanne Eggleston, Martha Smalley, Joan Swanekamp

The meeting commenced at 3:05 p.m.

I. Announcements, Future Agenda Items.

• Paul Stuehrenberg announced that a list of unfinished SQIC projects has been generated to assist the Council in resolving pending business. He will email the list of pending items to SQIC members.

• Danuta Nitecki announced that she is ready to share the preliminary results of the Fall99/Spring00 reader survey with SQIC at a future meeting. It was decided to add Danuta's presentation of survey data to the next meeting agenda.

II. Service Awards Program. Sandy Peterson reviewed the current status of the Service Awards program proposal:

• Presented by Sandy for the Staffing Issues Group to LMC on 5 January 2000

• Accepted by LMC on principle; comments from LMC on implementation of the program include the following:
  

• The program should be implemented this calendar year.

• Up to ten awards should be presented per year.

• Awards should be announced twice a year, but there should be only one awards ceremony. That ceremony will combine the presentation of awards honoring both 1) staff members who in some way have made an outstanding contribution to service quality improvement and 2) staff promoted in that year.

• The budget will be expanded to $5000/year.

• There was no interest in naming the awards after an individual; the name of the award should be changed to privilege the aspect of "quality" of service.
  

• Further implementation and budget yet to be fully worked out.

Decisions made by SQIC are as follows:

• Nominate membership for the Recognition Team for Service Quality (i.e., judges to select awards recipients) within the next couple of weeks; recommendations for the Recognition Team to be made via email

• Develop a working budget for review by LMC
  

• Anticipated expenses include cost for plaques, award certificates, gift certificates for students, refreshments for awards reception, publicity

• Delay the recognition of students until the following year given the program's late start this year, and use the September00 recognition ceremony as a kick-off for the service awards program

• Present student honorees with a $50 gift certificate to the Yale Bookstore; the idea of having a pizza party for students was dropped

• Charge the Staffing Issues Group with completing the final redaction of the proposal and posting edited documents for review; Sandy will draft a statement advertising the program.

There was some discussion on the aptness of honoring promoted staff and staff recognized for their quality of service in one ceremony. It was noted that the former category is not necessarily based on performance, whereas the latter category is based solely on this criterion.

Sandy will return to the Council will an amended proposal and budget.

III. Extreme Weather Policy. After a brief review of the proposal developed by the Staffing Issues Group, SQIC worked to refine the points outlined in the document. Policy recommendations for three types of extreme weather situations were outlined

A. State of emergency (Governor orders everyone to stay off of the roads) or major catastrophe in specific building (fire, flood, tornado), essential staff only

1. Library is closed to the public.

B. Early dismissal of all non-essential stay (all non-essential staff must leave); essential staff who stay are paid at time and a half

1. Only designated essential staff will stay in this scenario; Danuta noted that "essential-ness" is a quality that department administrators should define from a service viewpoint.

2. Basic services (circulation/check-out and security were mentioned) to be provided; it was agreed that selected library facilities must be open in some capacity to provide students with study areas; Danuta asked whether all libraries should be open.

3. the option of using interim schedule hours was discussed; SQIC will canvas colleagues in departmental libraries for opinions on shifting to the interim schedule.

4. A question was raised regarding procedures for non-essential staff who cannot leave the premises; it was decided to consult LHR on this matter.

C. Non-essential staff are permitted to leave early but those remaining do not receive additional pay; non-essential staff who leave must use personal/annual leave

1. Sue Crockford-Peters commented that confusion by staff may be avoided by changing the term "annual" to "vacation." Emily Horning suggested leaving annual and adding vacation in parenthesis.

2. Points 2 & 3 under Scenario B were applied to this category.

3. Our service standards should dictate our decisions with regard to dismissal of staff; however, it was noted that supervisors are asked to be liberal in letting staff stay at home.

Sue suggested that SQIC comment on the impact of extreme weather conditions on other, non-personnel issues, such as access to electronic resources. Fred Martz suggested that the policy include mention of the availability of fundamental computer resources (i.e., access to the library web server and the on-line catalog/Orbis). There will be a delay in addressing Web forms.

Sandy will return to SQIC with the policy proposal once it has been revised.

IV. SQI Plan. Danuta distributed a draft overview of the objectives and priorities of a proposed service quality improvement program plan. SQIC members were asked to read through the draft for future discussion.

The meeting adjourned at 4:05 p.m.