Mary C. Aagard and Cheri A. Folkner, associate professors and librarians, Marlena Hooyboer, receiving and collections manager, and Nancy Rosenheim, retired head of acquisitions and collections at Albertsons Library published the chapter “Building Better Collections Through Relationships: Sharing Expertise During Collection Downsizing” in the book Library Technical Services: Adapting to a Changing Environment.
The chapter examines librarian and staff perceptions and experiences during a large-scale collection rightsizing project Albertsons Library undertook in 2017. The authors developed a survey to investigate whether this project would strengthen working relationships between technical services staff and librarians.
The authors suggest that other libraries could use similar surveys prior to understanding a large-scale weeding process to help identify communication preferences, areas where training is needed, and best practices to use for the project.