Job Description
Purpose of Position:
The Head of Access Services provides leadership and guidance for a suite of services including circulation, course reserves and copyright guidance to the instructional community, document delivery, consortial resource sharing, media collections, disability services, learning commons partnerships located in the library, and the library’s integrated public service points where customers get assistance with general information needs, the first level of reference, and technology. This faculty position requires a solid commitment to public services coupled with a vision for using emerging technologies and evidence-based decision practices to develop, implement, and assess services. The Access Services Department consists of 4 full-time staff employees and a number of student employees. This position will have faculty status.
The W. Frank Steely Library provides a wide range of library services to support the University’s commitment to its Success by Design strategic framework, which promotes student success by embracing inclusiveness, equity, global awareness, and academic needs of students and faculty in each academic college. Library faculty and staff have enhanced traditional services to better address 21st-century information needs and are collaborative partners across campus. The library’s twenty-two faculty members and eighteen staff members are leading the implementation of NKU’s campus-wide Quality Enhancement Plan on Information Literacy and newly created digital repository and offering an online bachelor’s degree in library informatics.
NKU is a public comprehensive university located in the Northern Kentucky/Cincinnati, Ohio metropolitan area. The university delivers innovative, learner-centered education and engages in impactful scholarly and creative activities, all of which empower students for fulfilling careers and meaningful lives while contributing to the social and economic vitality of the region. NKU has almost 14,000 students, and over 2,000 faculty and staff. It offers 79 undergraduate degree programs, master’s degrees in 21 disciplines, graduate certificates in 15 areas, two doctoral programs, a law degree, and in a partnership with the University of Kentucky and St. Elizabeth Hospital opened a medical school in the fall of 2019.
Primary Responsibilities:
Leadership and Supervision:
• Leads and supervises full-time employees, including hiring, onboarding, training, determining workloads, delegating responsibilities, providing direction, coaching, mentoring, and monitoring and evaluating job performance.
• Leads and promotes the operations of the Library’s integrated service points that provide desk and roving assistance for first-level reference questions, disability services, technology lending, circulation, course reserves, copyright, document delivery, and other transactions.
• Oversees the Library’s circulation and interlibrary loan system. Captures, analyzes, and assesses transactional and performance data from those systems to determine trends and develop strategies to improve the library experience for students, faculty, and staff.
• Analyzes and manages workflows and processes to improve delivery, speed, effectiveness, and accuracy of resource sharing, including working with consortium partners, such as Kentucky Virtual Library to ensure effective operations with courier services, etc.
• Liaises with campus partners located in Steely Library, such as those who are providing research, writing, and tutoring services.
• Works with colleagues to develop a team environment that embraces diversity, inclusiveness, and equity.
• Collaborates with the Senior Associate Dean for Operations, Assessment, and Communications and University Police to ensure optimal functioning of the physical building from a user-centric focus and to manage emergency situations. Also, coordinates the opening and closing of the library.
• Participates in Library and departmental strategic planning.
• The department head may occasionally need to work evenings or weekends. The incumbent may need to flex their schedule occasionally due to staff absences and when the library hours change during extended study hours and intercessions.
Service:
• Participates in Library and campus-wide committees and NKU faculty governance.
Other:
• Contributes to research tutoring and consultations.
• Other duties as assigned.
Qualifications:
Minimum Qualifications:
• Master’s degree from an ALA-accredited library or information science program or an ALA-approved foreign equivalent.
• Experience in an academic, public or comparable library environment in various access and public services such as circulation, interlibrary loan, document delivery, copyright, course reserves, and/or reference.
• Strong customer service skills and commitment to providing excellent service in a diverse, fast-paced environment, including the ability to resolve issues in a professional and respectful manner.
• Supervisory experience and/or evidence of the ability to be an effective team leader who fosters an inclusive, efficient, and collegial workplace.
Preferred Qualifications:
• Demonstrated experience improving workflows in access services areas using, but not limited to, collecting and analyzing quantitative and qualitative data.
Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities:
• Ability to create an exciting, future-oriented library.
• Ability to lead staff and workflows/processes in support of strategic goals.
• Knowledge of current and emerging technologies as applied to access and public services.
• Exemplary interpersonal, verbal, and written communication skills, with the ability to establish and sustain positive working relationships with all levels of personnel (administrators, faculty, staff, and student employees) and with external constituencies.
• Strong project management skills to lead and/or coordinate multiple projects.
• Ability to work well both independently and in a collaborative environment and to contribute to professional service.
• Knowledge and understanding of key issues and trends that affect academic libraries or higher education.
• Ability to engage collaboratively, creatively, and effectively and provide innovative and exceptional service to a diverse clientele.