The 2CUL Technical Services Strategic Alliance
With the conclusion of the integrative work accomplished with the support of the three-year TSI Mellon grant, we will mainstream the 2CUL technical services collaboration as a “strategic alliance,” beginning in January 2016. The goals of this alliance are:
- To work together on discrete projects and initiatives of mutual strategic interest, whenever collaboration is likely to lead to better overall quality, productivity, improvement of services, and/or fruitful innovation than working alone;
- To preserve, promote, and invoke the 2CUL brand in broader collaborative forums (e.g. Borrow Direct, LD4P, the Program for Cooperative Cataloging), in which the 2CUL alliance is likely to serve as a catalyst or provide us with increased leverage in negotiating and advancing mutual interests;
- To maintain a lightweight administrative infrastructure to foster and support the continuing alliance between our technical services operations, in conjunction with the broader 2CUL partnership.
The 2CUL Technical Services Joint Senior Managers Integration Network (JSMIN) will remain the steering body for the alliance. It will meet quarterly via WebEx and annually at either Columbia or Cornell, pending significant agendas.
The TSI functional working groups will remain nominally in place, although those teams not actively involved in 2CUL projects, initiatives, and other arrangements may consider themselves on hiatus until the need for their renewed participation in the partnership arises. The formation of ad hoc working groups and teams will be encouraged and supported, as they materialize. New staff will be included in new and existing working groups, as appropriate. Both the functional and ad hoc working groups will be accountable to JSMIN or to the appropriate technical services directors within JSMIN.
JSMIN / 3 Nov. 2015