Spreadsheet data collection asked librarians to assess the level of expertise required to complete the various tasks broken down into three knowledge areas:
Three Areas:
Library and Information Science (LIS): The knowledge and skills associated with the profession of Librarian.
Domain/Discipline: The knowledge and skills associated with research in a specific academic domain e.g. Knowledge and skills required to conduct research in Chemistry, Pathology, or English. This question does assume that when performing the task you are doing so to support a researcher from a specific domain.
Research Technology: The knowledge and skills associated with the technology of research including equipment, programming languages, domain specific software etc.
Scale of expertise:
Beginner: Someone who is able to deliver generic support and education. General awareness of best practice and tools and services that support it.
Intermediate: Someone who is able to provide both generic and tailored education. Able to provide general advice on best practice and the use of tools and services that support it.
Advanced: Someone who is able to highly tailor support, education and advice. Able to give contextually specific advice on best practice and is skilled in the use of tools and services that support it.
During analysis these were calculated according to frequency per inside-out task e.g. 17% of tasks were rated as requiring Advanced LIS expertise. The results show that inside-out services require knowledge and expertise across all levels of the three areas.
| Expertise | Digital Scholarship | Unique Collections | Bibliometrics | Scholarly Communication | Research Data Management |
| LIS Advanced | 17% | 35% | 32% | 46% | 29% |
| LIS Intermediate | 50% | 61% | 68% | 46% | 53% |
| LIS Beginner | 33% | 4% | 0% | 8% | 18% |
| Domain Advanced | 41% | 42% | 20% | 46% | 7% |
| Domain Intermediate | 42% | 58% | 72% | 27% | 72% |
| Domain Beginner | 17% | 0% | 8% | 27% | 21% |
| Research Technology Advanced | 8% | 15% | 30% | 29% | 14% |
| Research Technology Intermediate | 75% | 66% | 60% | 53% | 68% |
| Research Technology Beginner | 17% | 19% | 10% | 18% | 18% |
LIS expertise to at least a intermediate level is important across all inside-out tasks but especially so for Bibliometrics. Digital Scholarship is the only inside-out service where LIS expertise to an advanced level appears less necessary.
Domain expertise to at least an Intermediate level was again important across all inside-out tasks.
Research technology expertise to an advanced level overall seems less important with exceptions in Scholarly Communication and Bibliometrics. These results were surprising especially for Research Data Management and Digital Scholarship. One possible explanation is that when these tasks require advanced levels of research technology expertise librarians either bring that expertise in from allied supporters (e.g. IT Professionals) or do not offer services at that level.
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