From: "Gillis, Catherine (ELS-PHI)" <[log in to unmask]> Date: Fri, 13 Jan 2012 19:06:37 +0000 Dear List Serv: Below is an overview of the Elsevier Medical Library Panel which I run here within the Health Sciences Journals Group: - Elsevier’s Medical Librarian Panel was formed in December 2009 and is hosted by the Director of Customer and Market Research in the company’s Health Sciences Journals group (Ms. Catherine Gillis) o The Medical Librarian panel is one of the most important initiatives of Elsevier’s “Voice of the Customer” program; our VoC efforts also include traditional outreach efforts such as our Library Connect newsletter and sponsoring of major events / conferences at SLA, ALA, MLA as well as large programs organized by our Academic and Government Customer Relations team - The Medical Librarian Panel meets 3x per year at our Philadelphia offices - Panel members were selected based upon a variety of criteria – of which liking Elsevier was NOT a consideration; the panel is not designed to be a giant “kumbaya” sing-a-long, but rather a real, open forum, where customers can tell us their pain points, what their unmet needs are, what their own institutional challenges are and how we might help them - My panel consists of ~15 members, drawn from within a 100 mile radius of our Philadelphia office and is a very diverse group; o Panelists are drawn from a variety of hospital / institutional “types” including: specialty hospitals, hospitals affiliated with a large medical school, hospitals which are part of an integrated health network, suburban community type hospitals, and independent, stand-alone hospitals o Among the institutions represented are: Thomas Jefferson University, Drexel University, Jersey Shore Medical University, Fox Chase Cancer Center, Albert Einstein Medical Center, Virtua Health, Pennsylvania Hospital, Lancaster General Hospital, St. Michaels Medical Center (Newark, NJ) and several others o We reimburse members for their travel expenses and always give each attending panelist an honoraria; the meetings typically begin at 10 a.m. and run through 2 p.m., with lunch served - Our panel has tackled a number of key issues such as: o Growth of smartphones and other electronic devices and the impact on the library and what services libraries need o Access and Entitlement policies that seem contradictory and or customer-unfriendly o E-Book collections and how to make them much more flexible and affordable o The importance of grading evidence and how / if an accepted industry standard could be implemented, which would do for journal users what Impact Factors and citation reports have done for editors and authors o How Elsevier is addressing point of care solutions and Clinical Decision Support systems and EHRs. - Additionally, our panel has also been a vital source of feedback for new products we are developing; several panelists have been part of a 6-month “alpha” testing program for a new clinical reference solution we are working on; their input and feedback to our product development has been crucial and incredibly valuable in the development of these news solutions. Rather than the old way of building something and saying, “here it is, hey it’s from Elsevier so of course it’s great” we have taken a different approach: “what do you need in a clinical reference solution that you are getting from us now, or from other publishers (including UpToDate)” and let that drive our product development efforts. - Finally, one of the biggest benefits is to the panelists themselves; after every meeting I hear the refrain: “Catherine I love these meetings because I always learn so much from what my peers are doing, and how they approach similar problems…” In an era when content consumers have so much choice and where often the speed of the answer may trump the level of evidence, we have become determined to truly listen to our customer’s voices. With so much choice and competition we can no longer have an attitude of ‘if we build it they will come.’ And as noted above, for our panelists, the opportunity to spend time together as professionals and learn from one another has been one of the best selling points for our panel., In fact, I think I think it is a prime reason why panel members keep coming back. Eventually, we would like to broaden the geographic base of the panels to include hospitals across the company, but for the time being, it will have this regional make-up. Do we get everything right? No. Are “VoC” efforts enough to demonstrate our sincerity in making sure our customers’ voices are heard throughout the company? Probably not. But we are really committed to keeping our panel going as we find it so valuable. Thank you. Catherine Catherine M. Gillis Director, Customer and Market Research Global Medical Research Elsevier Health Sciences 1600 JFK Boulevard, Suite 1800 Philadelphia, PA 19103 215.239.3780 (office) 484.343.1322 (mobile) [log in to unmask] www.journals.elsevierhealth.com