In an effort to reduce the amount of staff time devoted to responding to surveys, and to clarify the procedure for doing so, the following guidelines have been established.

Surveys Received by the Director's Office

The Assistant to the Director will decide which surveys received by the Director's Office will be filled out (surveys from ARL, ARL institutions, and OCLC will always be completed) and will send them to the appropriate staff to complete. On completion, these surveys will be returned to the Director's Office for mailing and to be filed in the central files. Cover letters of surveys not filled out will be kept on file in the Director's Office to avoid further activity if subsequent surveys are received.

Surveys Received by Departments and Individuals

Department Heads will decide which surveys received in departments or by individuals will be completed. Factors to consider in determining if a survey is to be completed include:

• is it worth the staff member's time?
• are there business reasons to respond, e.g., a vendor survey eliciting feedback on a product?
• the source of the survey - is it reputable?
• does the survey elicit information in a sensitive manner?
• is the survey directed to the appropriate level?

Copies of these completed surveys will be sent to the Director's Office for the central files. If it is discovered that duplicate surveys have been sent to several Libraries' units, the Assistant to the Director will send a message to Library Council members informing them of the situation and advising them not to complete the survey. The Assistant to the Director will then respond to the survey initiator for the Libraries as a whole.

Approved by Library Council 10/25/95

Last updated 960306