1.
How and where did you hear about CMS?
I started hearing about CMS about 5 years
ago. I would see IT articles on the Internet and in popular magazines.
2.
What
were your motivations to adopt CMS for its current use (library website or any
other purpose)?
To make things easier. Everything I try
to do is to make things easier for staff and patrons. We use CMS for
posting items on our website. Before CMS, it was a scheduling nightmare
because we wanted to change items on the website frequently but with staff
having to have IT staff post things for them, it was causing IT to be a
bottleneck in the process. By removing this bottleneck staff can work on
their own time schedule and if they don’t like the posting they can edit it
immediately.
3.
What
was your decision making criteria for choosing the right one and meeting the
library’s needs?
We built our own. We felt like we did
not need anything fancy. We have a great web department that were able to
make things happen. With SharePoint (staff website) it was even easier because we were
able to use the security area of SharePoint to lock down CMS to only approved
staff.
4.
What
is the name of the CMS we are using now?
It does not have a name since we built our
own.
5.
What
are the important benefits or advantages of CMS we are using now over the old
system or another CMS system we've used in the past?
We did not use a CMS system before the
previous one.
6.
Are
there any disadvantages of the CMS we are using now?
It can always be better and easier to use and
have more features.
7.
How
was the learning curve for IT and other staff members?
I think it was easier for IT employees than
other staff. I think staff learning how to navigate and work with pictures
has been the hardest. The graphics on certain areas of the CMS have to
be a certain ratio and that has been hard for staff to use stand why a picture will
not work.
8.
How
has the CMS and the ability for other staff members to maintain the website
affected the job duties of IT staff members? (Has it alleviated work or
caused new responsibilities?)
I think that it has freed up time for IT staff
to work on other tasks.
I work at the same library as Holly, and while knew how I felt about certain aspects of our new CMS system, it was interesting to hear about its impact on the IT department. As she mentioned, whenever there used to be an issue with the website, staff members had to send a "Track-It" to IT to fix it, even if it was a slight change such as a typo or deleting an ad for a program when the date has already passed. It was obviously frustrating for both parties, and the CMS has alleviated some stress for every staff member. While I use the CMS to update program registrations, I did not realize that our web department created their own system, and I am really impressed with their skills. Thankfully, I have not had to upload any photos to the site (because I do not have those permissions) but I would not have predicted that would be the most challenging factor when it came to making a community-based site. While the system was just launched a couple of months ago and is still new and fresh, I am glad to see how much it has benefited those in the IT department, because I know I much prefer being able to erase a registration in a snap on my own, rather than sending a request email for IT to do it and waiting for them to have time to complete the task, as well as sending me a confirmation email that my Track-It has been processed. Overall, the CMS seems to be great for everyone, and I think it can only get better as it is further developed.
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