Program Director of Mountain West Digital Library

Description

The Mountain West Digital Library (MWDL) seeks an energetic, visionary, innovative, and accomplished professional for the position of Program Director.  This is an excellent opportunity to work with collaborative and enthusiastic colleagues across the Mountain West to maintain and improve access to unique and rare materials from libraries and other memory institutions.  MWDL serves the Mountain West region as a Service Hub for the Digital Public Library of America, and it aggregates metadata from partnering libraries, museums, and archives in six states for sharing both regionally via the MWDL portal at http://mwdl.org/ and nationally via the DPLA portal at http://dp.la/.  MWDL’s Member Repositories and other collections partners collaborate to develop standards for digital collections metadata and other aspects of digital collection management.

MWDL operates as a collaborative program funded by sponsorship from the Utah Academic Library Consortium and membership dues from the Member Repositories around the region, along with in-kind support from the J. Willard Marriott Library at the University of Utah.  The Program Director and the MWDL team are hosted at the Marriott Library in Salt Lake City.  The Program Director reports to the Associate Dean for Research and User Services at the Marriott Library and to the MWDL Governing Board.  The Program Director manages an annual budget of over $250,000 and 4 part-time staff members.  The Project Director position is funded at .75 by the Utah Academic Library Consortium (UALC) and at .25 through membership fees.

Compensation: $68,000-79,000 dependent on qualifications, plus excellent benefits including a 14.2% retirement contribution to TIAA-CREF/Fidelity, medical and dental coverage, and generous paid sick and vacation time.

Preferred consideration will be given to all applications received by June 6, 2016.

       
Requirements

Working with the MWDL team, the MWDL Governing Board, and Marriott Library employees, the successful candidate will:


Provide strategic vision, leadership, and supervision of day-to-day activities in MWDL.

Evaluate and promote the adoption of new technologies and tools as needed.

Hire, supervise, and train employees and interns to provide services to Member Repositories.

Coordinate the MWDL membership program with existing Member Repositories, manage the renewals of membership fees, and expand membership services to additional digital repository institutions around the region.

Provide leadership in maintaining strong relationships and developing further collaborations with MWDL members and other collaborating institutions in the region and nationally, including the Digital Public Library of America and national/state funding agencies and foundations.

Ensure the quality and value of the services and programs provided by MWDL to its members.

Oversee the process of ingesting digital collections metadata from new Member Repositories.

Report to MWDL members and the rest of the MWDL Governing Board on various activities and usage statistics. Serve as ex officio member of the Governing Board.

Oversee improvements to the MWDL web portal to facilitate discovery of shared collections.

Serve as standing co-chair of the MWDL Digitization Committee to coordinate the work of memory institution volunteers in developing standards and best practices for managing digital collections.

Serve as chief spokesperson for MWDL in the digital library, digital archives, and academic library communities.

Coordinate work with the Governing Board and member-driven committees and task forces.

Working with the Marriott Library Budget Director, develop an annual budget for approval by the Governing Board and oversee the management of all funds, consistent with the University of Utah Marriott Library accounting policies and systems.


Required qualifications:


ALA-accredited MLS/MLIS or MAS with emphasis in digital libraries, digital curation, or archives management OR the equivalent combination of a relevant advanced degree and experience working in a digital library setting.

Five years of increasingly responsible library/archives experience and success in development of digital projects and/or other library/archives initiatives.

At least one year of supervisory experience and successful development and motivation of employees and volunteers.

Demonstrated ability to promote the services or work of an organization to internal and external constituents.

Demonstrated knowledge of "leading edge" digital library technologies along with related digital library issues such as rights management, metadata best practices, and XML/XSL.

Excellent written and verbal skills and strong interpersonal skills.



Ability to work creatively, collaboratively, and effectively both as a team member and independently, and to promote teamwork among colleagues.

Knowledge of challenges facing digital libraries.

Outstanding analytical, organizational, project, and time management skills and the ability to lead multiple projects simultaneously.



Capacity to thrive in the fast-paced, future-oriented environment of an academic research institution and to respond effectively to changing needs and priorities.

Successful completion of a criminal background check, as required by Utah state law (
http://www.regulations.utah.edu/humanResources/5-130.html
).


Desired qualifications:


Experience working with dispersed organizations and/or collaborative organizations.

Two years of supervisory experience of employees and volunteers.

Experience in managing teams with a technical focus.

Experience using webinars for teaching and collaboration.

Reading, writing, or speaking skills in a second language.



Successful history of government or foundation grant applications and/or individual and corporate awards.

Experience creating user-friendly documentation and training programs.