Proposing Performance Indicators for the National Library of Iran (NLI) based on BSC Perspectives

This paper aims at propose appropriate performance indicators based on the world’s national libraries and related ISOs. These were grouped according to 4 perspectives of BSC involving (Resources, access, and Infrastructure; Use; Efficiency; and Potentials and development).

Firstly, performance indicators of 7 national libraries (British Library, National Library of Australia, National Library of Spain, Swiss National Library, Library and Archives Canada, National Library of France, and National Diet Library) were collected and categorized according to ISO 28118, ISO 21248 standards. The outcome then was viewed and commented for suitability by 13 senior professional staff of NLI. In total, the indicators were defined in 11 dimensions and 192 indicators based on NLIs goals and tasks. The research tools to conduct a Fuzzy Delphi technique involve a checklist whose validity were recognized according to expert's opinion.

32 out of 192 performance indicators were considered suitable. These were grouped according to 4 perspectives of BSC: 11 indicators on Resources (Percentage of National Publications Acquired by the NLI, Percentage of acquired books in any medium and multimedia resources entered by legal deposit, Percentage of acquired serials entered by legal deposit, Coverage of the national imprint in the new entries of the national bibliography , Percentage of national publication with Cataloging in publication; Number of searches for "National Bibliography Offering Service" of NLI-OPAC, Number of NLI Press Online titles, Increase the percentage of digitized titles and pages per 1 000 Documents in the Collection, Cumulative percentage of at-risk audiovisual material migrated from an obsolete to a current digital file format, Total m2 of surface in deposits of bibliographic funds with control of air conditioning and percentage, Percentage of Storage Space which has an Appropriate Environment); 8 on Use (Qualitative evaluation using case studies of use and value of the collection and services, Satisfaction with ease of finding information on the NLI’s website, Satisfaction level of NLI-OPAC- user questionnaire, Overall satisfaction level of user service (user questionnaire), Level of user satisfaction with the search of the NLI website, The number of active users of NLI, Number of views of digitized books and magazines, Number of views of Digitized press); 10 on Efficiency (Median time to catalog books entered by legal deposit (in weeks), Median Time of Document Processing, The rate of providing document reference services, Percentage of information requests submitted electronically, Percentage of correct reference questions answered electronically, Number of users to whom direct bibliographic information has been provided in the reading rooms with a maximum waiting time of 10 minutes and a percentage of the total, Number of users to whom general information has been provided with a maximum waiting time of 10 minutes and percentage of the total, Employee Productivity in Document Processing, Employee productivity in Cataloguing in Publication (CIP), Employee Productivity in Lending and Delivery Services ); 3 on Potential and development (Percentage of library staff involved in resource processing, Percentage of processing staff involved in CIP, Percentage of Staff in National and International Cooperation and Projects).

By extracting and proposing performance indicators and classifying them in 4 dimensions of balanced scorecard, it is possible for the National Library of Iran to evaluate its performance and compare itself with other national libraries in around the world and reach consensus on valid indicators through repeated reviews and monitoring.From the results of this research, it can be said that among the 32 selected indicators to evaluate the performance of NLAI, a total of 8 indicators are related to the two ISOs studied (28118 and 21248); That is, 25% of the performance indicators monitored in this study are in accordance with ISO. Finally, both ISOs related to national libraries (ISO 28118 and 21248) can be a good source for designing performance indicators of national libraries. .