Licensing and Negotiating

By the end of this section, you will understand:

  • The importance of principled negotiation and assertive communication in the licensing process, focusing on how to maintain professionalism even during challenging negotiations.
  • How to avoid stereotypes that can hinder effective communication between librarians and vendors, and why addressing these misconceptions is crucial for successful negotiations.
  • The value of involving your library community and internal parties during the negotiation process to ensure alignment and support.
  • The role of written documentation in negotiations, including why it is essential to clearly record agreements and expectations to protect both parties.
  • The significance of establishing workflows and checklists for negotiation, ensuring consistency and thoroughness throughout the licensing lifecycle.
  • How repeated practice and preparation can reduce anxiety and improve your effectiveness as a negotiator, including utilizing external resources.

Introduction

Now that we know the basic structure and contents of a license for electronic resources, we can discuss the negotiation process.

Last week we learned that some licensing may be avoided due to projects like SERU and projects like LIBLICENSE will help streamline the process. Each of these help standardize the boilerplate that is commonly used among electronic resource licenses. However, when we negotiate for products, especially big ticket products, we need to know what that process might look like and how to engage in it.

Principled Negotiation

Abbie Brown (2014) offers a number of great tips in her talk, and I want to highlight them.

First, her discussion of principled negotiation and assertive communication is important. Principled negotiation is about keeping negotiations professional, even when it feels personal or possibly emotional in the licensing process. It involves negotiating based on interests (i.e., your library's) rather than on positions and aiming for mutually beneficial outcomes. Before you enter negotiations, keep in mind the objective you want to attain; and use reason, creativity, and problem solving skills to get there.

Assertive Communication

Assertive communication is being willing to express yourself. It means expressing your needs clearly, respectfully, and often succinctly without crossing into aggression. Aggression is not ever warranted. Brown's (2014) suggestion to have other people look at your emails, that might have been written in anger, before sending is golden.

Stereotypes

Brown (2014) also discusses, based on her experience, some stereotypes that get in the way of negotiating. These include:

  • Librarian stereotypes
  • Library stereotypes
  • Vendors stereotypes:

Stereotypes, from either direction, should be avoided. For example, vendors may assume that librarians are inflexible or overly focused on cost-saving. Librarians may think that vendors are solely profit-driven. Either of these kinds of stereotypes will lead to distrust. And among other reasons, they represent a kind of background {mis}information that causes miscommunication. People exist on each side of the table, and although each side has their own self-interests, stereotypes prevent connection. Reflecting on any stereotypes we have can reduce anxiety in the negotiation process.

Community

As a negotiator, Brown (2014) described having to work with lots of people and having to negotiate with people in her own library. This is a great insight. It's important to talk through issues with colleagues and vendors. Aligning relevant parties and even users ensures that everyone is on the same page before approaching vendors. This helps underscore the importance of building internal consensus.

Put it in Writing

Brown's (2014) point about putting things in writing will help you. Written documentation serves as a binding record and helps all parties avoid misunderstandings and provides a reference if disagreements arise. What we put down in writing thus entails a kind of commitment. As such, wording matters. You therefore want to write write well and succinctly.

Negotiation Workflows

Smith and Hartnett (2015) provide a real world example of the negotiating process that includes a work flow around licensing. Remember, document everything and revisit your documentation. Use that documentation to formalize checklists. Having a workflow in place around licensing will helps ensure that all bases are covered.

Dygert and Barrett (2016) cover the specifics of licensing: what to look for, what shouldn't be given away, how to negotiate principally, and more. Dunie (2015) gets into the specifics of the negotiation process, which includes definitions of terms, business models, and strategies.

Conclusion

Becoming a skillful negotiator takes practice, but this section will help prepare you for the process. The main point I want to make is this: if you find yourself in a position where one of your job responsibilities is to negotiate with vendors for e-resources (or for anything else), then come back to these sources of information and spend additional time studying them. Repeated exposure to the negotiation experience will make the process less intimidating and improve your effectiveness over time. Sources like these, and others like them, such as those listed by Garofalo (2017), will prepare you if you study them. Being prepared is the most important step.

Readings / References

Brown, A. (2014). Negotiation of E Resource licensing pricing terms. (2014, September 17). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LET4MWO7egI

Dunie, M. (2015). Chapter 3. Negotiating with content vendors: An art or a science? Library Technology Reports, 51(8), Article 8. https://journals.ala.org/index.php/ltr/article/view/5834

Dygert, C., & Barrett, H. (2016). Building your licensing and negotiation skills toolkit. The Serials Librarian, 70(1–4), 333–342. https://doi.org/10.1080/0361526X.2016.1157008

Garofalo, D. A. (2017). Tips from the trenches. Journal of Electronic Resources Librarianship, 29(2), 107–109. https://doi.org/10.1080/1941126X.2017.1304766

Smith, J., & Hartnett, E. (2015). The licensing lifecycle: From negotiation to compliance. The Serials Librarian, 68(1–4), 205–214. https://doi.org/10.1080/0361526X.2015.1017707

Additional References

ALA. (2006, August 25). Libraries and licensing. https://web.archive.org/web/20180611070938/http://www.ala.org/advocacy/copyright/librariesandlicensing/LibrariesAndLicensing

Chesler, A., & McKee, A. (2014). The shared electronic resource understanding (seru): Six years and still going strong. Information Standards Quarterly, 26(04), 20. https://doi.org/10.3789/isqv26no4.2014.05