Using LibCal Appointements for Research Consultations
Use LibCal Appointments to schedule research cosultation appointments and to report lconsultation stats. The instructions below provide procedures for:
- setting up Outlook calendar integration
- appointment availability and customizations
- how to use the Internal Note to distinguish between consultation and non-consultion appointments, which will help to avoid stats inflation.
Set up Outlook Calendar Integration
LibCal Appointments can reflect your availability by syncing to your Outlook calendar.
In the Appointments tool, select the Integrations tab. Scroll to Outlook/Exchange Settings.
Add your availability
Select the Availability tab in the top navigation links.
Choose the start and end times for meetings and the frequency with which this should apply (e.g. every week).
Select your Appointment Settings
Select the My Settings tab in the top navigation links.
These settings determine how long your appointments last, how much time you have between appointments, and how far in advance patrons can book or cancel appointments. This is also where you can:
- Create a friendly URL as your appointment link.
- Add office location information.
- Set up reminder or follow-up emails.
Receiving and deleting or changing appointments
Once a patron has made an appointment, you will receive an automated alert email.
If you synched Appointments to your Outlook Calendar, the appointemnt will automatically appear there. Note: deleting this synced appointemnt in your Outlook calendar will not delete it from LibCal Appointments. Deleting and changing appointments must be done in Appointments.
Use the Internal Note to identify non-research consultation appointments
If an appointment is not a Research Consultation, add an Internal Note to indicate this.
Adding the Internal Note "non-consultation" will ensure that the appointment will not be counted as a Research Consultation in our stats.
Consult ACRL's definition of a Research Consultation to determine this.
Research Consultation definition
"Consultations are one-on-one or small group appointments that are often scheduled in advance, occur outside of the classroom or a service point, and require staff preparation or equivalent previous relevant experience. Include interactions that took place in person or were conducted by phone, e-mail, Web interface, or other medium.
This may include any walkup transactions if the person initially asked could not answer the question and the question is referred to another person with the appropriate and aligned knowledge, no matter what the length or topic discussed.
A specific example of a walk-up transaction becoming a consultation is when a question posed at the reference desk cannot be answered at the desk at that moment for whatever reason. The person at the desk may encourage the patron to schedule an appointment or contact an appropriate person in their office to see if they are available. If an appropriate person is available and comes out to the desk, or invites the patron back to their office, this would be a reference consultation albeit unscheduled."