 Welcome everyone. My name is Allison Hitchens and I'm the Associate University Librarian for Collections, Technology and Scholarly Communication at the University of Waterloo. Today I'm presenting on the work that Waterloo did as part of the ARL Research Library Impact Framework. This is based on a presentation Shannon Gordon and I gave at the Bibliometrics and Research Impact Conference in April 2021 with some expanded content working with Laura Bredel. When the project was announced by ARL in 2018, our University Librarian, Namajavaya approached Shannon and I about submitting a proposal to do a practice brief based on our Bibliometrics experience at Waterloo. Now over the years I've had a few library directors reach out to me to ask about our practice and therefore we were confident we had an audience for this brief. So using a template from ARL we began writing in 2019 with Shannon as the primary author and me providing suggestions for content and giving feedback. An important aspect of the project was reaching out to colleagues for feedback. Internally it was essential to hear from our partners whether we had presented the Bibliometric Services and key learnings accurately and externally we wanted to know if the brief made sense to those not in the Waterloo context and if what we included was considered valuable information. We also wanted to make sure that if we linked to other Bibliometric Services examples that we were using the appropriate links. ARL staff also gave us feedback based on how well the work fit into their project concept and encouraged us to add areas that they thought would be of interest. Then in 2020 Laura began as Waterloo's new Bibliometrics and Research Impact Librarian and she was able to review the work through the eyes of someone who was learning the role and provide great thoughts for improvement. According to ARL a practice brief is intended to be short evidence-based document to support practitioners in improving library assessment work. So Shannon and I tried to keep it focused on what would be most useful to a library in deciding to start or revise Bibliometric Service and give guidance on what they need to think through. The feedback from our external reviewers was essential to making sure we had the right balance. Our reviewers emphasized the importance of the why it matters section which helps libraries understand why libraries are involved in this area and they suggested adding details to sections such as ethical considerations and the resources needed to run the service. They also pointed out areas that needed clarification and helped us identify things that may be unique to Waterloo. I've included a quote from one reviewer as an example. From a local standpoint the practice brief helped us to reflect back on a service we had been offering for a few years and think about the importance of the partnerships we have built with the Office of Research, Institutional Analysis and Planning and various research administrators across campus. It was also a great onboarding tool for a new librarian and we used it to help the communications team work on a piece about Bibliometrics at Waterloo. The development of the brief has also led to opportunities to present on our service with the OCLC Research Library Partnership and to facilitate a conversation about Bibliometrics and Libraries. I want to give a shout out to Rebecca Bryant at OCLC who continues to show a keen interest in our work and provides opportunities for networking. I should mention that a practice brief in our mind is not the same as best practices. Our brief was mainly based on our Waterloo experience and some things may not apply to your context but we hope that the topics covered are a guide to the things that you need to consider. When we started writing our practice brief we really wanted to create something for practitioners to explore the practical elements of one institution's experience supporting Bibliometric data needs. So what does this document that we created actually explore? It includes some background information to offer insight into the local context at Waterloo, for example the role played by institutional readiness which I'll speak to in the lessons learned. It does a deep dive into the various layers of the service delivery model we present, the type of service, who provides it, who uses it, data sources, that sort of information. It also shares a range of lessons learned across several years of providing the service which I'll get into on the next slide and recommendations for the future for example continuing to actively monitor the evolution of Bibliometrics tools. It then concludes with highlighting some practical resources that may be of interest to others, including links to services at other institutions, professional development opportunities, and recommended readings. It gives the details on a variety of lessons learned from working with Bibliometrics. I'm just going to highlight a few of them. On reflecting on the service we think that institutional readiness was a key factor for Waterloo. A working group on Bibliometrics was formed by the provost in 2013 with broad representation and the work of that group at the broad consultation from the white paper that resulted was key to building an understanding of Bibliometrics and fostering relationships both of which contribute greatly to our work. Like with most things we found effective communication to be really important, Bibliometrics is just one measure of research impact but can affect institutional rankings, institutional grant opportunities, and the success of individual researchers. So it's important to be able to communicate when Bibliometrics are and are not appropriate and have sensitive conversations with senior administrators. Being able to communicate clearly the methodologies used, the scope and limitations is also important. Collaboration with partners across campus has also been key to success. It has been important to develop skills and interests throughout the institution to share the work and allow the library to prioritize when we need to do the analysis ourselves and when we can be trainer and guide. Similarly it's been important to build an external network to keep up to date on Bibliometric practice and share challenges. The Canadian Bibliometrics community of practice has been an important community for us to engage with. We didn't mention it in the brief but another obvious lesson is that things are constantly shifting and changing with new Bibliometrics tools being released, new questions asked of us, and new challenges for research impact such as the impact of COVID-19 on research productivity. It's important to keep our eye on these changes and learn with them. The increased use of collaboration platforms like Microsoft Teams during the pandemic has helped us to create the informal channels for chatting about these changes between meetings. I also want to highlight some of the new work we've engaged with since the practice brief was finalized. In late 2020, Laura launched the Bibliometrics and Research Impact Community of Practice on campus and this has allowed practitioners to share information with each other on methodology, interesting work, and challenges. So for example a review of Power BI dashboarding of Bibliometric data via academic apartment. Laura has also provided training for example on taking control of research identities and we've had guest speakers for example this month John Aspler from Orchid Canada will be joining us. This spring we've launched a project to update our white paper on Bibliometrics. We hope to augment the paper by looking at Bibliometrics through several lenses that are not well covered in the original publication including better representing the arts, humanities, and social sciences, the use of alternative metrics, looking at Bibliometrics through an EDI lens, collaborative research, and the impact of COVID-19. We also want to explore opportunities for providing more practical guidance and we hope to publish a revised version in 2013. I want to thank you all for your attention and please reach out to Laura or I if you have any questions about our Bibliometrics and Research Impact work and finally a thank you to ARL for the opportunity to participate in the pilot project community. We really enjoyed working with and listening to the work of the other institutions involved. Thank you.