Approvals, Slips, and DDA! Oh My! The Yellow Brick Road to Collaborative Approval and DDA Profiling

In the last several years, approval profiling has changed significantly and grownincreasingly complex, particularly due to the prevalent shift toward collecting inelectronic formats. While approval profiles have been predominantly e-preferred for sometime, the growth of demand-driven acquisition (DDA) has led to new license models, modesof acquisition, and tighter integration of DDA with approvals. With the advent of theDDA-preferred approval plan came options for the inclusion of multiple e-book platformsas well as complexities involving publisher embargoes. Additionally, the numerousapproval and DDA profile parameters, workflow options, and administrator settings varywidely, resulting in a seemingly endless array of possibilities that can affect howtitles are ultimately profiled. The task of creating a new profile or preparing profilereviews can be overwhelming, especially for those new to profiling or trying a newvendor. However, it can and should be a collaborative experience with vendors that leadsto more than just great profiles. While library staff should strive to learn how to makethe most of what a vendor offers, vendors should inquire about the library’s collectiondevelopment strategies, issues, and needs. Vendors can also share current trends andoffer advice modeled on how other libraries handle similar issues, as well as gatherfeedback for potential development. This paper supplies tips that will help librarystaff who are preparing to create or review approval or DDA profiles or to profile withnew vendors, to be better prepared in order to maximize their time profiling withvendors.