Initiatives Principle 2: A good digital initiative has an appropriate level of staffing with necessary expertise to achieve its objectives.

There are many staff roles, each requiring different skills and abilities, that must work together to build a successful digital collection. At some point in time every digital initiative will require some expertise in management and project management, budget and finance, programming and systems administration, content selection, metadata creation and more. Some roles may be filled by the same person, while other roles may require multiple people. Every initiative has different requirements, and an organization may choose to emphasize different roles at different times, particularly as an organization’s digital collection initiative matures. In some cases, building or enhancing an organization’s capacity to create good digital collections can be an explicit goal of a digital initiative.

There are three strategies for an organization to accommodate the different roles and skills needed: in-house staffing, outsourcing, and collaboration with one or more partner organizations. Each of these strategies has advantages and drawbacks, and all three are generally used in combination by successful digital collection initiatives.

Some useful resources on staffing and managing digital initiatives:

• Grace Agnew, Staffing Roles for Digital Collection Building (2006) http://www.njdigitalhighway.org/documents/staffing-roles-for-digital-collection-building.pdf. Comprehensive summary of staffing roles and organizational strategies. 
• Stephen Chapman, "Chapter III: Considerations for Project Management" in NEDCC, Handbook for Digital Projects (2003) http://nedcc.org/oldnedccsite/digital/iii.htm. 
• North Carolina ECHO, Project Management, Revised edition (2007) http://www.ncecho.org/guide/management.htm.
• Technical Advisory Service for Images (TASI), Advice – Managing Digitisation Projects website http://www.tasi.ac.uk/advice/managing/managing.html. 
• Technical Advisory Service for Images (TASI), Digitisation: To Outsource or Not? (2006) http://www.tasi.ac.uk/advice/managing/outsourcing.html. 
• Technical Advisory Service for Images (TASI), Staff Training (2006) http://www.tasi.ac.uk/advice/managing/staff_training.html. 
• Harvard College Library Preservation and Imaging Services, Planning Digitization Projects: A Brief Bibliography (2005) http://preserve.harvard.edu/bibliographies/digitalplanning.pdf.