The Independent Talis User Group

The Independent Talis User Group (iTUG) was established in late 2004. This followed a customer survey and a meeting held after the 2004 Insight Conference where the results of the survey were discussed. Agreement was reached that an iTUG would be beneficial, as an independent forum where Talis customers could exchange experience and bring matters of concern to the attention of Talis Information Ltd.

The 1st Annual General meeting of the Talis User Group was held at the Talis Insight Conference on 15 November 2005. At this meeting the constitution of the User Group was ratified and the committee members elected.

Elected committee members hold posts for two years and as the re-formed iTUG is two years old the following posts are up for re-election: Chair, Deputy Chair and Communications Officer. If you would like to nominate anyone for election to any of these posts please inform Carol Thompson as soon as possible. Please make sure that the person you are nominating is happy for you to do so.

In addition, some slight changes have been made to the iTUG Constitution and these will need to be agreed by members at the AGM. The changes were made mainly to add consistency of the terms iTUG and ILS/LMS and to clarify a quorate.

The Committee members are:

Chair Melanie Keady m.e.keady@derby.ac.uk
Vice Chair Leigh Richardson leigh.richardson@sunderland.ac.uk
Communications Officer Carol Thompson carol.thompson@northumbria.ac.uk
Minutes Secretary Dawn Petherick d.petherick@bham.ac.uk
Membership Secretary Vicky Mitchell vicky.mitchell@merthyr.gov.uk

 

Regional groups have now been established in the North, the Midlands, Ireland, Wales and the South to compliment the longer standing Scottish User Group and HUGS (Higher Education User Group in the South). For further information about these groups please contact the relevant person in the following table. Contact any member of the Committee for further information on the Talis User Group. We would be particularly interested in hearing from anyone willing to be involved in forming an Eastern and Home Counties regional user group.

Regional Group Chair/Contact Email address
Ireland TBC TBC
Midlands Judy Reed j.reed@worc.ac.uk
Northern Jacy Clark J.Clark@tees.ac.uk
Scottish Scott Simpson scott.simpson@eastrenfrewshire.gov.uk
Southern Jenny Treherne J.Treherne@surrey.ac.uk
Wales Vicky Mitchell vicky.mitchell@merthyr.gov.uk

 

As well as the Talis Forums there are two jiscmail discussion lists that Talis customers can join:

LIS-TALIS – a general open discussion list used mainly by system managers and other staff as well as Talis to discuss technical issues. To join contact Dawn Petherick d.petherick@bham.ac.uk

LIS-TUG – a closed discussion list for Talis User Group members only to discuss general Talis related issues. To join contact Carol Thompson carol.thompson@northumbria.ac.uk

Talis Information Ltd has proved to be very supportive of the concept of an independent iTUG and have agreed that:

  • Talis Account Managers attend regional meetings if requested to do so.
  • The iTUG AGM forms a scheduled part of future Talis Insight Conferences.
  • Talis Information provide access to web space, for use by the iTUG, from their web site.
  • The Chair of the iTUG Committee is a member of the Talis Advisory Board and so has input into product development.
  • Talis Information endorsed their support for iTUG by formally announcing its formation at Insight 2005.

Upcoming Regional Group Meetings:

All customers are welcome to attend, simply contact your regional representatives to contribute to the agenda and confirm your attendance. The calendar includes:

Scotland - 13th March hosted by Perth & Kinross. Contact Scott Simpson at scott.simpson@eastrenfrewshire.gov.uk

Wales and Ireland - 15th April hosted through video conferencing. Contact Vicky Mitchell at resources.librarian@merthyr.gov.uk

Midlands -16th April hosted by Harper Adams. Contact Judy Reed at j.reed@worc.ac.uk

Northern Region -12th May hosted by Lancashire County Library Service, Preston. Contract Tracey Temple at tracey.temple@unn.ac.uk

Southern Region -14th May hosted by Surrey University. Contact Jenny Treherne at j.treherne@surrey.ac.uk

 

ITUG AGM, 7th November 2007

This took place on the second day of the Talis Insight Conference in Birmingham.

Download the ITUG AGM Agenda

The Independent Talis User Group recently carried out a survey of Talis customers – the objectives being:

  • To determine if the communication issues raised in the 2006 survey were still an issue for customers
  • To gather information relating to any dissatisfaction related to Talis services and bring this to Talis’ attention.

The survey report was completed in November and shared with those people who attended the AGM at Insight and also forwarded to Talis for their response. The full survey report with the response from Talis is now available.

The ITUG Committee are preparing a reply to the Talis response – if there is anything you feel should be included in this please contact carol.thompson@unn.ac.uk Thank you to those who completed the questionnaire.