While this is a technology project, it is your staff that will ensure the success of the project.  Please review the staffing plan created during the planning phase. 

Funding will greatly impact your desired level of staffing. As you identify your team members, consider that you may be able to hire staff as full time or part time employees, or as consultants --or you may be able to reassign some duties to your existing team. In order to hire staff, advertise previously prepared job descriptions, interview candidates, and select qualified staff.  Use your professional networks to inform others of the open position.  If hiring consultants, begin the process of selecting them and writing contracts with deliverables. If you plan to share or “borrow” staff members from stakeholder groups, finalize these arrangements.  For reassigned or borrowed staff members working on several different projects, it is important to establish a schedule that clearly outlines the amount of time that should be spent on each project and related duties.  We suggest that you pay particular attention to the need for documentation as a deliverable. Particularly when personnel perform technical tasks, it is very important that they provide sufficient documentation to allow a “new” person to update or revise the function at a future date.

Assemble your project team as completely as possible before implementing the repository.  If you are unable to fully staff your repository project for any reason (e.g., budget issues, lack of suitable candidates), readjust your staffing plan.  However, it is important to be able to articulate suitable staffing needs for success.  In the states of Florida and Georgia, initial staffing has been accomplished by one or two individuals with assistance from institutional staff or OPS workers from higher education -- due to limited budgets.  While this is not ideal, these states have still managed to move forward and launch their repositories.