Interlude: Library Instruction

June 18, 2010 at 9:57 pm (creativity, databases, day in the life, digital divide, humor, intellectual freedom, personal, philosophizing, presentations, professional development, religion, traditional library services, Uncategorized)

You know you’re a hopeless library nerd when you willingly spend a Friday evening talking to library school students about what it’s like to work in a public library.  It’s a good kind of hopeless, though, the kind that reaffirms what you’re doing and why.

Because it was a library instruction class, I spent a goodish chunk of time talking about instruction in a public library — much of which is impromptu, on-the-fly, and tailored to individual needs, requiring great flexibility and versatility on the staff’s part.  I expressed this, of course, as “making it up as you go along,” because that’s what you do.  Being able to do this, though, requires excellent public speaking skills and a broad knowledge base.  Training as an improv comic, if you can get it, certainly doesn’t hurt either.

But I talked about a lot of other things, too, under the broad heading of “a day in the life of a public librarian.”  I took the radical step of nixing PowerPoint, handouts, and canned remarks.  Instead, I spent most of this week quietly seeking inner guidance about what the right things to say might be, and spoke off the cuff, trusting that the words I would need would show up when I needed them.

[If that sounded scary to you, keep in mind that I've been performing in public since I was five years old.  With experience, you get more comfortable winging stuff.]

The most important thing I’ve learned about any kind of speaking, formal or otherwise, is that to have maximum impact, it should be done with love.  It can be tough love, but the love’s got to be there.  Otherwise you’re just a noisy gong, a tinkling cymbal.  That is, I’ve heard.  I’ve had plenty of opportunities this week to think about loving and non-loving speech, to practice one and to apologize for the other.  All of this, I think, contributed to the presentation going well tonight.

Because I’m not a complete maverick, I did scribble down a short list of things I wanted to make sure I said, under the umbrella of “Positive aspects of public library work.”  I wanted to make sure that they knew it was worth it:  the jobhunting, and the subpar salaries, and the budget crises, and the “paying your dues” phase.  Here’s what I came up with:

You learn something new every day.  I’m sure that’s true in other kinds of libraries as well.  However, the serendipity quotient goes up in a public libraries because you never know what the lesson will be, or what guise it will come in.  Sometimes it’s a book title or random fact; sometimes it’s a lesson in patience or kindness.

The dress code is made of awesome.  I can, and do, look “nice” most of the time.  However, I’m deeply grateful that “nice” for me can run the gamut from business casual to capris/t-shirt/cardigan to Victorian goth.  It’s also nice to have that flexibility when, say, water starts pouring down from the ceiling, and you have to help move a whole lot of reference books very fast. 

Performance feedback is frequent and somewhat more relaxed.  I don’t live in dread of my performance appraisal because I get continuous feedback and when I feel I want more, I’m comfortable asking for it.  Also, given that so much of my work is visible, I usually get immediate results.  If something is working or not working, you’ve got empirical evidence to keep going or, conversely, stop.  See also, no tenure file.  If I pursue certain kinds of projects and opportunities, it’s because I think they’re interesting, not because they will make or break my chances of success.

Every day you get a chance to prove that not everything’s on the internet.  The digital divide is real.  The need for, and love of, print materials are real.  The shortcomings of e-books and databases are real, especially when it comes to pre-1990s journal articles (to say nothing of the architecture journals from 1919 sitting in phase boxes down on first stack).  Preservation and conservation concerns are real.  Microfilm still has a viable role to play. Every day in public libraries, we write that book.  Would that the conventional wisdom-mongers were listening.

There are more opportunities to be flexible and implement new ideas.  This is more of a theory based on heresay, but when I listen to some of the complaints my academic peers have, I thank my lucky stars I work somewhere where nobody’s ever going to disrespect me because I don’t have a longer string of letters after my name.  There are fewer boundaries between kinds of workers, and people are less attached to titles and more attached to what you can actually produce.  That makes for a lot less emphasis on things like “personal branding” and a lot more emphasis on authentic personality (which is good, because brands are for cattle, et c’est tout.).

And last, but certainly not least:

When you screw up on the job in a public library, gallons of oil don’t go gushing into the Gulf of Mexico.  This is, of course, my flippant way of pointing out that public library work contributes, on the whole, positive things to the world.  We don’t crank out useless products or generate pollution; instead, we are repositories of learning, wisdom, values, hope and, sometimes, good old-fashioned fun.   That is, quite frankly, the best thing ever, and I wouldn’t trade it for all the little gold statuettes in the world, Oscar fantasies notwithstanding.

So, yeah, I’m a public library nerd, card-carrying, cardigan-wearing, shall-not-be-shushed, world without end, amen.  But it’s me and my kind who will carry the day, in the long run.  For three things last always:  library faith, library hope, and library love.  And that last one’s the greatest.

Or so I’ve heard.  Do you feel the public library love?  Have I gone past denial now, straight on to delusion?   Or am I just coming down from “speaker’s high”?

Holla back.

Reading Today:  The Thyroid Solution, Ridha Arem, M.D. One in ten women have thyroid disorders and don’t realize it; could you be one of them?  A comprehensive primer overview of the mental and physical aspects of thyroid disease and its various treatment options.

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(Data)base! How low can you go?

October 21, 2009 at 5:15 pm (access, collection development, databases, innovation, leadership, management, Uncategorized)

Still waiting to hear from the state what’s going on with POWER library.  My sources tell me it might be a while.  And, as that veritable sage Tom Petty once put it, “The waiting is the hardest part.”

The plus side to waiting, though, is that you have plenty of time to scheme plan and agitate collaborate.  It’s always good to have a plan, and it’s about time you heard a little more about some of the fine people I work with, and what we do.

I will do my best to make these topics as “sexy” as possible, but sometimes there’s just no way to dress up a skunk:  librarians care, and very deeply, about electronic resources.  Patrons tend not to know, or care, how the magicians do their tricks…until the money runs out, and resources are cut.  I provide this information anyway, in the hopes that it will be useful to someone.

Allegheny County Databases 101

Library users in Allegheny County have access to three levels of database service, provided in different ways.  Let’s take it from the top down.

Pennsylvania POWER Library

This is the suite of electronic resources that is available to all libraries in the commonwealth. It is currently paid for by the state of Pennsylvania, but based on the 57.1% reduction to the line item that includes these resources, its future is uncertain.  These databases are selected and purchased by either the state library or a statewide committee of library staff, I believe–someone please correct me if this is not so.  It’s a tad shrouded in mystery, and I’d like a little more transparency on the process, myself…

EREC Databases

The Electronic Resources Evaluation Committee is a committee of the Allegheny County Library Association.  It is composed of librarians who represent different geographical regions within the county, as well as staff from the Electronic Information Network, a/k/a EIN, which currently handles the statistics reporting and tech troubleshooting for countywide electronic resources.   EREC purchases are funded from a variety of sources, which makes deciding issues about their administration (including tech support and stats-keeping) a touch complicated.

All databases selected by EREC are available to all library cardholders in Allegheny County, regardless of which library issued their card.  The committee meets once a month to decide which products to keep or cancel, discuss other electronic products on the market, set up trials, discuss the outcome of trials, and generally keep tabs on the state of library electronica. 

Individual Library Subscriptions

Each of the county’s libraries–and there are quite a lot that are not part of the CLP system–has the option to purchase individual database subscriptions with their collection development budgets.

CLP has its own Database Selection Committee (DBSC), which is made up of representatives from both Main Library and the branches, who make decisions about what, if any resources, we want to buy for CLP cardholders on top of what the county and state provide. Individual subscriptions have pros and cons, which we will examine more in detail when we discuss the patrons’-eye view of all this.

Everybody with me so far?  All righty then:

Chain Lightning

When all is working well, this three-tiered system actually functions more like an equilateral triangle, with all limbs in perfect balance, resting on a solid base.  If Bob Ross were here to paint it, he might call it a happy little triangle.

In our current situation, however, with steep budget cuts to POWER that could very well eliminate the majority of the subscription databases, a chain reaction has begun.

The current posse of fine folks on EREC are currently creating a survey, meant to be distributed to staff countywide, so they can provide feedback on what resources are key for them and their patrons.  A patron-friendly version of the survey, which will appear on the county database page, will glean info from library users.

The surveys will, hopefully, tell EREC a few important things it needs to know, namely:

  1. Which databases are most useful to library staff.
  2. Which databases are most useful to patrons.
  3. Which POWER library databases EREC should try to purchase if the state drops their subscriptions.
  4. Which EREC databases we should cancel to make room to pick up POWER subscriptions.

Do you see the bind that crops up there with points 3 and 4?  Given that the public library subsidy was cut 20% statewide, chances are good that EREC will have LESS money to spend in 2010, it will boil down to canceling some resources in order to save others.

Good times.

Whatever choices EREC makes will trickle down to individual libraries.  If, for example, a particular database is canceled countywide, each individual library may choose to research pricing, and make a purchase for its own cardholders.  Given that many vendors do their pricing by population served and/or number of cardholders, electronic resources are less expensive the smaller your service area gets.

The only problem there is that it creates little “service ghettos,” in which the quality of electronic access varies widely depending on how much collection money a library has to dedicate to databases.  This is what we library professionals like to call “uncool.”

The Patron Perspective

Patrons don’t care who buys what, what standards they use, or where the monies come from.  They simply want what they want.  This is human nature, and I am at peace with it.

Besides, look at it from the average patron’s point of view.  To her/him, does it matter who bought what for whom?  Nope.  S/he just wants the information, not an object lesson on service models.  And when s/he asks why s/he has access to some databases and not others, there’s currently no way to answer this question without boring the living daylights out of the poor patron.

If I ruled the world…

As you may have gathered, I think about these issues quite a bit.  I’ve been immersed in this stuff for about two years now, so I’ve certainly had plenty of time to consider it.  I’ve served on the DBSC and EREC, and then suddenly found myself as chair of both. 

From a certain perspective, this makes the job a lot easier:  when I get pricing for things, I can measure twice and cut once.  However, wearing multiple hats also forces me to think about everything twice as long and twice as hard.  What’s really in everybody’s best interests?  What is the solution that will be best for my library and its patrons, as well as other libraries and their patrons?

I’ve come to the conclusion that, in most cases, it really makes more sense to buy databases on a countywide level, especially databases that give access to full-text journal articles.  It seems ridiculous to have an army of little full-text fiefdoms – better to make the purchase on a wider scale, making as many journal articles available to as many people as possible.

In a way, this is not unlike the argument for opening up the gifted curriculum to students of all levels.  Trips to the ballet, and chess lessons, and visits to art museums, are just the ticket for the high-achievers.  But perhaps, if the “regular” or “under-performing” kids had those opportunities as well, it would cause them to flourish and grow?  While every library should be free to spend its individual collection budgets as it sees fit, I can think of very few situations where a boutique database is needed.

Obviously, there are exceptions, and sometimes pricing on a countywide scale is prohibitive.  Why shouldn’t a library pick up that would please its patrons if countywide pricing is not feasible?  Still, if I ruled the world, I’d do a complete overhaul of the current three-tier system.  Here are some of the changes I’d make:

  1. There would be a countywide database coordinator whose sole responsibility would be the care and feeding of the EREC databases.
  2. That person’s duties would include, but not be limited to:  researching products, designing and producing promotional brochures, scheduling–and, if necessary, teaching–training sessions, creating Camtasia and/or video tutorials for staff and patrons, maintaining an electronic resources blog to keep everybody in the county abreast of electronica, serving as liaison to EREC and whomever selects state resources, as well as being a consultant for libraries on an individual basis.
  3. And speaking of the state, a huge part of this person’s job would be to let some sunshine in on just exactly how those POWER databases are selected.  They’d also be responsible for promtion of and training on state-provided resources.
  4. If, after closer examination it was felt that was the best solution, this person would also be responsible for database tech support and statistics gathering for all the county libraries.
  5. Given the scope of 2 & 3, this person should be compensated A Very Lot.   Perhaps not as much as a director, but definitely more than the average librarian. 
  6. A subscription to The Charleston Advisor should be part of this person’s benefits package. Either that or the agency that employed him/her should pick up the tab.

You can see why I won’t be put in charge of anything anytime soon.  I can just hear you now:  “Where, foolish dreamer, is there money for that in this current economic climate?”

My only response on that point is, you get what you pay for.

If you have made it to the end of this post with your eyeballs still firmly lodged in their sockets, I salute your fortitude.  Blathering about all this has been helpful for me because I have been asked to give not one, but two, presentations about databases within the next few months, and spilling it out in a blog entry has been insanely helpful in terms of brainstorming what I want to say.

Comments / questions / clarification?  Let me know.

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Dances With Vendors: Confessions of a Clumsy Alchemist

August 27, 2009 at 5:43 pm (databases, ethics, Facebook, humor, leadership, Learning 2.0, management, personal, philosophizing, presentations, professional development, Uncategorized)

Your alchemist is not the most graceful person on the planet.   Ever since my childhood dance teacher suggested–not unkindly, mind you–that perhaps being a prima ballerina was not in my future, I’ve been a little leery of anything that requires physical coordination.  When I do dance, it’s either in a dark, crowded room where nobody’s really looking at me, or in the privacy of my own apartment, where I can lace up my Doc Martens, crank up something gothtastic on iTunes, and let ‘er rip.

Dancing with vendors is a slightly different proposition, but, I would argue, only slightly.  The same amount of grace and dexterity is required, and there’s certainly plenty of sweat involved.  Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to pick the best products and services for your library.  This involves setting good boundaries, being able to say no without closing a door to future interactions, should your needs change, communicating your needs clearly, and, from time to time,  letting poor behavior roll off your back.

All things considered, strapping on a pair of pointe shoes again sometimes seems preferable!  That being said, though, I’ve been practicing this particular form of dance for about two years now, and I think I’m starting to get the hang of the basics.  Maybe in a few more years, if this sort of thing continues to be part of my responsibilities, I’ll be able to execute the pas de deux with the best of ‘em (like our former deputy director, who was, arguably, the Martha Graham of database negotiation).

Here are some behaviors that work well for me in the sense of keeping me relatively sane when doing the vendor dance.  I’d also like to offer some suggestions to vendors so that our dances together can be more enjoyable for both of us.

Dance Steps for Librarians

  1. Try scheduling vendor calls.  Your Outlook calendar can be your friend.  If your life is as busy as mine, you can’t always take a call when the vendor wants to talk…and yet, sometimes, you really will be interested in what they have to say.  Offer to schedule a time that’s convenient for you.  This cuts down on random calls, and lets vendors know you’re willing to dance.  If a vendor isn’t willing to work with you on your time, maybe it’s time to rethink that relationship.
  2. Learn to say no.  I know, I know.  If we could all figure this one out, the world would be a magical place full of sunshine and rainbows.  Still, the only way you’re going to get better at this is if you practice.  There are a million ways to say no, and many of them are kind.  “We’re going in a different direction right now” and “This doesn’t seem like the right solution for us at this time” are two examples.  There’s something to be said, as well, for the basic, “No thank you, we’re not interested right now.”  Pick your poison, but pick one (PA residents should feel free to invoke the state budget dilemma)!!
  3. Screen your calls.  This is a sticky wicket for me personally, because I don’t have a personal extension or voice mail.  I hate asking my colleagues to run interference for me and take messages, but the fact of the matter is this:  if you’re the vendor contact, and you take every single call that comes in for you, you will go stark raving mad in short order; in addition, you will never get anything else done.  If you can screen calls, do it!  If you can’t, talk to your boss and colleagues about what a good solution for your office might look like.
  4. Take calls when you can.  Vendors are human beings with a job to do, so you should treat them with the same respect you would ask for yourself.  That means actually taking their calls when you can.  If you aren’t interested in the product, see #2.  If you’re interested, but the timing isn’t right, say so, and suggest you talk again in X number of months, or next year, or next budget cycle. 
  5. Have FAQ information organized and ready.  Vendors often need to know certain things in order to quote us prices accurately.  Often this information includes population served, number of cardholders, city/county population, and/or number of public computers available.  Write these things on an index card and keep it handy.  That way you can make the most of your phone time by being prepared for questions.
  6. Be able to articulate specifically what your users want and need.  By the same token, there are certain things you’re looking for in a product.  Make a list of these and ask about them right away.  If the vendor cannot fulfill your needs, it’s better to find out right up front.  Then you can go straight to #2 for the polite “no.”
  7. Don’t take bad behavior personally.  Selling something for a living–and some folks are solely on commission–can really stink, especially during these economic times.  If you’re working with a vendor who dances clumsily, please try to remember that they did not get up this morning hell-bent on ruining your workday.  A vendor’s job is to sell you things.  That’s just how it is.  If their behavior bugs you, please go find a colleague to vent to, or watch a funny kittens video on YouTube, or make an ice cream run, or whatever will get you through the day.  Just don’t take it personally, because, quite frankly, it isn’t.

Dance Steps for Vendors

Dear library product vendors:  Your job is a tough one, and I know I wouldn’t do it very well, so I appreciate the hard work you do.  Here are some suggestions I would like to make that could improve our relationship all around, and make for better business transactions.

  1. Please don’t send me presents.  I don’t know you very well, and getting a gift from somebody I don’t know is a little awkward and doesn’t feel ethically correct.  On top of that, giving me a present is not likely to influence my purchase decisions, especially if your product isn’t what my patrons need right now.  I’d much rather the money you spent on presents went toward improving your product, and making sure all your employees get a fair wage.
  2. Please don’t call me 3 times in 30 minutes.  If I can’t take your call, it’s because I have another committment.  Working in a large public library is delightfully insane, and it doesn’t make for predictable phone availability.  Repeat calls in a short period of time doesn’t make me enthusiastic about your persistence or your product.  I know you’ve been burned on this one before, but I’d appreciate it if you could trust me.
  3. Please learn to spell and pronounce my name.  It’s a little tricky, I’ll grant you, but it’s not like they call me Chasmodeus Czyrwilmeninczky.  I accept that I’ll probably have to explain it once or twice.  Once we hit three times, however, it just seems like you’re not listening.
  4. Please don’t write me long, friendly e-mails full of chit-chat if we’ve just met.  If I’ve contacted you for information, I’d like just that information.  I know that the current business emphasis on making the customer feel valuable has resulted in a lot of friendly gestures designed to make us feel comfortable with you as people.  A good working relationship, however, is built over time.  If I buy your product, and we work together a lot, a level of informality will grow naturally.  Being overly folksy right out of the gate is somewhat off-putting, however. 
  5. Please answer the questions we actually have.  I know you’re really proud of your product, and you want to tell me everything about how it’s going to change my life.  But if I have a question, I’d really like the answer to just that question, and not an explanation of all the other great things.  If I ask about a feature you don’t have, don’t tell me about the other four features you DO have.  If I have questions about those features, I will ask you.
  6. Please don’t take “no” personally.  If your product isn’t right for us, or we have to cancel your product due to budget cuts, or whatever reason we’re saying “no” at this time…it’s not personal.  You didn’t do anything wrong, per se, and you should take our “no” at face value.  Calling repeatedly to find out the “real” reason why we canceled is kind of stalkerish, and doesn’t inspire a change of heart.
  7. If we ask for a trial, please don’t offer us a live demo.  This is especially applicable to vendors who are just now discovering the library market, and don’t know public libraries or their users very well.  We want to get our hands on your product and playtest it against the realities we face every day.  Live demos can be interesting, but there isn’t always time in the day for them.  On top of that, a lot of time can be wasted in a live demo trying to get you to cut to the chase.  I know you’ve worked very hard on your presentation, but there are certain things we look for that only a good playtesting will assess accurately.  If we have questions, or want a live demo, we will ask for them.  Pinky swear.

Now, all of that being said?  I work with some really cool vendors.  I’m Facebook friends with one of our reps, and she’s been insanely helpful in terms of training, answering questions, tech support, etc.  She also understands the boundaries of our professional relationship and doesn’t feel the need to comment on every conversation I have.  There’s another vendor with whom I wish we were doing business (stupid PA budget) because she’s perfected the art of knowing how often to call to see if our situation has changed, and she’s clearly done her homework on public libraries because she knows what’s important to us and what’s not.  Doing the vendor dance doesn’t have to be a hair-pulling, migraine-headache inducing experience; it can be pleasant, cvil, calm, and–dare I say it?–even fun on occasion.   It only works, though, when we all strive to dance well.

As ever, I would like to hear your take on these things, and I’m open to other perspectives.  Do you work with vendors at your library?  How’s that working out for you?  Do you have any tips for an intermediate, still slightly clumsy, alchemist?

Oh, and I wasn’t kidding about the Docs or the dancing.  Might I suggest A Life Less Lived? To see if it would be your cup of tea, here’s a representative sample:

Happy dancing, and I’ll see you next week.

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You can’t spell intern without “ni!”: Stuff I’ve learned.

August 25, 2009 at 4:28 pm (blogging, collection development, creativity, databases, humor, leadership, management, professional development, Uncategorized, web resources)

If that subject header had you scratching your noggin, click here for elucidation.  For the rest of you, on with the story!

For the past few months, my workload rose to such a pitch that half-joking plea for an intern had become part of my regular rotation of requests.  Call it manifestation or plain old nagging, but when an opportunity appeared mid-summer, yours truly was given an intern…er, 1/2 an intern.  In Solomonic fashion, Tanya split her time here at Main between the stacks and shelving department, and helping me with tasks in Ref. Services.

Having her around has been educational.  For one thing, Tanya’s not planning to make librarianship a career, though she was intrigued that there were such things as medical libraries and librarians.  Working with her has forced me to re-examine everything I do, because I know I’m going to have to explain/justify it to a non-library person.  It’s also forced me to be even better organized, because I want to make her time here useful and educational – that means having tasks ready, and not just tasks, but a variety of tasks, so that she gets a well-rounded experience.

On top of that, I’ve had plenty of opportunities to model that one behavior I hope to someday perfect–the art of dropping everything and paying attention to her when she has a question–as well as other behaviors worth having in the bag of tricks:  patience, a sense of humor, problem-solving skills, diplomacy, flexibility and creativity.   We had a teachable moment just this morning, in which I was having difficulty exporting data from Millennium Create List, and I had to ask one of my peers for a reminder/refresher on the spot–not sure if that was more educational for her or for me!  But still, the point was made:  even the nominal leader gets stuck, and needs to ask for help.

Here are some of the things Tanya’s helped me with so far:

  • mass mailings
  • weeding (literal and digital)
  • creating digital booklists
  • creating displays
  • database evaluations [seeing how a non-library person perceived our electronic resources was insanely valuable]
  • collection development (print and digital)
  • searching for missing items
  • shadowing at the reference desk

She also wrote a very nice Eleventh Stack post describing her internship, both at Main and at the Carrick branch, where she spent the first part of her summer. If the point of internships is to educate folks on just how important library service is to the community, I’d have to say “mission accomplished” on this one. I can’t really take the credit for that, per se, but I’m glad I played a small part in helping her have a good library experience.

As for me, I was a lot more comfortable in a leadership role this time than I was last time, when I supervised the Help Desk workers. Funny what time and, hopefully, a little maturity, can do! I am still not 100% convinced it’s the direction in which I want to take my career, but I now know that I could become a good manager if I were willing to work at it. So the real question is, what would make me happy?  Although I’m pro-money, and fond of regular meals, I’m a little more concerned with other levels on Maslow’s hierarchy of needs at this point in my life.

If and when I ever get a handle on that, I’ll let you know. And if that last paragraph shocked you, you should hear about my backup plan just in case this whole librarian thing doesn’t work out. No, not the goat farm – that’s the retirement plan.

I have a few writing topics I’m going to defer until September, as they revolve around specific timed events.  There are a few things saved in my newsreader that I want to warble about, but for now, let’s leave it open-ended.  Your alchemist also takes requests, so if there’s something you’d like me to write about, do leave a comment.

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Soylent Green (day in the life, part II)

July 31, 2009 at 3:33 pm (blogging, creativity, databases, day in the life, leadership, management, personal, philosophizing, professional development, traditional library services, Uncategorized)

Fables of the Reconstruction

The problem with part I of this “day in the life” recap is that, despite my best efforts, it still doesn’t capture what passes for normal around here. Monday was very tech-heavy, which could lead to the mistaken impression that I get to play with cool 2.0 stuff all day long while my colleagues are sweating away at the refdesk. Not so.

A normal day around here also usually involves a lot more walk-and-talks. This is a term used to describe the state of affairs when one is conducting business while walking around, as seen on Sports Night and The West Wing. Teamwork and collaboration are the order of the day around here, and while there are many thngs I do independently, like buy books in my subject area and tot up those darned database stats, there are also a lot of things that only come together when my compatriots and I team up and form Voltron.  I also get more phone calls these days, and my presence is required at more meetings.

On top of that, I’m forever charging into people’s offices with a crazy idea, philosophical question, or shameless request (how do you think I got an intern? Ask and get!). The two people I consult regularly — my boss and one of the other senior librarians — are great models for leadership because no matter how many times I go in to talk to them, they stop whatever they’re doing and give me their full attention. They do this for everyone else on staff, too, and I’ve tried to emulate this behavior because I think it’s a valuable one.

Another dimension of the new normal around here is the ongoing advocacy effort. There’s a staff blog and wiki where everyone can contribute their ideas and ask questions, and I log in to read these and contribute whenever I can. It’s comforting to me to see the organization use emerging technologies for the common good, to keep everyone on the same page, spread accurate information, etc., and no matter how our particular situation turns out, at least we’re using all the tools at our disposal.  This morning, in particular, it was amazing to log in to the advocacy wiki and see all the great ideas coming from people all over the system. 

In other words, library service is people!  It’s all people!  Whether the service benefits a peer or a patron, everything I do on a so-called normal day revolves around helping a real person.  And that’s often chaotic, messy, and hard to pin down.

Zone defense

I’d hoped to type up my refdesk observations from the other day, but, life happens.  I know they’re on my desk somewhere.  Problem is, so are a lot of other things.  Like small press catalogs, to-do lists, piles of books, spreadsheet printouts, booklists, newspapers, etc.  The rest of my time this week has been occupied with totting up 2nd quarter database stats – I’m about 3/4 done – and preparing for the meeting we had around 1 p.m. today.  It went well, I think.  I’m getting more comfortable with planning and running meetings, and actual work is getting done, which is the goal.  There’s almost nothing worse than a meeting that’s a waste of everybody’s time.

So, that was a day – literally and philosophcially – in my library life.  It’s crawling chaos.  It’s madcap zany.  It’s headache-inducing, spirit-lifting, skippy-dancing, goat-farm-dreaming, puzzle-pondering goodness.  I feel very fortunate to be here, and I wouldn’t change a single thing…except, maybe, to have one whole wall in my office that was nothing but whiteboard.  That would be pretty cool.

Things I want to talk about if I ever get 5 seconds:

  • Having an intern
  • Book reviewing
  • Why Walt Crawford is awesome
  • Gen X leadership

The reach must exceed the grasp.  Isn’t that what library blogs are for?

I’ll be on staycation next week, though.  The play I’m in goes up Friday and Saturday, so I’ll be focusing on delivery and diction rather than databases and desk work.  I maybe might chime in with some of the more abstract, bigger-picture ruminations I normally don’t have time for, but that’s a longshot-darkhorse prospect.

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Sorkinesque (a day in the life, part I)

July 29, 2009 at 6:04 pm (ALA Annual 2009, blogging, collection development, conferences, databases, day in the life, humor, leadership, management, news, personal, philosophizing, professional development, reader's advisory, traditional library services, Twitter, Uncategorized)

Intro/Backstory
Yes, it really did take me that long to finish and post those meeting minutes!  The reasons why will become apparent shortly.  But first, some backstory.

Last week various colleagues posted the news in various forums that another one of those “day in the library life” blogging events was going to take place.  I love those things.  I never sign up for them, though, because, realistically, if I stopped to write down everything I was doing in a given moment, I’d never get anything done.  And then I thought, well, what better way to demonstrate that a normal day in my life is very much like an episode of Aaron Sorkin’s Sports Night than to take a crack at it?

[Those of you who don't know from Sports Night are cordially invited to check out the DVD and see what all the fuss is about - even though starting with anything other than the pilot might seem counterintuitive, I highly recommend starting with "Dear Louise," "Shoe Money Tonight," and "Small Town" to get a feel for the characters, their workplace, and their relationship to each other. It's a wonderful show about a close-knit group of professionals who are extremely passionate about what they do, to the point of appearing like complete ciphers to folks who don't work in their field. Sound like any other professional folks you know? :) ]

So, without further ado, here is a reconstruction, based on my frantically scribbled notes, of everything that took place in my library life on Monday, July 27, 2009.

Library Alchemy: A Day in the Life

Part I – Off-desk

9:30:  Check the desk schedule, add my desk shifts to my Outlook calendar.  Exchange witty banter with colleagues.  Laugh self into pancreatic pain.

9:40:  Finish up ALA expense report and bring it to my boss.  Chat with boss about database stuff, which segues into a philosophical discussion of future staffing models for the reference department.  Return to office.  Field questions from colleague about the exact same stuff was just discussing with boss.  More philosophy ensues.

10:00 Open up e-mail.  Answer the time-sensitive stuff.  Answer flurry of questions about Twitter and HootSuite.  Get another chunk of the Twitter gang signed up with HootSuite accounts and schedule trainings for those who want it.  Discover the “most popular Tweets” feature in HootSuite and squee over it.  Put aside a whack of database reference cards to give to a branch colleague at the Friday meeting.  More e-mail with various blog staffers in an attempt to coordinate some guest posts for September. Decline to take a call from a vendor and proceed to feel guilty about it.

A colleague drops by to check in with me about the school tour I’m giving this afternoon.  The group  has changed its mind several times on whether or not it wants catalog and database training.  The colleague and I decide that asking them what they want is the best solution.  Photocopy catalog and database training handouts for tour group.  Run over training in my head while at the photocopier.  A colleague walks by, greeting me with the mysterious phrase, “PEANUT SAUCE!”  I respond with the countersign, “SCALLIONS!”  Tamp down nervousness about giving catalog and database training, which never seems to go away no matter how many tours and trainings I do.  Accept that fear is normal.  Recite the Litany Against Fear anyway.

11:00 Break time. Decide to take a walk around the building. Ask colleague how her Friday evening presentation went. Ask another colleague about bloggish things. Say hello and good morning to countless other colleagues. Receive a lovely gift: an inspirational photo of a dandelion with the phrase “I release all that does not serve me” written on it. Hang photo on bulletin board.

11:15 Head over to book order. Discover that all of the non-fiction books mentioned in the 7/26 New York Times Book Review have either already been purchased, or are on order. Do vague skippy victory dance. Dive into the other ordering tools with gusto.  Decide that I should probably call back the vendor whose call I dodged and just tell her “thanks, no thanks” right up front. Get vendor’s voice mail. Quietly rejoice. Deliver polite, professional message and hang up, feeling 100s of pounds lighter.

12:00 Lunch. Chat with colleague in lunchroom about violins and music librarianship. Consume leftover peanut noodles with zest and start reading Work the System. Approve wholeheartedly of its emphasis on systems thinking and personal responsibility. Speculate on how its principles could be applied to my work life. Finish peanut noodles and head to the post office to mail a package to my mom. Study lines for the play I’m currently acting in while stuck in line at the post office.

1:00  Log into Eleventh Stack. Clean out spam filter, look at stats. Start rearranging widgets in sidebar based on a conversation taking place on the blog team distribution list. Start draft of next week’s blog post. Proofread a few scheduled posts. Read the post du jour and marvel again at how many awesome, creative people I’m surrounded with.

Log into the library’s Twitter account. Check for new followers. Block spam followers. Read followers’ tweets. Make mental note to remind everybody to use #pittsburgh in their tweets. Ping the rest of the Twitter team about HootSuite signup and training.

2:00 Meet the school tour group in the teen department. Immediately lose all normal vision when contact lens slides off center. Attempt several times to correct this subtly. Fail miserably. Start tour anyway, blind. Ignore rude noises produced by high school males and charitably assume that they are involuntary. Give tour of first and second floors, with special emphasis on Job and Career Center, based on group leader’s interests.

Ask about catalog and database training. Teacher says, “Whatever you think is best.” Decide to give the best catalog and database training ever and lead students to computer lab. Turn on projector. Wait. Fiddle with projector, silently coaxing it to cooperate. Decide projector has developed selective deafness. Give training without projector, using the computer at the lab attendant’s desk. Give thanks once again for theater and improv training.

3:00 Reassure long line of patrons waiting outside computer lab that yes, they can use the computers now. Check e-mail and discover that the wireless is down. Discover, also, that there are questions about my ALA reimbursement form. Silently consider starting a goat farm.

Start planning for Friday’s database committee meeting. Finish writing up June EREC meeting minutes, send to group, and post to ACLA wiki. Skim newsreader. Read an article that makes my heart sink and e-mail it to pertinent (and impertinent) parties. Skim “kept as new” items and decide to keep them marked because someday I will pay them the full attention they deserve, really!

Run downstairs to get coffee. Run into teen patron at coffeeshop. Engage in casual, stealth readers’ advisory with said teen. Run into hard-to-schedule colleague and set up a training time that is technically after my regular work hours, but is the only thing that will fit her schedule. Run back upstairs to my office.

Make list of tasks for my intern to work on on Tuesday. Walk down the hall to resolve the questions about my ALA reimbursement. Notice that the hallway smells strongly of french fries. Observe to colleague that, if the library were a musical, it would be at this point that we all burst into song about the joy of french fries. Stand still with colleague for a few seconds and imagine what this would sound like. Clear up questions about ALA reimbursement. Walk back to my office, inhaling deeply and smiling to self.

See? And we haven’t even made it to the reference desk yet! That deserves its own special installment, which I hope to deliver on Friday. Stay tuned!

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Marketing, Advocacy, and T.S. Eliot

June 9, 2009 at 5:19 pm (creativity, databases, philosophizing, professional development)

I’m usually not scheduled for the reference desk on Tuesdays (sniffle), so I spend my time catching up on committee work and other extended projects.  Today I’d set aside some time to read the EREC binder, because if I’m going to chair a countywide committee, I want to make sure I know the history (fairly reasonable, no?).

Among many other useful things, I found a copy of Rivkah Sass’s 2002 article, Marketing the Worth of Your Library.  As I read it, it struck me how the debates in library marketing have changed very little in nine years!  We are still talking about:

  • “Library as place” vs. “24/7 access”
  • Librarians as marketers (or not)
  • Databases trumping Google
  • The true costs of “free”

The one thing that perplexes me is why some librarians are still reluctant to be marketers, given that we live and move and have our being in an age where hordes of people choose to brand themselves via blogs, Tweets, Facebook, etc.  How can you put so much delight and glee into crafting a digital presence, and still be gun-shy about marketing?

Maybe it’s the word “marketing,” which still has icky connotations for many of us.  We became librarians because we didn’t want to buy, sell or process anything, and the notion of selling democratic access to information can definitely leave a sour taste in one’s mouth.  Marketers, for many of us, are those unscrupulous folks featured in the film The Corporation, who actually studied nagging patterns in order to more effectively market to small children. And we don’t want to be identified with Those People.

 Marketing sounds so much better when we call it “advocacy,” doesn’t it?  The definition of the two words are strikingly similar,  to be sure.  A quick trip to OneLook renders the following definitions:

marketing: the commercial processes involved in promoting and selling and distributing a product or service.

advocacy: active support, especially the act of pleading or arguing for something.

Note that the main difference between the two concepts is the absence of “filthy lucre” and the presence of pleading.

I am writing with tongue in cheek, of course, because such debates amuse me more than anything else. Rather than get upset or argue about it, why not just accept and get cracking? Whether we like it or not, we are the public faces of our libraries, so we might as well take every opportunity to promote our products and services.

Maybe I just feel that way because it comes naturally to me. I don’t see how I can talk to patrons and NOT recommend an applicable database, or take the opportunity to talk about the state budget. It’s easy to advocate when you’re in love you believe in the service you’re promoting. I’m open to the possibility that I could be wrong – however, I’ve come to believe that, when it comes to differences of opinion in library world, the best position to take is T.S. Eliot’s: “Teach us to care, and not to care.” We should care enough to go to bat for our libraries, but we could probably stop caring about what the proper name for it should be. That way lies madness. Madness, I say!

I think about this stuff a lot because 1st quarter database stats were way down from last year, and that scares me. I refuse to accept the argument that goes, “Well, people Google these days, so why bother?” We should bother because the content of the subscription databases is, quite simply, better than the free web, especially when it comes to full-text journal articles. There are a million print pieces available via PA POWER’s librarian-only website, and from the vendors themselves. Now I just have to make the time to write up a million graphics requests, so they can be personalized with the library’s logo…

On a happier note, I’m told that 6 boxes of promotional materials from Mango Languages are winging their way toward me as I speak, so, huzzah for the path of least resistance! Vendors are really bending over backwards these days to make their products promotable, which makes everyone’s lives just a little bit easier.

On an extremely happy note, all those hard-core advocates who deluged their senators with e-mail, phone calls, and letters will be happy to learn that a little victory was won yesterday in the PA House Appropriations Committee meeting. I did my part not only by e-mailing my representatives, but also, with the blessing of my boss and The Other Powers That Be, inserting language on the database page that draws users’ attention to the budget situation – you can see it here (scroll down past the subject headings to “Access PA POWER Library”).

Back to my graphics requests. I may or may not get to post later this week, but if I do, I want to talk specifically about why Allegheny County’s public librarians should put their hats in the ring for the Emerging Leaders program this year.

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My Alchemical Romance (Library Career Fangirling)

June 5, 2009 at 12:54 pm (23ThingsN@, databases, Learning 2.0, Library 2.0, personal, philosophizing, Uncategorized)

Much of this week has been occupied with matters database-related.  Next week’s 23 Things ‘N @ module is dedicated to the role of databases in a 2.0 world – it’s a little more philosophical than some of the other activities, but what I’m hoping is that it will get a good conversation rolling, countywide, about these resources, and how we purchase, use, and promote them.

I’ve also been doing the negotiation dance to get Mango Languages up and running.  One of the challenges of working in teams and across departments is that you want to make sure all solutions are win-win, and that, if somebody has to “lose,” it shouldn’t be your patrons.  I have achieved my objectives, and Mango will go live countywide on Monday.  I am extremely grateful to everybody I get to work with for making this happen, and hope they’ll enjoy learning new languages, too.  I’m planning to start, myself, with Chinese, so that I can watch Firefly without subtitles. :)

So, yes, it’s been hectic this week.  However, the good feeling I get when I manage to accomplish objectives that will make our patrons happy is priceless, and worth any stress/drama it took to get there.  I’m literally sitting here, grinning like an idiot, because in how many professions do you get to work on things that are for the public good, and make people happy?   That’s really important to me as a librarian, and it’s one of the things that sustains me during the current tough economic times (the company and help of my sterling peers is another, of course).

In other words, being a librarian still knocks me out, all the darned time, no matter what.  I get this good feeling in my heart, like it’s growing and expanding, when a plan comes together.  I’m pretty sure I can’t be the only person in the profession who feels like that, but I wish I saw more of the sentiment in library blogs.  Or maybe I’m just reading the wrong library blogs.

Is anybody else still as much in love with the library profession as I am, despite the challenges?  If you’re moved to leave a comment, or write about this in your own blog, that would be fantastic.  If anybody starts singing “Kumbaya,” though, I will turn this meme around, and we will all go home with no ice cream. :)

Looking forward to hearing your thoughts, and hoping you have a pleasant weekend.  I’ll be back next week to talk a little more about library marketing and advocacy, since those twin bees have been buzzing around my bonnet for ages and ages, and are directly related to various projects I’m working on.

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Working Harder AND Smarter – Thursday Update

May 28, 2009 at 4:35 pm (23ThingsN@, blogging, collection development, databases, Emerging Leaders 2009, leadership, Learning 2.0, news, professional development, social justice, traditional library services, Twitter)

Did I say Wednesday?  That didn’t happen, clearly.  But, rather than let this blog become a bluesy litany of “where does the time go,” I’ll confine myself to a quick project update:

Collection development:  The one sane thing in my workday.  It’s nice to go through NYTBR and see you already have all the hot nonfiction either in the collection or on order.  Score!

Eleventh Stack:  Also holding steady.  Hit count is slightly down, but still above last year at this time.  It also mirrors last year’s slight decline.  I don’t mind fewer readers over the summer, as long as it’s part of a larger pattern.  Still, all the more reason to sit down and think of ways to kick it up a notch..

23 Things N’@:  Week 4 is all about wikis, and everybody’s happy!  The range of experience and abilities continues to educate me on how we can do this better next time.  Definitely a move to a tiered-activity system is in order, IMHO, something along the lines of beginner/intermediate/advanced, so that people have options to choose from according to their experience/comfort level. That being said, holy project success!

Twitter: I have mixed feelings about how this is going, and would like to write more about it at length.  Long story short, it’s an easily managed, low-maintenance project, but I don’t know if it’s achieving our objectives.  More time may be called for.  We shall see.

Database Stuff (CLP):  We haven’t met for a while because our new quarterly renewal schedule has made the committee process more efficient.  It’s time for 3rd-quarter renewals, though, and a look at 1st-quarter stats.  Plus, me being me, I have some wild and crazy ideas to throw at the committee to see what they think.  Secretly I want a database promotion task force.  I will pay for jackets that say “Database promotion task force,” if given free rein. :)

Database Stuff (EREC/ACLA): Good news!  The deal went through, and the county has purchased a subscription to Mango Languages.   Our patrons really miss Rosetta Stone, and for the life of me, I still don’t understand WHY they chose to stop selling the database to public libraries.  We are hoping, however, that Mango will fill this critical gap – language learning is very popular here, and the wait list for materials is very, very long.  We’re working out the hookup kinks as we speak – stay tuned, because you know I’m going to try to learn about seven languages myself. :)

Oh, and all that above about task forces and jackets?  Add a blog and multiply by ten, and you’ll get an idea of what I’d love to achieve at the countywide level.  Girl’s gotta dream…

Emerging Leaders:  You’re probably wondering why I have barely discussed this at all.  I’ve been meaning to, but now I don’t have to, really, because the fine folks at In the Library With the Lead Pipe have spread it all out for you in a nutshell.

Emerging Leaders has been like boot camp. I am getting a lot out of it. I am not sure that what I am getting out of it is exactly what the program planners intended, but such is life. :) It’s difficult to capture the zeitgeist of this kind of experience in medias res, so I’ll probably not even try until after annual, when it’s all over and done with.

Alternative Media Task Force/Event Planning: My other ALA project! The group process on this particular project has been amazing. We are putting together the Alternative Media Reception / SRRT 40th anniversary celebration, and it’s going to be awesome. Stay tuned for the official announcement, because you’re really not going to want to miss it.

And just because it’s not nearly busy or exciting enough around here, guess where the next G20 summit is going to be held? It’s going to be one crazy summer at Alchemy, so stick around…bonus points if you can identify the Sports Night references in this post…

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Tech Playground Videos. Also, resiliency.

May 6, 2009 at 6:02 pm (blogging, databases, ethics, personal, philosophizing, presentations, professional development, Uncategorized, virtual reference, web resources)

If you’d like to see some of the footage we shot at the Technology Playground program, check out the CLP YouTube channel. The wizards in our Communication and Creative Services department are going to edit footage from these into one longer video, to show our legislators just how much of an impact the library has on Pittsburghers’ lives.

If you’re pressed for time, try just watching this one. It’s my favorite because it’s short and poignant:

In other news, t’s nearly 5 p.m., which is the time of day when I, as a morning person, have long since scaled the top of BrokeBrain Mountain and am once again contemplating goatherding for a living. So I reread Beth M.’s wonderful slideshow on resiliency, and got some much-needed fortification. Honesty forces me to admit that I also got a cup of coffee and a chocolate peanut-butter brownie from our cafe on the ground floor, but you go with what works. :)

But, I digress: I don’t think we can talk about resiliency enough, because–and I fear I’m starting to repeat myself, or enter a recursive loop, or something–public service is hard, hard work. And yet, it’s not something we talk about much in library world. I’m not sure why.

Of course, occasionally people do. In a conversation taking place elsewhere in the blogosphere, concerning librarians who talk smack about their patrons online, a commenter who identifies simply as “Sarah” has this to say:

The actual underlying problem here, the big elephant in the profession is that public service is becoming increasingly more stressful and the divide between those who do it on a regular basis and those who don’t is becoming increasingly wider (just like the wage gap). The profession isn’t dealing with it but instead issues statements, documents, and all sorts of meaningless stuff castigating those who supposedly can’t deal with “change”. People will talk, and vent, period. If they don’t have any constructive help in dealing with the stress, and if there isn’t respectful two-way communication, and if they are crapped on for their public service skills by those who don’t want to realize that there are also INTERNAL customers to be served, then this will just continue. Most people don’t get pats on the back for being “so 2.0″ when they are doing their job, over and over again. How about making sure that public service people have the resources they need to do their jobs – after all, they are customers of library management. Would they take their business elsewhere if they could? So instead of getting all snotty about “negative energy” and customer service, how about cross-training yourselves to ensure that public service people can get off desk and take vacations? How about designing jobs which are 50/50? I’ve had an offer out for 25 years that, if anyone has a problem with my public service skills, they can do my job for a week and I can watch and take notes on how a REAL professional does it. Nobody has yet taken me up on my offer.

I wish Sarah had included an e-mail address, so I could thank her personally for her honesty and bravery. It’s not cool to snark about patrons online, anonymously or otherwise, if only because everybody really is always doing the best they can. However, it is also decidedly not cool for us as professionals to turn on each other during these horribly stressful times when we all need each other more than ever. Librarians should be helping each other out, supporting each other, not taking each other to task in their blogs.

My opinions on this matter are heavily colored by the recent news of Pennsylvania Senate Bill 850, which pretty much ambushes library service in a dark alley, takes its wallet and credit cards, and then beats the living snot out of it. You can read the specifics here, but the paragraph that made me sick to my stomach was this one:

Library programs under S.B. 850 are hit hard. The Public Library Subsidy would be cut 50% to $37 million. The Library Access line (POWER Library, statewide borrowing, interlibrary delivery) would cease operations as this year’s $7 million appropriation would drop to zero. The Electronic Library Catalog (Ask Here PA, Access PA database) would have only $1.7 million next year compared to this year’s total of $3.7 million. Funding for the State Library (50% cut to $2.4 million) and Library Services for the Visually Impaired and Disabled (2% cut to $2.9 million) are the same in both the Governor‘s proposal
and the Senate Republican bill.

Emphasis mine. These are only possibilities, but terrifying ones.

So, resiliency and professional courtesy become more important than ever now. If we do not hang together, well…you know how it goes. Here’s hoping we can all look past our own cares and worries for a few moments and take time to check in on our peers, see if they need a sympathetic ear, a cup of tea, a walk around the building for a private vent session…

Tomorrow and Friday are kind of eaten up with NetLibrary trainings and preparation for a presentation I’m giving next week. I’ve been so busy, I’ve been forced to delegate my next Eleventh Stack post to one of my cats. Those of you who know my cats won’t be too surprised to learn it’s the Smoky grey one who will be doing the guest honors. :)

More next week, probably. Until then, keep the faith…

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