As someone who works in the academic sector, I think I sometimes forget what it’s like for those of us who work in the public sector and are constantly in need of advocacy, constantly having to defend themselves, their value and services, and having to justify their existence in the face of more and more cuts to public services. Academic librarianship seems like the only safe sector these days because nobody contests that universities need libraries, right?

Well, I’m not so sure, because there are a lot of academics who don’t know what their university library actually does. One of my lecturers likes to tell this story of a doctor of medicine who told him that what he needed was a screen in the operating theatre with the most current research on the specific procedure he was about to perform, but he didn’t need the university library. Presumably that information would have to get there by some sort of magic.

Also, at LibCampUK yesterday, people mentioned that if the academics in a university don’t lead by example in using the library, we can’t expect students to follow. So yes, even though the existence and value of academic libraries are  seemingly taken for granted, we need to speak up for ourselves and make the people we serve aware of what exactly we can do for them and what we need to provide that service. The people who make decisions about where the money goes in a university need to be told just how valuable their libraries are, precisely because things are taken for granted so much in this sector. So I’m currently looking at ways to get more involved with this.

I’m definitely getting in touch with Voices for the Library because public libraries have played such an essential part in my life. And yes, I was a middle-class child whose parents were teachers. Public libraries really aren’t just for people from educationally/financially deprived backgrounds, although that is an important part of their audience. But really libraries are for everyone, and that’s a message that I don’t think we communicate strongly enough.

So, in summary, yes, advocacy is vastly important both on a big and on a small scale, and I’m going to get in there.

One of the most amazing things I have been able to do in a professional capacity so far was attending IFLA 2010 in Gothenburg, Sweden. It was a great conference and I took away a lot; I was on the team for the IFLA Express so my “attendance” involved a lot of sitting in an office far away form the talks, yet I still feel it was a valuable experience. The networking was great, Gothenburg is a lovely city, and on the whole, it was an amazing week.

What was frustrating was that, at that point in time, I was in no position to implement any of the knowledge that I had taken away. But, you know, it’s never gone, and it’s all experience. It’s taught me a lot about attending, planning, etc. I tend to think though that I prefer smaller events, like Online and the German Bibliothekartag, because they are more specific and the way that I network works better with smaller crowds of people. Larger conferences have their uses and if I got the chance to go to one I would obviously jump, but I think, personally, I’m better with smaller events.

2./3. Presenting/organising

I haven’t done any of that (yet) but I hope that once I qualify, I’ll be able to be a bit more involved with things. I did get some insight into the behind-the-scenes work of a conference at IFLA, and I have helped organised big events, but none of them were library-related.

At their most simple, literature/research management tools are databases, indexes of things you read. Besides fields for the standard bibliographic information, you maybe need a field for notes and good compatibility with the program you’re using to write your research paper/dissertation and a choice of reference formats so you can import references in the format you need. Personally, I wrote both my dissertations pretty much without using literature management tools—the first because it proved impossible to get LaTeX to play nice with MLA reference formats, the second because it was pretty much what I was used to, and because the number of references wasn’t unmanageable.

But I digress. So, we’re looking for a service that can do those things I just described, and that is web-based so you can use it on different computers.

Mendeley seems to be better in that respect, and it can be used on mobile devices as well, which is great. I used to use Papers on my Mac, which was a very similar tool—basically something to manage the library of PDFs you have on a computer. I’ve played around with it a bit and if I was to do research again, I think I’d definitely go for it. I am, despite being a “millennial”, very much a tactile, paper-based person when it comes to writing and research, but much of the rational behind that is precisely that paper still offers me things that I can’t do on a computer—like put sticky notes in books, scribble notes in the margins, etc. If I can do that directly on a PDF, great. Zotero was supposed to be able to add citations from websites; a functionality, however, that was working inconsistently at best for me. It remains to be seen if Mendeley does better in that respect. But all in all, it looks like a nice tool that could come in handy.

I’m not a fan of citeulike, much like I’m not a fan of delicious. Because in my experience, it’s very easy to just save everything with a click or two, but then most things, you never look again a second time. So yes, it’s useful, but you need to use it correctly. Again, what I would want from a literature management tool most of all is having one tool that keeps my library straight; to have everything in one place. It’s great that there is such a variety of tools out there and I’m sure different people pick different tools for different reasons, but once I pick a system, it has to be one that I’m likely to stick with. As said above, Mendeley seems like the best candidate at this point in time, but by the time I get to do research again, this may have changed.

UEA is in the 1994 group, same as my workplace, so architecture is brutalist and the library building is listed, which, as we heard, makes it difficult to adapt to the needs of 21st century students. Nevertheless, I think UEA are doing a fantastic job with what they have, and there are one or two pages that I wouldn’t mind people taking out of their book.

Signage

The library at UEA is divided into various zones: Phone zones, Silent Study, Quiet Study, Group Area. Each of these has a colour assigned to it, so if you see a blue sign, you know it’s okay to use your phone; if you see red, you want to switch off and get down to silent study, etc. I think that’s a nice and effective way of demonstrating to people what they can and can’t do where. There is an area at the front of the building, before you go into the actual library through the security gates, which is designated for eating and drinking. Given the amount of times that library staff need to tell people to take their food outside, I think having a designated area for eating and drinking inside the library building helps a great deal: People can come “into the library” and have a snack yet no negative interaction with staff, and then proceed through the security gates to do actual study in the library.

And, very importantly, they have signs that tell you where the toilets are.

It's okay to talk on the phone in the staircases.

Access

The library has security gates that can only be operated with the student IDs. Because these IDs have all the students’ information on it, it is possible for the libary manager to compile detailed statistics on library use and to see whether any groups are underrepresented, which would mean that their access needs are not met.

It struck me how much care UEA takes to ensure ease of access. Given that the campus is a concrete labyrinth of stairs and narrow passageways, I’m sure students with mobility difficulties appreciate the wide security gates, the lifts, low security and help desks, and low and adjustable desks within the workspace. MY workplace, by contrast, has a revolving door (so students with mobility issues have to ring a bell to be let in through a sliding door), security gates that are just wide enough, and a paternoster lift – also one proper lift, which is for use of staff and disabled students only, but students have to get an authorisation card to be able to use it. Oh, and we have one place on the circulation desk which is the right height for wheelchair users. I wasn’t really aware of how many hurdles to access there are in a libary, but it would appear that what UEA are doing is a way forward.

Silent study area: note red sign and width of throughways.

Liaison

The library liaises heavily with student support and the various departments. And, more importantly, they listen to what people have to say. I’m not the world’s biggest fan of “you said—we did” displays, but they have their uses. I think a key point is to listen to what customers have to say, to react to a suggestion and make a change if it’s doable and makes sense to you, and if you don’t react, to explain why you didn’t.

That said, I really like this display.

Listen to your customers.

Work pattern

UEA employs “floor runners”, which by and large are “rovers”. I think roving, as a concept, can definitely help support users in large libraries. Because helping users at the point at which there is a problem and not making them go somewhere else that deals with problems is generally a good idea. Roving is only one way of doing this—the library of my uni in Berlin, for example, has helpdesks on every floor so help is never too far away.

The library is integrated into student support, which is unusual if not unique, but given the need to ensure ease of access and supporting a diverse student community, it definitely makes sense. There is an IT team that works on the site as well, so you wouldn’t necessarily think they weren’t integrated. What really struck me is the level of co-operation that seems to exist between the library and the rest of the university. I know from my own experience and from that of several friends and acquaintances working in the sector that working in academic libraries can sometimes feel very disconnected, so seeing a library that is integrated and working together with the rest of the university to achieve certain goals was nice.

Secret agents or academic librarians? Here's where it all happens...

Conclusion

I really liked the visit, and the overall impression of the UEA library was very positive. One thing that the library manager said really stuck with me, and that was her take on the tripling of tuition fees: “If, in a 9k world, a student decides to drop out, that’s one place you’re not going to fill again.” This will become an important issues for universities and university libraries in the very near future, and while I dislike the increase in tuition fees as much as the next person, I think it’s more important than ever to give students what they want and need. So, yes, things like 24-hour libaries, all-over-campus wifi access (because if you have large ebook and e-journal collections yet the wifi connection inside the library is unreliable to nonexistent then what’s the point?), easy access for all kinds of users, well-trained staff that can deliver excellent customer service… these things are not a luxury, they are absolute necessities because if students who pay £9,000 a year for their education feel they are not getting their money’s worth will take themselves and their money somewhere else.

There are always things that are negative or that could do with improving. UEA uses RFID and has a book-sorting machine for returns. They also have terminals for checkout and machines for fines payments. However, the fines payment machines don’t give change, and RFID tags can be temperamental—but then that’s the case everywhere that uses it, and there is a backup checkout system in place. The book sorting machine can sometimes get overfilled and you’ll still need staff to do the actual sorting onto trolleys and shelving, so like every technology, it’s not perfect, but it’s certainly a step in the right direction. I’m not sure how I feel about ordering books shelf-ready—I always think of it as something that libraries have to do when times get tough because it’s not like you’re freeing staff up, like with RFID and fines payment machines, it’s actually replacing in-house cataloguers. Which basically redefines the whole role of the library. I’m going to have to do some thinking about that.

Also, I thought that the holds system was unnecessarily complicated. Open-access hold shelves are fine by me and data protection is important, but there are better ways of managing this kind of holds system than giving the holds hideously complicated numbers with nine digits and making the hold shelf near impossible to search through for staff. Other libraries I’ve seen that have open-access hold shelves simply wrap the books up in opaque paper and put the patron’s name on the spine.

And while we’re talking of wrapping things up in paper, I thought the DVD collection was a bit OTT. They’re all wrapped in plain paper with only the classmark visible on the spine, so the only way to find a DVD is to go through the library catalogue. The argument for it, of course, is that it’s to ensure DVDs are used for academic purposes only. But then again, the CD collection is all open in plain sight, so I don’t necessarily see the need.

All wrapped up.

Overall, I think it was great to see how things are done somewhere else, and I took away some very positive impressions.

Twitter: I tweet a lot on my personal account but much less so on my official/professional account.

Facebook: Facebook is creeping me out more and more. I still have it, mostly to keep in touch with friends and colleagues in Germany, but I’m seriously considering getting rid of my account because it creeps me out. Google+ even more so. I mean, I don’t have a lot of privacy concerns to start with, but Facebook will change the T&Cs without notifying their users, Google+ so far looks like it’s a privacy accident waiting to happen, even to me.

LinkedIn: This should probably go under “personal branding”—one of my tasks this week is to overhaul my CV and put it on LinkedIn. That said, I don’t really talk to people on there. But it’s useful if employers are on there, and if you want to get recommendations from them. My current employer isn’t, but I’ve added a couple of people that I’ve met on visits/networking events.

I’m not really active on CILIP Communities or any of the other LIS-specific networks. I’m registered on LISNPN, which seems the most relevant network for my current situation, but again, I haven’t really been active much. So it’s probably again a case of “I need to talk more”.

Offline networking is something that I used to dread, like I said. However, I did go to the CILIP London CPD23 meetup and I really enjoyed it. Mostly because I took the advice from Joeyanne’s invaluable post on networking for people who hate networking to heart. I had two or three long and interesting conversations with people (hello Emma!) and I felt like I’d actually made an impression and a connection, something that doesn’t usually happen. So for me personally, that event was a big success. As for other offline networks, I’m in a bit of an awkward place geographically—the East of England has no library schools and the CDG is mostly based in Cambridge, which is a four-hour round trip on British Rail for me. I’ll try and go to a LIKE meeting some time, as they sound quite interesting.

Reflection: shifting your perception

1. Recall it: Blogging is a great way of helping recall–I do have quite good memory, but actually writing things down is obviously a big help in recalling stuff. So, going through the posts on CPD23 so far, I find that I’ve had a good experience.

2. Evaluate it: 
What did you learn?

Apart from Pushnote, I haven’t really discovered new services, but Thing 2 and 3 were far more interesting and thought-provoking than I would have expected. I started to really think about my online reputation, about the way I engage (or, rather, should engage) with others in the profession, about how I network and communicate, how I keep up to date, how I can do these things better.
What did you enjoy?

Reading through everyone’s posts was definitely very enjoyable. Just feeling that I’m not alone, that we’re all on this journey together, is fantastic. Also, I enjoy how a little can go a long way and feeling that, if things go the way of the first couple of weeks, everything I learn this summer will be really useful. I’m enjoying getting back into blogging, which I didn’t do for the longest time–either because I had no time or because I felt I had nothing interesting to talk about. Learning that I do, and that I should use my voice more often, has been quite the eye-opener.
What worked well? What, if anything, went wrong?

So far, things have been going pretty well. I started the course a bit late, so I’m still catching up on blogging about it. There are a few things that I want to write about from previous Things–I hope I can get it all done… I like how it’s completely possible to jump in a bit late and still get a lot out of the course.

As for things going wrong, well, sometimes technology goes TITSUP on me and I can’t leave comments on people’s blogs with the account that I want to use, which is annoying. Learning to customise my blog has also largely been a trial-and-error process, and I find I need to keep a better eye on comments and reply in a timely fashion.

What would you change?

I think it’s too early to say anything about that. I definitely like the format of the course and the Delicious account that allows people to find each other’s blogs according to a set of criteria. Maybe that one could be organised a bit better.
What (potential) impact could this have in your workplace?

I don’t think it’ll have a great impact in my current workplace, but for me personally, it is already having quite a significant impact–like I mentioned earlier, I just finished my MALIS, so looking into potential careers, getting to know people, trying out and evaluating services etc. is very helpful for me personally.

3. Apply it: Take some action. What can you practically apply from the experience you’ve had?

I think a key point here is that this has the potential to change a lot of my habits. Being selective about which blogs I follow, blogging more myself, coming to terms with how I use Twitter, polishing my blog visually and making it nice and shiny, actually talking to people and not just lurking as a reader are all things that I’ve known how to do but never quite got round to. I know that this course is exceptional in terms of blog productivity for me, but I hope I can stick to blogging more and not drop it completely once the course finishes.

Current awareness comes in many flavours.

As I said earlier, I have two Twitter accounts, and I find it somewhat useful for current awareness – the trick is to figure out who to follow so you can keep on top of things. It mixes current awareness news accounts with engaging others (or at least, that’s what I think it should do) so it can be useful for discussion if people use it that way. Most of the time though, I “fave” tweets and never look at them later. So I’m not sure if I’m getting the right things out of it. Maybe I need to have a clearout of who I follow, or reorganise between accounts. I do have lists, but they’re a bit out of date as well.

RSS feeds – similar story. I use Google Reader but again, the key element seems to be keeping it manageable.

I’ve had a look at Pushnote, but I’m not sure yet how to use it, or if it can be of more use to me than my current bookmarking tool of choice, Licorize.

In any case, here I am again, and here is what I have to say about the personal brand list of things to do.

Name used. I put a lot of thought into what name I should use, and settled on “That Black Book” because “I’m looking for that black/blue/green book…” or similar questions are just so familiar to anyone who works in libraries. Also, if you’ve seen Black Books, it may connect for you there. So I suppose, if you just look at the name, my personal brand is a bit whimsical. Not quite as drastic as Libraries Suck, but along the same lines. I was delighted to find a blog entitled “Have You Checked The Catalogue” in the CPD23 list – clearly, somebody shares my sense of humour.

Photograph. I have a gravatar that’s linked to my email address on WordPress. I use an application photograph of myself for my Twitter account, and I hadn’t used the Gravatar in so long that I’d forgotten what it even looked like. I love that application photo though, so I’ll try and use that for all my professional interactions online.

Professional/personal identity. This is a tough one. I try and keep them separate for most of the time – I have two Twitter accounts, I have a friends-locked personal journal, but the reality is, sometimes these two spheres will touch. And I only have one facebook account, so of course there are things that, strictly speaking, are part of the “personal” side of my life also going on on facebook. The question is where to draw the line though, and that can be hard. But then, there are privacy settings to deal with that, and obviously knowing what to say in which places. I guess this is where the concept of profersonalism comes in. I’m still wrestling with it a bit myself though, and when I set up this blog I made the conscious decision that it was going to be a space for library-related stuff.

Visual branding. Again, this is where I go about revamping my blog and my professional Twitter account, at this point in time, because I’d like them to be consistent. I’m looking into various designs – I think a key point here is just to go out and find some Twitter themes, browse the WordPress theme gallery, and see what appeals to me and what I feel represented by. Knowing me, it’ll be a bit of a journey, but I’m sure I can find something. It’s tricky though, because you can waste hours on just browsing patterns and colour schemes.

Google yourself. This was an interesting experiment. The first two hits are for my XING profile and my Twitter account, some Twitter-related stuff – even some individual tweets, and my GoodReads account. Then you get a link to an essay of mine that I wrote for a website some months ago, making a conscious decision to attach my RL name to it, and then a website from a drama project I did at uni, way back in the day.

All in all, I think that’s an okay result. Nothing incriminating, nothing that says much about me either. You might infer from the individual tweets and the essay that I’m a bit of a geek and a Holmesian, but if you meet me in person, you’ll find that out within the space of about five minutes anyway. And yes, one of them is a bit cringeworthy, and it’s only on there because I used FriendFeed – a service I tried out for a bit but abandoneed. But apparently it stores my tweets, even those I deleted, so I deleted my FF account for good. Bit of housekeeping never did anyone any harm anyway

My blog, alas, doesn’t come up, which is because I’ve neglected it for so long, so the lesson I get from the Googling Yourself experiment is probably that I need to make my mark in the online world of the LIS profession a bit more. And be mindful of which accounts I use for tweeting about what.