Pre-conference started out with a bang–first no wi-fi in the room and then we got our own wireless router hooked up! Thank you awesome conference staff! Now I don’t have to worry about this blog post will be erased due to loss of wi-fi. This pre-conference session is on WordPress by Polly-Alida Farrington and Kyle Jones (via Skype). [Resources (session notes) available at lib20.pbworks.com] Kyle blogs at The Corkboard. Polly blogs at pafa.net.
Goals: Get the pieces of the puzzle and decide what to get into deeper after the session: Content Management System (CMS) Tips & Tricks, Coding, Safe & Secure, Plugins, etc.
New WordPress books: Digging into WordPress (updated for version 3.0) by Jeff Starr and Chris Coyier and Beginning WordPress 3 by Stephanie Leary Kyle and Polly are publishing a book on WordPress in the spring via ALA Tech Reports
Basics 101 WordPress has a web interface–you can do everything online; you don’t need an application installed on your computer. It’s a content management system that is open source. (Yay for open source!) This is great because the WordPress community can develop new plugins and templates. There are 28 million installations of WordPress–very large community of people.
Net Neutrality: it’s a hot topic and buzzword phrase in the news right now. But how much do you really know about Net Neutrality? It’s a fascinating, important, and complex issue that deserves careful consideration. Luckily for those of us who live in the Bay Area (and could make it to Berkeley last night), we were treated to a talk on Net Neutrality by Richard Esguerra (staff activitst) from the Electronic Frontier Foundation, an organization that works to protect people’s digital civil liberties. It was a great talk, even with some rather crazy technical issues, sponsored by the San Francisco Bay Region Chapter of SLA. So I thought I’d try to share the highlights with you.* (If you just want the bare bones executive summary, skip to the end of the post.)
So without going back to the very beginning of the Internet and making us sit through hours of history lessons, Richard gave us “Internet Architecture Lite.” The most important concept is the “end-to-end principle” which, in simplified terms, means that most of the control, processing, and changes to packets of information (the requests sent over the Internet for data, webpages, etc.) should only occur at the ends of the process. So if you request a website by typing the URL into your browser, there should not be changes made to that request as it is sent through the various nodes as it is routed to the server that can serve up the website page. Control and processing should reside with your computer (one end) and with the server that is fulfilling the request (the other end). Thus the “end-to-end principle.” Net Neutrality could then be seen as the transferring of the “end-to-end principle” into a law or policy requirement, as Richard explained later.
But first we have to talk about a very important Supreme Court Case, National Cable & Telecommunications Association v. Brand X Internet Services. (Trust me, this is important). This ruling decided basically that cable companies were not telecommunication services and therefore not subject to the same regulations. While telecommunication services, such as AT&T, have to let competitors use their infrastructures for reasonable rates, information services do not have to follow this regulation. Brand X, an Internet Service Provider (ISP), wanted to rent infrastructure from Comcast in order to run Internet service over Comcast’s cable infrastructure like other ISPs use different companies telephone lines to provide DSL service. Due to this ruling Comcast did not and does not have to let competitors use their infrastructure which is why if you want cable internet, you pretty much only have one choice of service provider.
After this ruling, the FCC issued a Broadband Policy Statement that had four clauses that became part of the foundation of Net Neutrality. In order to preserve open internet, consumers should have:
access to the lawful internet content of their choice
the ability to run applications and use services of their choice
the ability to connect their choice of legal devices that do not harm the network
the right to competition among network providers.
All of this sounds good, but as Richard pointed out there is a major problem with the FCC issuing a policy out of basically thin air. Who ever gave the FCC the power to make and enforce such a policy? The story gets even more interesting when independent research by the EFF and Associated Press showed in 2007 that despite Comcast’s denials, it was actually throttling BitTorrent (it was denying requests for BitTorrent downloads on its infrastructure). This brings us full-circle back to the “end-to-end principle,” which Comcast wasn’t following as it was filtering and denying requests by users who wanted to use BitTorrent to share files. Now obviously ISPs need to have some ability to manage network traffic, so we get into a gray area of what is “reasonable” network management. The FCC ruled that Comcast needed to stop blocking BitTorrent traffic in 2008 and Comcast challenged the ruling.
Because of this, the court ruled in April 2010 that the FCC cannot enforce broadband policy. This nullified the FCC’s Broadband Policy Statement, which it had just expanded in late 2009. This leaves us in a bit of muddle because there is no clear way forward and no one wants to see an internet that is tiered like the graphic shown below:
So why is all this history important? Because, as noted before, we are in a quandary over how to proceed. Currently there are four main options put forth as the way to Net Neutrality:
Reclassify broadband as a telecommunication service so it falls under more regulation
Partially classify broadband as a telecommunication service
Genachowski’s Third Way: the FCC would have regulatory control over certain, select bits of broadband
Congress should pass a Net Neutrality law (which would probably give regulatory authority to the FCC
As you can see, there isn’t any clear path and any path to Net Neutrality has potential problems such as: Congress moves slow and has the potential to be swayed by special interest groups, giving the FCC more power might lead to “regulatory capture” where the FCC is eventually steered by the very companies it is supposed to be regulating, etc.
Summary
In short, Net Neutrality is a super-important, pressing issue and the implementation of Net Neutrality is so much more complex than I thought it was before the talk. There are so many areas of grey and lots of issues surrounding free speech, civil liberties, copyright, fair use, creative works, and innovation that I really hadn’t considered. I think, if nothing else, a safe lesson to take away from last night’s awesome talk is that everyone should have a healthy amount of skepticism about any plan about how to implement and regulate Net Neutrality. Stay tuned for further developments and check out the section on the Deeplinks blog about Net Neutrality.
Have a fantastic rest of your week. I’ll be blogging from Internet Librarian this coming week, so don’t be surprised to see many posts about conference talks and cool technology to use in the library.
*Any mistakes or inaccuracies in the history or technical aspects are mine and probably due to my hastily scribbled notes from last night and definitely not attributable to Richard of the EFF.
Happy Blog Action Day 2010! (If you don’t know what Blog Action Day is, check out their website). This year’s issue is water. At first I thought this would be a very difficult topic to connect to libraries and archives. I mean I could go the standard green technology route and talk about informing our patrons about water conservation, etc., but that has been done a lot. (Not that it isn’t important.) Then I thought I could talk about the danger of water damage to archival materials, but I thought that would be quite a downer for a Blog Action Day post. So I decided to instead focus on two archives that deal with water.
The Colorado State University Water Resources Archive is a “joint effort of the University Libraries and the Colorado Water Institute. I thought the layout of the results page from searching the digital objects was very well done. I just wish that non-CSU affiliated users could use the my favorites feature, although there was an amazing list of bookmarking sites linked into the records. Plus, the records had links for EndNote and EndNote Web which is just awesome. I had issues searching the finding aids, but that could just be a fluke. The list of collections is completely usable as are the lovely EAD-encoded finding aids. Definitely one of the more sensibly designed archives’ websites and results lists that I’ve seen on the web.
The Water Resource Center Archives has been at UC Berkeley, but as of today it is suspending services during its move to UC Riverside and CSU San Bernardino. You can check out the blog post detailing the move and timeline here. Also, the On Water blog is just a great resource for “news, research, and current events on all aspects of water resources.” Luckily for us, while the physical archives are moving down to SoCal, the digital resources are still accessible via the UCB site and the Online Archive of California.
And, because, I mean really how else was I going to end this post? Here is an amazing mash-up trailer by Seduff using clips from The Waters of Mars and The End of Time.
Have a fantastic weekend, full of relaxing, reading, helping others, and making sure your water filters are working. The Waki Librarian will be back next week.
I was talking with one of our interns about signage in the library today and it got me thinking about design in libraries. Now, I have no experience or expertise in designing library buildings, so I’m not going to go there. Instead, I want to talk about design and photography as it relates to library signage and marketing materials.
A lot have probably seen the signage posts on the blog, Tame the Web. These posts, more often than not, showcase bad, ugly, or unfriendly signage spotted around libraries. Obviously we could use some help with our signage and design in general.
I was inspired to think more about, and be more mindful of, designing beautiful and useful materials after reading this post by Seth Godin: getting better at seeing. The book mentioned in the post, Before & After: How to Design Cool Stuff, is a fabulous, accessible resource for anyone interested in designing better marketing materials. I think it should be required reading for anyone designing signage in the library (not to mention designing websites, flyers, videos, or other promotional materials).
There are so many resources available for studying and improving design skills that really, we have no excuse not to make better signs. Also, because so often our promotional materials (and sometimes signs) contain photographs, we really should improve our photography skills as well. (I know I definitely need to.)
For more professional looking photographs, you may want to check out another Lifehacker article on using an 18% gray card for better color balance in your photos. If you are shooting for a marketing campaign for your library, or going to create banners from your photographs, please, please, please shoot high resolution photographs. I’m always amazed when I see images in libraries that are obviously pixelated. (And, if you are going on a photography shooting trek, check out how a Tenba insert turns your messenger bag into a stealth camera bag. Now maybe I have an excuse to buy another Timbuk2 bag.)
All I’m saying is take some time to really see what your signs and marketing materials are saying about your library and see if there isn’t a way you can improve what’s being said. Libraries are fantastic resources, we all know this, but now we need to be communicating this fact through our design. Beautifully designed stuff is not only aesthetically pleasing, but also more user-friendly.
If you need some inspiration of your own, check out Beautiful Portals. It’s truly one of the most beautiful Tumblr feeds I’ve seen and a great inspiration to libraries which are often likened to portals of knowledge.
The Waki Librarian will be back with more on Blog Action Day. Until then, enjoy your day designing cool stuff.
Happy Friday! I don’t know about you, but this week has run me over and I’m ready for the weekend. I’m feeling more like I’m in survival mode than in a really productive, “on top of things” mode this week. So I thought, what better to write about on Friday than survival when you’re sure the world is just about to cave in and you just know that the other shoe is perched precariously on the top of an unused card catalog and ready to drop. So let’s take some control over the chaos that is the library and archival world and get back to a good normal.
First, the incredibly helpful, practical, and fairly easy to implement tips for the end of your week. I don’t know about you, but I really dislike getting junk mail so Lifehacker’s article on the best sites, numbers, and forms for banishing junk mail was most appreciated. Let’s stop the resource waste and get rid of the junk mail.
After you’ve gotten rid of receiving physical junk mail, it’s time to tackle the dreaded email inbox. The “zero inbox” policy is one way of dealing with email overload (and I find it fairly helpful), but I also have become quite enamored of assigning email a 15-minute minimum to avoid unnecessary checking. This is great for those of us who feel the need to respond to everything within a minute of receiving it, when it is neither productive or necessary. Creating boundaries is not only healthy for you, but sends the signal that your time is valuable and not to be wasted or interrupted without good reason.
If you’ve been reading this blog for any length of time, it’s pretty obvious that I’m not a fan of meetings in general. It’s probably no surprise then that I adore this idea to increase meeting effectiveness by scheduling for brevity. Ten minute meetings? Completely would work for me. I wonder if I’ll ever be able to convince my colleagues that this is the only way to go when it comes to meetings.
Finally, on the tips and tricks front for survival is this WebWorkerDaily post on surviving sudden social network changes. Read it. Trust me, you need to if you are at all hooked into the online social world.
Switching gears, let’s talk about how you’re already perfect. zenhabits is one of my favorite blogs for posts to inspire quiet, balance and joy in life. This post is especially timely as being in survival mode means you rarely think you have time to pause and remember that you are already just fine. It’s also great to share with your friends who are always interested in self-improvement and doing things better. I know I fit into that category, especially with my work. So it’s nice to have such a positive affirmation: you’re already perfect.
I’m continually, pleasantly surprised by how much inspiration I find in Seth Godin’s blog which is obstensibly about marketing. I think his post on demonstrating strength is one of those inspiring posts. The best survival strategy when you’re overloaded (after figuring out how to stop being overloaded)? “Offer kindness.” The world could use a little more kindness.
Happy Archives Month! I know, I can tell you are as excited as I am about Archives Month. So for those of you living in the United States, October is Archives Month, and for everyone else, please join in the celebration–just make sure to leave your party hats, glasses of champagne, and slices of celebratory cake outside of the archives.
To get you into the celebrating mood, check out this news release that the Smithsonian is celebrating Archives Month and then go sign up for the blog’s RSS feed to get awesome posts about archives every day for the rest of the month. Also, the California Digital Library recently rolled out local history mapped on Calisphere. These are awesome, pass on the news. And for more links, resources, and other stuff than you could possible imagine, check out the Society of American Archivists’ Archives Month page.
Now that you’ve had your fill of links to archives resources to share during the month of October, what will I add to the mix? I was going to talk about archives in general as being places of history, linking people with the past and important events in their collective histories, but then I happened upon this great TED Talk (thanks for highlighting it Lifehacker): How great leaders inspire action by Simon Sinek. Seriously, take the eighteen minutes and watch it. Really. I’ll wait for you; see, I’m not going anywhere.
Sinek’s talk inspired me and I hope it inspires you to think about not just what archivists do, but why we do what we do. Perhaps it will even inspire you to reach out and spread the word about archives to others who still think all archivists do is put papers in boxes.
Sinek said:
“Leaders hold a position of power or authority. But those who lead inspire us. Whether they’re individuals or organizations, we follow those who lead, not because we have to, but because we want to. We follow those who lead, not for them, but for ourselves.”
Let’s use Archives Month to demonstrate to others that archivists can lead by inspiration. Let’s bring the value and meaning of archives out into the light of the public’s consciousness (even though we, of course, keep the archives in light-free environments).
I believe in the power of archives to inspire us, to help us remember the past, to help us right past wrongs, and to help us change the world. As an archivist, as a librarian, as an information professional, what do you believe in?
Do you ever think about balancing? And while you’re pondering that question, I have another one for you: how do you define balance? When you hear the word “balance” what does it bring to mind? Work-life balance? A balanced ecosystem? A balanced checkbook? Harmony? Balance is a hot topic in the library world right now, even if few writers actually use the term. We are trying to balance service to our patrons with acknowledging that we cannot do everything with smaller budgets and overworked staff. We try to balance fostering a personalized learning experience for our students with ever increasing class sizes. Balance, in other words, seems to come up most often when we are talking about systems, people, lifestyles that are out of balance. So today I’d like to write about a few different types of balance and a few technology tools that may help with your productivity so you can attempt to find balance in your work and life.
This issue comes up at my library when people talk about workload issues, especially when we talk about our teaching load. I always find it interesting to talk about workload issues because I am definitely for drawing boundaries (see last week’s post), I’m also someone who believes you finish the task you agreed to or were assigned and don’t count the hours. My philosophy has usually been work until you’re done. That being said, one can easily get consumed by work so when the school year starts (which coincides with the restarting of committee work on the library and university level and therefore an increase in workload), I always think about how to achieve balance. If I ever figure out the secret, I’ll let you know. But I did find this article by Lifehacker, establishing boundaries between work and play, to be a good reminder about the importance of getting both physically and mentally “out of the office.” WebWorkerDaily also has a great article to help out with the issue of balance, time management beyond the task list.
I think one of the biggest issues is how to decide how technology can help create a balance in your life versus which just sucks away your precious time. Now, depending on how you use it, a smartphone can either be an intense distraction that breaks your concentration or a huge time-saver. For me, as long as I don’t check Twitter every couple of minutes, it has been a great time-saver. For those of you that have smartphones, check out two guides from Lifehacker, best Android apps for getting things done and best iPhone apps for productivity. (Never let it be said I didn’t give equal space to Android and iOS.) So how do you balance your use of technology or use it to facilitate productivity and allow you more time to relax or do whatever else you want to do in your life? How do you help your patrons navigate the ever-changing realm of technology and communication tools? If you need something to get you focused on using technology as the tool it is supposed to be (and not the ‘end all and be all’), check out this lovely article, Achieving Techno-Literacy.
Balance takes on another cast when we talk about instruction in the classroom and at the reference desk. How do we balance different learning styles and personalities in the classroom? How do we balance the time it takes to help someone at the desk when there is a line of other patrons who also need help? I think that this is where the side of our profession and training that is an art form comes in. I don’t think there is a formula that can tell you how to manage a class or exactly how many minutes to spend helping someone with a reference questions. (Of course there are books one can read and classes one can take to get better at teaching or inter-personal skills, but there is no magic key that makes everything work out smoothly.) I think everyone has to learn this kind of balance for themselves. It comes down to being human.
Learning balance, in all facets of life, is a process, a process I think that goes more smoothly (and with less falling) if we help each other. So let’s all try to not get caught up in the mentality that ‘more hours at work equals better work’ or that being up on email at 3am is a desirable activity. And if you have any techniques for balance, in any area of your life, I’d love to hear about it.
And for Friday’s fun, check out this wonderful promo for the BBC show, Being Human, and be thankful that no matter what you have to balance, at least you don’t have to pretend to be human.
The Waki Librarian will be back next week; enjoy your weekend and let me know what you’re reading. Thank you and namaste.
Okay, so yeah, it was a stretch to get all three things into one post–it made a lot more sense in my head. But for a quick, mid-week technology and information world hit, I am going to share some cool links about all three topics: flying, cloud computing, and archives. So as the Doctor would say, “Allons-y!”
Did you see the announcement that NARA released guidelines for records management in cloud computing environments? (NARA stands for National Archives and Records Administration.) You can read the NARA bulletin in full, here. Just when you thought records management couldn’t get any more complicated in the digital environment, along comes the cloud. Have I ever mentioned before how happy I am not being a records manager? Unfortunately, cloud computing impacts archivists’ work too–anyone have any experience with cloud computing in the archives?
Now that we are all worrying about cloud computing and archives, let’s move on to something a bit easier to wrap one’s head around: flying and airlines, or rather how to make travel a little less onerous. (And I will say, once more for the record, that I am so glad Internet Librarian is close enough to my home that I don’t have to fly.)
Oh, and if you have to be in an airport this week, pick up a “banned book” to read and celebrate Banned Books Week! Check out the list of the most frequently challenged books in 2009 on ALA’s website.
Have a wonderful rest of your day and week. The Waki Librarian will be back on Friday with a post about balance (and no, you don’t have to read it while standing in Tree pose.)
Happy Friday! Well, we’ve survived the start of classes on my campus and the chaos that accompanies the beginning of another school year. (Although, of course, some of my colleagues would argue that technically the new academic year begins with summer quarter and not fall quarter. I, however, hold that the year starts when the hordes of students return in the fall, but really that’s neither here nor there.) In honor of surviving the first week of classes, I decided that today I’d celebrate by sharing some unsolicited advice with the library world, especially library students and those who have just started their first professional job. I usually avoid giving unsolicited advice because really, who wants it? But going into my third year as an academic librarian/university archivist/de facto person to talk to about records management, I figured I have some insights to share. I hope this helps. If you’re not interested in advice, not to worry, skip to the end of the post for this Friday’s bit of fun.
First, a disclaimer: I work in an academic library, so my viewpoint is necessarily skewed towards academia. Hopefully some of these thoughts and pieces of advice are generalizable so anyone can find something useful. If not, I’m sorry and The Waki Librarian will return to its regularly scheduled programming next week. Allons-y!
Before we get into everything I wish someone would have told me when I started this job, I wanted to talk about a few things I’ve learned. Hopefully these lessons will help you in your work.
1. It’s important to listen before anything else.
Everyone wants to make a mark and contribute, especially when you get out of school and have so many new ideas. I know I had so much I wanted to add to the library when I started, but it is better just to sit back and listen. I’ve been working on reclaiming my natural state of reflecting quite seriously instead of acting based on knee-jerk reactions; it’s hard to maintain balance when things seem to need to be done yesterday, but it’s important and listening helps immensely.
2. Be kind, even when you think no one is noticing. Trust me, they notice.
This is one where Mom was right (as always)–you should be nice to everyone and everyone notices how you interact with people. As they said in Ocean’s Eleven, someone is always watching. I’m continually amazed by the little things (little to me at least) that make an impression on people. I’ve found that erring on the side of being nice is definitely the only way to live and work.
3. Student assistants, interns, and volunteers are vital to the library; treat them as such.
Honestly, I think the library would crash and burn if we didn’t have our awesome student assistants. They helped me out a lot by answering all the questions I had when I started at the library (and did so without making me feel silly or stupid that I didn’t already know all the details about the library). Interns are fabulous because it is fun to talk with people that are super-enthusiastic about the profession. Plus, working with interns has forced me to reflect on my teaching philosophies which has been very helpful. Volunteers are super-important in many libraries, as we all know. At my library, though, it’s the archives that would still be neglected if it wasn’t for the work of our volunteer (or rather I’d be the only one trying to sort it out which wouldn’t be nearly as much fun).
4. Just because you know the technology, don’t assume that anyone else does.
Because I’m interested in emerging technology, I often think that everyone is up on emerging technology and I’m constantly behind. Well, I quickly found out that I’m not behind the curve. This made me feel a lot better and has given me a niche in the library–teaching my colleagues about technology and how it is fun (and how it can be used in our instruction sessions and classes).
5. Nothing goes as planned; be prepared for anything, and never let them see you sweat.
I like to have a plan. Planning enables me to keep calm and make sure everything is completed on time. I don’t like rushing and I’m not a fan of last minute things because, unlike some of my colleagues and friends, I don’t work better under a mountain of pressure and I don’t like the spike of adrenaline produced by running up against an almost impossible deadline.
Like so many things though, my perfect world of planning got smashed by the realities of the academic library world. I’ve, by necessity, become a lot more flexible at reacting to changes in plans and working on projects that should have been done weeks in advance, but no one bothered to mention those details to the librarians. Such is life.
But the most important thing I’ve learned is to never let them see you sweat, no matter what is happening. It is always important to maintain composure and professionalism. This is definitely going on the ‘fake it ’til you make it’ philosophy which really does work. So does yoga, by the way. Also, keep your sense of humor.
Now on to the advice. I didn’t get a lot of advice, unsolicited or not, when I started my position. I basically wandered around and talked with people because, like so many organizations, most of the important stuff isn’t written down–it’s in people’s heads. Below are a few pieces of advice I wish I’d been given when I started my first professional job. Since I’ve had to learn it by trial and error, I’ll save you the trouble of re-discovering the wheel.
1. People will test you to see how far you will bend, when you will break, and to find your line in the sand.
Everyone tests the new person because everyone wants to know who you are and what you can (and will) do. You will have many opportunities and many challenges in your first year on the job. You will need to figure out what you are comfortable doing and what you will not do (and this doesn’t mean comfort in the sense of you are in your comfort zone in relation to work responsibilities, but comfort in the sense that it will not violate your personal principles or morals). You will need to learn the power of the positive no (definitely check out the book of the same name by William Ury). This doesn’t mean you aren’t still nice and polite, you are, but just with a backbone. Don’t lose yourself in other’s expectations; do grow and accept change; do be willing to say no.
2. It’s necessary to have an elevator speech about your research because no one cares as much as you do.
If you are in a position where you are expected to research and publish, this becomes essential. People will smile and nod when you explain your research, but really, their eyes start glazing over when you get to the 30 second mark. So figure out what to tell them and wait until you find another research nerd to go into the details. (And yes, you will find someone who will be thrilled to talk research with you for hours–keep those friends, they are golden and will keep you from feeling like an idiot for being able to passionately discuss theory for hours.) I could talk off anyone’s ear about my research in archives and language and power dynamics and historic changes and continuities, but I can guarantee I’ve bored half the readers of the post already. So what I usually say is I study community archives.
3. Music may be the universal language, but baked goods work pretty well too.
I read one post, and I’ve completely forgotten which blog it was on, in which the author wrote that she didn’t bring baked goods to work because it was somehow unprofessional or would undermine her position as a professional. While I can respect that point, I completely disagree with it.
I picked up the tradition of baking for the library from another librarian who has since retired. Baking is something I love to do, as I’ve stated before on this blog, but I have absolutely no need to have five dozen cookies in my house, even if I now have one of the coolest cookie jars ever. Sharing the cookies seems like a much better idea. To me, bringing in baked goods is one way of saying, ‘Hi. I appreciate you and what you do for the library and for me. So thanks, and have a cookie.’
If you don’t bake, don’t worry about it. Just find some way to acknowledge the work and dedication of your colleagues. It’s important to stop, smell the fresh baked cookies, and remember to be kind to each other so we have the ability to transfer that kindness to our patrons.
4. Committee work will take up three times the amount of time (at least) that you think it will; plan accordingly.
Especially if you are in academia, you will be on committees–probably lots of them. They take up a lot of time; you will learn things and some committees will make a good deal of difference, but no matter what else they do committees will eat up your time. Just be prepared, that’s all I’m saying.
5. Keep up with the literature, the technology, and the profession.
You will be overwhelmed your first year as a professional. It’s okay, but don’t become so immersed in the job that you forget about the larger profession. Read widely–I know it’s old advice, but it is good advice. I’ve found wonderfully helpful articles in other fields such as business, cognitive science, history, etc. It’s important to keep up on technology too and what’s going on in the profession. Go to the blogs and Twitter, dear reader, and you’ll be just fine.
6. Get good at presenting because you will do it, a lot.
If I could counteract only one stereotype about our profession, it would probably be that librarians (and archivists) never interact with the public and have no need for public speaking skills. Maybe you’ll be able to avoid all public presentations. I suppose it’s possible. But, more than likely, you’ll have to present before committees, your director, at workshops, in classrooms, and even possibly at conferences. Get good at public speaking and it will help you make an impression because so few people are good at it.
Remember that it’s okay to be nervous. I’ll let you in on a little secret, before every talk I give, I still get nervous (and I give presentations and teach classes all the time). If you get nervous, it is a good idea to remember the ‘fake it ’til you make’ approach. You’ll be surprised at how many people you will fool into thinking you are a cool, steely presenter while you grip the podium so they can’t see you shake. But before you know it, you will be a cool, wonderful presenter and someone whose presentations people want to come and hear.
7. Become invaluable.
You got hired for a reason: you are made of awesome. Now you need to prove it. You need to stick out of the crowd in a good way and you need to let your personality, work ethic, and creativity shine. Seth Godin calls people who are invaluable Linchpins. I think that’s a great term; it reminds us to not become replaceable cogs in the library machine, but maintain our humanity and force us to be great. You don’t want to be like everyone else, even if that seems like the safe way to go. You need to be recognizable, memorable, and fantastic at what you do–even if this means creating a new niche.
Does becoming invaluable necessitate that you become a workaholic? Nope. In fact, I’d argue against becoming a workaholic–everyone needs a life outside of work. (Yes, even I have a life outside of work.) You need downtime to maintain a balance and to have the space to see the solutions to problems and to be inspired.
I hope some of the advice was helpful. If not, I’m sorry. Next week we will be back to more technology fun. In parting, I leave you with this fantastic video with David Tennant and Catherine Tate, which I may or may not have posted before. Either way, it is great fun.
Have a lovely weekend and the Waki Librarian will be back next week.
Did you know that today is Social Good Day? (RED) and Mashable have gotten together and asked the question, “Can social media make the world a better place?” I have to agree with their thought that social media can be leveraged to make the world a better place. To find out more, check out their website and if you post something on Twitter about Social Good Day, tag it #SocialGood. Because people are encouraged to blog, in addition to tweeting about Social Good Day, I thought I’d share just three examples of people and groups that are using social media to better the world.
My friend, and former university colleague, Michelle Pacansky-Brock (check out her blog, MPB Reflections, here), uses social media to make the world a better place, one online class and instruction section at a time. While she is now an entrepreneur and frequent speaker at conferences and facilitator of workshops, she was (and still is at heart) a teacher. She taught art history for many years and used social media to connect with her students, to connect her students to each other, and to connect them all to the art. Her use of social networks, such as Ning, and online modules, such as VoiceThread are inspirational. The interaction, in an online environment, prove that with human connection comes inspiration and the ability to change a student’s outlook on learning. To me, that’s changing the world for the better in a profound and lasting way.
The second person that always comes to mind when I think about using social media for the social good is BJ Fogg, check out his website here. I had the good fortune to hear him speak at a conference a few years ago and was delighted to hear about using technology and persuasion (aka captology) in a positive manner. To quote from his website, “Another focus in my lab is what we call ‘peace innovation.’ We’re investigating how technology can help change attitudes and behaviors in ways that bring about global harmony.” This is a man, and his team, who understands technology, social networks, and psychology and can use them together to create something that may just change the world for the better.
Finally, in the realm of utilizing social media in positive ways to form community and “decrease world suck” is the Nerdfighter community, facilitated by the Vlogbrothers–Hank and John Green. I’ve featured many of their videos on this blog and use them in my classes. Not only is this a wonderful community whose members support each other, this is a community that does things like The Project for Awesome and positive pranking. This is one of the best examples of creating community and using social media to make the world a better place, both on an individual level and on a global scale, that I have ever seen. DFTBA! (Don’t Forget To Be Awesome)
So what does any of this have to do with librarians and archivists? Well, we all know how “library as place” is a super-important concept in the physical world and some libraries are already created digital spaces through Facebook accounts, Twitter feeds, etc. But what we really need to do is somehow create real, interactive communities so that we can work together to create changes in our local communities and reach out across the world. And I’m not just talking about public libraries, but academic, government, and special libraries too–not to mention archives and museums. We have some of the most tech savvy and creative people working in our profession, it’s about time we utilize our talents in recognizable ways. We need to be leaders and not just persuade behind the scenes, although that is important too. We have access to so much information and talent, why don’t we get together and do something? Suggestions?
One way to get excited about utilizing technology in new ways is to go to a conference, and one of the best is Internet Librarian. I’ll be there next month and will be blogging. If you are going, let me know in the comments and hopefully we’ll be able to say hello in person at the conference.
Have a wonderful Social Good Day. Use the day to help someone and support a cause you believe in. The Waki Librarian will be back tomorrow.
