Evernote is a handy tool for storing thoughts (ie 'notes'), photos, clippings from online articles, all sorts of information and titbits. Unfortunately, right now I feel that my life is complicated enough without yet another handy tool for storing information, and I'm happy to keep using pen and paper for now. I have looked at the Getting Started webpages, I now have a better understanding of this tool, I just don't need it.
I'm happier to stick to a combination of emails, bookmarked links, word (etc) documents, My Pictures files, and save as much of these items to memory sticks and my data storage gizmo for posterity. There is already enough 'data' in my life. I am happy to forget some things.
This is a blog written by a medical librarian used to discuss library issues, 23 Things projects, and cats.
Wednesday, 27 July 2011
Tuesday, 26 July 2011
CPD23: Thing 8 - Google Calendar
I'm familiar already with Google Calendar, as my previous employer used it to organise the business, and I found it easy to use as well as convenient, 2-3 years ago. Times have changed, and now I rely on my Outlook calendar to organise myself and the Knowledge Centre/ staff. Unfortunately, we don't have a massive calendar for all 25 staff and to book the various rooms we have, but we live in hope that one day, it will be possible to see that X, Y and Z are on leave on A Day therefore cannot help with a training session, etc.
I use my Outlook calendar much as I would use my Google calendar: for appointments, to show when i'm on leave or using our Group Study Room, and for personal reminders about my tap class etc. It is Very Useful.
I use my Outlook calendar much as I would use my Google calendar: for appointments, to show when i'm on leave or using our Group Study Room, and for personal reminders about my tap class etc. It is Very Useful.
Friday, 22 July 2011
CPD23: Thing 7: Face-to-face networks and professional organisations
I am a member of CILIP, and therefore of the Health Libraries Group. I've written articles for their newsletter, attended the conference last year armed with my two posters, and follow emails on the mailing list.
I don't often get the chance to go out in the evening to meet other librarians. I mainly see them at work (ha!), at conferences, at Bodleian staff development training events, and online via Facebook or silly emails. My colleagues are tremendously helpful. For example, when I got a query last december about current awareness for nurses working in the transplant department, it was through talking to my colleagues that I started a blog. They are a constant source of morale, support, and work...
I've now been out twice in the last 10 days to see other librarians face-to-face, taking advantage of other Oxford librarians' initiatives. I've attended the Oxford TeachMeet (12th July), and the CPD23 informal meet-up at the Turf after work on Tuesday this week (19th July).
The Oxford TeachMeet
This event took place upstairs at the University Club, from 7 - 9pm on Tues 12th July. Attending it were about 40 young brunette librarians/ library assistants/ graduate trainees, and four men. (I still haven't gotten used to this female-dominated profession, and how young the people are who bother to attend something voluntarily after work). I met a graduate trainee from the Law Library who is lovely and bubbly and enthusiastic about law and libraries, as well as a few familiar faces from training sessions at the Osney One building for staff development.
The first 7-minute presentation was by Ollie Bridle and Isabel McMann, about QR codes and how they are using them in the Radcliffe Science Library to help readers to find their way around. QR stands for Quick Response. You need an iPhone or a similarly expensive and unreliable model to read them. As the Government has put up the fees for undergraduates, and Oxford has joined in, the RSL librarians think that the new intake of students will all have these smart phones and will want to make the most of their expensive investment in their education by taking full advantage of the library services, including the QR codes. As I don't have a smart phone, this is pretty meaningless to me, although I now understand what the funny symbols in magazines etc mean.
Next up was the presentation on colwiz. I need to know about colwiz, or get the team behind it to come and give a presentation to the scary scientists working in my building who might find it useful for their collaborative projects. Colwiz is a research management tool designed for post-doc scientists. It has a library and PDF reader. You can integrate references with Google scholar, PubMed etc. You can annotate PDFs. It works on Macs, PCs, and Linux. It is free. A really useful and interesting feature is that you can see how often certain authors publish, whether two authors publish together and how often (etc), using the statistical tools. On the downside, there are questions about copyright, as this tool allows you to share PDFs of papers with people from other institutions with different access rights. But my mum might find it useful. It is better than Mendelay, which I *still* haven't investigated..
Alison Prince gave the third 7 minute presentation about her experiences of Making Online Exhibitions. In this case, it was an online exhibition of a physical exhib., Shelley's Ghosts. See here. There must have been an article about this amazing website in the Bodleian staff newsletter, Outline, but I missed it. Therefore I am very glad that I found out about it via the TeachMeet! It is quite a beautiful website. Alison talked about how difficult it was to build a website which reflects the physical exhibition and make it interactive, and widen access to a huge potential audience. Another thing that I learnt from this presentation is that Twitter hashtags are now "maybe the most powerful marketing tool" we have.
A quick one on #AskArchivists' day on 9th June 2011... using twitter to ask Qs and spread the word about this profession. A good use of Twitter that I approve of!
Another quick presentation, 2 minutes, on making secure, long, complex, unique passwords. Have a master password, very complicated set of letters, numbers, symbols, and then additional tags for each website you need a password for.
Finally, two 7 min presentations on redesigning the Corpus Christie college library pages on WebLearn, and one on the Science Museum based at Wroughton Airfield, which sounds cold and a long way away. They were neither terribly relevant to my job and my interests, but good to see what a variety of activities there are in this profession, and the enthusiasm of the graduate trainee from Corpus Christie in particular!
By the way, the University Club does very nice beer from the Lake District as an extra incentive to go there. £2.90 for a pint of Jennings. Heaven.
The second informal event: CPD23 in Oxford (5.30-6.45pm Tues 19th July)
There were seven of us young brunettes sat around a pub table, and one older man. We talked about how hard it was to find the time to start a blog, let alone keep up with all the Things, but how worthwhile the whole experience is. We talked about the BRANDING question, and how our profile photos on Facebook appear in Google searches, and so it is important to NOT have a publicly-accessible photo of yourself with three cocktails ... The New Professionals' Network was mentioned, which I must follow up. Sonya, the organiser, said that she started her Twitter account last year and has added people to follow that she has met at conferences. I then talked to the only man in our group and learned all about cataloguing the legal deposit material that the Bodleian receives each week (up to 2000 items in a week!) 11 staff catalogue 2000 items in a week = roughly 40 items each per day. Wow.
Hopefully there will be another informal pub meeting like this one soon. it was good.
I don't often get the chance to go out in the evening to meet other librarians. I mainly see them at work (ha!), at conferences, at Bodleian staff development training events, and online via Facebook or silly emails. My colleagues are tremendously helpful. For example, when I got a query last december about current awareness for nurses working in the transplant department, it was through talking to my colleagues that I started a blog. They are a constant source of morale, support, and work...
I've now been out twice in the last 10 days to see other librarians face-to-face, taking advantage of other Oxford librarians' initiatives. I've attended the Oxford TeachMeet (12th July), and the CPD23 informal meet-up at the Turf after work on Tuesday this week (19th July).
The Oxford TeachMeet
This event took place upstairs at the University Club, from 7 - 9pm on Tues 12th July. Attending it were about 40 young brunette librarians/ library assistants/ graduate trainees, and four men. (I still haven't gotten used to this female-dominated profession, and how young the people are who bother to attend something voluntarily after work). I met a graduate trainee from the Law Library who is lovely and bubbly and enthusiastic about law and libraries, as well as a few familiar faces from training sessions at the Osney One building for staff development.
The first 7-minute presentation was by Ollie Bridle and Isabel McMann, about QR codes and how they are using them in the Radcliffe Science Library to help readers to find their way around. QR stands for Quick Response. You need an iPhone or a similarly expensive and unreliable model to read them. As the Government has put up the fees for undergraduates, and Oxford has joined in, the RSL librarians think that the new intake of students will all have these smart phones and will want to make the most of their expensive investment in their education by taking full advantage of the library services, including the QR codes. As I don't have a smart phone, this is pretty meaningless to me, although I now understand what the funny symbols in magazines etc mean.
Next up was the presentation on colwiz. I need to know about colwiz, or get the team behind it to come and give a presentation to the scary scientists working in my building who might find it useful for their collaborative projects. Colwiz is a research management tool designed for post-doc scientists. It has a library and PDF reader. You can integrate references with Google scholar, PubMed etc. You can annotate PDFs. It works on Macs, PCs, and Linux. It is free. A really useful and interesting feature is that you can see how often certain authors publish, whether two authors publish together and how often (etc), using the statistical tools. On the downside, there are questions about copyright, as this tool allows you to share PDFs of papers with people from other institutions with different access rights. But my mum might find it useful. It is better than Mendelay, which I *still* haven't investigated..
Alison Prince gave the third 7 minute presentation about her experiences of Making Online Exhibitions. In this case, it was an online exhibition of a physical exhib., Shelley's Ghosts. See here. There must have been an article about this amazing website in the Bodleian staff newsletter, Outline, but I missed it. Therefore I am very glad that I found out about it via the TeachMeet! It is quite a beautiful website. Alison talked about how difficult it was to build a website which reflects the physical exhibition and make it interactive, and widen access to a huge potential audience. Another thing that I learnt from this presentation is that Twitter hashtags are now "maybe the most powerful marketing tool" we have.
A quick one on #AskArchivists' day on 9th June 2011... using twitter to ask Qs and spread the word about this profession. A good use of Twitter that I approve of!
Another quick presentation, 2 minutes, on making secure, long, complex, unique passwords. Have a master password, very complicated set of letters, numbers, symbols, and then additional tags for each website you need a password for.
Finally, two 7 min presentations on redesigning the Corpus Christie college library pages on WebLearn, and one on the Science Museum based at Wroughton Airfield, which sounds cold and a long way away. They were neither terribly relevant to my job and my interests, but good to see what a variety of activities there are in this profession, and the enthusiasm of the graduate trainee from Corpus Christie in particular!
By the way, the University Club does very nice beer from the Lake District as an extra incentive to go there. £2.90 for a pint of Jennings. Heaven.
The second informal event: CPD23 in Oxford (5.30-6.45pm Tues 19th July)
There were seven of us young brunettes sat around a pub table, and one older man. We talked about how hard it was to find the time to start a blog, let alone keep up with all the Things, but how worthwhile the whole experience is. We talked about the BRANDING question, and how our profile photos on Facebook appear in Google searches, and so it is important to NOT have a publicly-accessible photo of yourself with three cocktails ... The New Professionals' Network was mentioned, which I must follow up. Sonya, the organiser, said that she started her Twitter account last year and has added people to follow that she has met at conferences. I then talked to the only man in our group and learned all about cataloguing the legal deposit material that the Bodleian receives each week (up to 2000 items in a week!) 11 staff catalogue 2000 items in a week = roughly 40 items each per day. Wow.
Hopefully there will be another informal pub meeting like this one soon. it was good.
CPD23 Thing 5 (and7): Reflective practice again
I've spent 38.5 hours working on 11 searches for a colleague's readers while she has been on leave over the last two weeks. No wonder I am very tired.
If I take a reflective approach, i might think that I spent too much time on these searches, time which I could have used in writing up a survey to determine the info and service needs of people working in our building, or which I could also have used in working on my Chartership portfolio. Yet I have learned a lot: I have created a complicated search strategy for one reader, then replicated it in five other databases, learning how to use three in the process and learning to manage my own deep frustration at not being able to export search results from Ovid on my PC (I had to use a public PC instead). I have learned how to search using very basic phrase search terms for someone looking for information about diet myths. I was too sophisticated at first, and retrieved search results about a particular medical condition which refers to people who eat late at night and have weight problems as a result. It turned out that this was NOT what the reader wanted, so I had to redesign my searches and use the databases in a simpler way to find the right information. And it worked... !
I've been going home exhausted though. This is also the week when we had a new library management system start up (yesterday morning, in fact), which meant that I had to quickly learn how to return, loan and renew books, as well as register new readers for this library, as well as show another member of staff what to do. The patience that I had to practice (breathe in, breathe out, hope that Endnote will now import the files...) during the difficult searches was put into practice with the staff member as I felt my frustration levels rise.
I haven't been able to do Important Bits of Work this week, which I will now have to do next week, if I am not swamped with literature searches (I have three for next week already).
If I take a reflective approach, i might think that I spent too much time on these searches, time which I could have used in writing up a survey to determine the info and service needs of people working in our building, or which I could also have used in working on my Chartership portfolio. Yet I have learned a lot: I have created a complicated search strategy for one reader, then replicated it in five other databases, learning how to use three in the process and learning to manage my own deep frustration at not being able to export search results from Ovid on my PC (I had to use a public PC instead). I have learned how to search using very basic phrase search terms for someone looking for information about diet myths. I was too sophisticated at first, and retrieved search results about a particular medical condition which refers to people who eat late at night and have weight problems as a result. It turned out that this was NOT what the reader wanted, so I had to redesign my searches and use the databases in a simpler way to find the right information. And it worked... !
I've been going home exhausted though. This is also the week when we had a new library management system start up (yesterday morning, in fact), which meant that I had to quickly learn how to return, loan and renew books, as well as register new readers for this library, as well as show another member of staff what to do. The patience that I had to practice (breathe in, breathe out, hope that Endnote will now import the files...) during the difficult searches was put into practice with the staff member as I felt my frustration levels rise.
I haven't been able to do Important Bits of Work this week, which I will now have to do next week, if I am not swamped with literature searches (I have three for next week already).
- 3 searches
- Survey people in the building
- Tell people in the building about two aspects of our library service: group study room and laptop loans.
- On the help desk at the KC: Monday lunchtime, Thursday and Friday lunchtimes, Friday evening. On the help desk at the other place: 10-1pm on Weds.
- Chartership stuff - complete the draft PPDP and send to mentor, review and revise my CV and send to mentor, likewise for my job description with annotations about how I do the job and examples of what I've done so far in the four months I've held this delightful position. I should also write up notes from the CPD23 informal pub meeting on Tues 19th July, and from the TeachMeet last Tuesday 12th July... for my portfolio and for this blog, which are two examples of face-to-face networking!
- PREPARE FOR TWO WEEKS' LEAVE!
Wednesday, 20 July 2011
CPD23 on Twitter
Search for #cpd23.... interesting results.
I blogged earlier on today about linkedin. Blogger hasn't saved my post. Why is that?
I blogged earlier on today about linkedin. Blogger hasn't saved my post. Why is that?
Hmmmm.... LinkedIn
A colleague just invited me to be friends or whatever the appropriate noun is for LinkedIn.
Which reminded me that I wanted a good answer to the question: Why should I use LinkedIn? What's in it for me?
This article is useful for answers, eg:
"With LinkedIn, in addition to the standard information about your current job, you’re able to not only create
a showcase for past projects and engagements, but also provide a summary of your most outstanding
career highlights, areas of expertise, and specialties, all without worrying about exceeding the standard
single/double page resume restriction. In the “Experience” section, you can post information about
previous jobs and/or projects, and can then expand and enhance that information via
“recommendations,” or statements about the amazing wonderfulness of your work, from colleagues,
bosses, clients, etc., should they choose to post (and if they are also members of LinkedIn).
"Under the “Additional Information” section, you can list your websites, interests (including a couple of
your personal passions/commitments may help “round you out” to potential employers or clients),
groups and associations, and honors and awards. Here would be the place to note the special interest
groups you belong to, that “innovative librarian of the year” award, and your interest in social
entrepreneurship. The goal here should be to give someone (such as a potential employer) a deeper
understanding not only of what you can contribute, but who you are and what’s important to you."
Which reminded me that I wanted a good answer to the question: Why should I use LinkedIn? What's in it for me?
This article is useful for answers, eg:
"With LinkedIn, in addition to the standard information about your current job, you’re able to not only create
a showcase for past projects and engagements, but also provide a summary of your most outstanding
career highlights, areas of expertise, and specialties, all without worrying about exceeding the standard
single/double page resume restriction. In the “Experience” section, you can post information about
previous jobs and/or projects, and can then expand and enhance that information via
“recommendations,” or statements about the amazing wonderfulness of your work, from colleagues,
bosses, clients, etc., should they choose to post (and if they are also members of LinkedIn).
"Under the “Additional Information” section, you can list your websites, interests (including a couple of
your personal passions/commitments may help “round you out” to potential employers or clients),
groups and associations, and honors and awards. Here would be the place to note the special interest
groups you belong to, that “innovative librarian of the year” award, and your interest in social
entrepreneurship. The goal here should be to give someone (such as a potential employer) a deeper
understanding not only of what you can contribute, but who you are and what’s important to you."
Tuesday, 19 July 2011
CPD23 Thing 6: Online Networks
I joined LinkedIn and never used it. I'm busy keeping up to date with people via their blogs (i.e. via RSS feeds), via librarian friends' facebook pages, and via CILIP news. I am happy with this. I have been a member of LIS-MEDICAL for years now, and although I find most of what people email about to be rubbish, there have been some gems over the years. I do enjoy keeping in touch with people on Facebook though, as librarian friends in London write about weird and wonderful things, post links to songs on YouTube, and generally cheer me up that way.
I should head off and leave work right now, thinking of networks, as a group of Oxford Librarians are about to meet in a pub in town in 20 minutes to talk about the CPD23 Things project...
Reference for me to CPD23 Thing 6 page
I should head off and leave work right now, thinking of networks, as a group of Oxford Librarians are about to meet in a pub in town in 20 minutes to talk about the CPD23 Things project...
Reference for me to CPD23 Thing 6 page
CPD23 Thing 5: Reflective practice
I have to reflect that since my colleague went on holiday, I have taken on a lot of her workload and a) I am exhausted from searching, figuring out how to export results from X database (eg the WHO Global Health Library today) to Endnote X4 and b) am shocked at how much work she handles, the variety, and how well she has her readers trained to send her their searches in a well thought-out manner.
So I haven't had a lot of time to write up my Personal Professional Development Plan for my chartership... draft, nor revise my CV or job description for the same, nor write up notes from last week's Oxford Teach Meet. I have to reflect that maybe my time management skills need improving, or I prefer the challenge (exhausting but exciting) of completing difficult searches for my colleague's readers to completing paperwork and reflecting.
I must TAKE TIME to REFLECT more.
Do > Plan > Review
What? > So what? > Now what?
I could evaluate and reflect on my first nearly-four-months in my new job...
And on the fact that my desk has exploded since I took it on, because I am constantly juggling literature searches, 1-1s, other training sessions, my Management reading, notes from meetings that I now attend, my promotion plan for the Knowledge Centre, my survey for people who work in this building, managing two part-time library assistants and whoever else is managing the help desk at the KC, managing the line manager, thinking about other training that I need, keeping up to date with events in the world/ country/ library affairs/ medical affairs etc, and thinking about Chartership. (And about whether I am ready to become a Mum. !!)
I have learnt an enormous amount since March. I have learnt an enormous amount about my organisation, good and bad, that I didn't have to know in my previous role. I have had to have difficult conversations with staff and I have been in tears after an awful experience at work. I have also had a week off during all this with a torn muscle in my shoulder and dreadful pain.
I will come back to this theme, hopefully tomorrow or later this week (again, depending on time and energy). Thank you, CPD23 Thing 5, for helping me to take the time to REFLECT.
So I haven't had a lot of time to write up my Personal Professional Development Plan for my chartership... draft, nor revise my CV or job description for the same, nor write up notes from last week's Oxford Teach Meet. I have to reflect that maybe my time management skills need improving, or I prefer the challenge (exhausting but exciting) of completing difficult searches for my colleague's readers to completing paperwork and reflecting.
I must TAKE TIME to REFLECT more.
Do > Plan > Review
What? > So what? > Now what?
I could evaluate and reflect on my first nearly-four-months in my new job...
And on the fact that my desk has exploded since I took it on, because I am constantly juggling literature searches, 1-1s, other training sessions, my Management reading, notes from meetings that I now attend, my promotion plan for the Knowledge Centre, my survey for people who work in this building, managing two part-time library assistants and whoever else is managing the help desk at the KC, managing the line manager, thinking about other training that I need, keeping up to date with events in the world/ country/ library affairs/ medical affairs etc, and thinking about Chartership. (And about whether I am ready to become a Mum. !!)
I have learnt an enormous amount since March. I have learnt an enormous amount about my organisation, good and bad, that I didn't have to know in my previous role. I have had to have difficult conversations with staff and I have been in tears after an awful experience at work. I have also had a week off during all this with a torn muscle in my shoulder and dreadful pain.
I will come back to this theme, hopefully tomorrow or later this week (again, depending on time and energy). Thank you, CPD23 Thing 5, for helping me to take the time to REFLECT.
Friday, 8 July 2011
Thing 4 2011: Twitter
I've just read Grace Dent's article on the Guardian site about her relationship with Twitter. Very good article. Give it a read.
Can I be cheeky and copy and paste a Comment? I happen to agree with it:
by hoskas 07/07/11 9.12pm
"Twitter is always addictive and funny, but really it was made for live tv. Eurovision, The Apprentice, The X-Factor, breaking news stories, The Royal Wedding etc, these are all vastly more hilarious when being live tweeted by Joe Public."
Brilliant stuff. And I still don't feel the need to join or look at Twitter.
Can I be cheeky and copy and paste a Comment? I happen to agree with it:
by hoskas 07/07/11 9.12pm
"Twitter is always addictive and funny, but really it was made for live tv. Eurovision, The Apprentice, The X-Factor, breaking news stories, The Royal Wedding etc, these are all vastly more hilarious when being live tweeted by Joe Public."
Brilliant stuff. And I still don't feel the need to join or look at Twitter.
Thursday, 7 July 2011
CPD 23 Thing 4 - Current Awareness
Twitter is great for fun and I can see how it can be useful for evidence-based medicine when people can instantly review a new systematic review by Tweeting and using hash tags to make it easier to search for all related tweets. But I personally don't find it useful for my work.
RSS feeds, on the other hand, are vital for my work. I used to have a Bloglines account, but when it looked like Bloglines might die a death last year, I switched to Google Reader. I have other 100 feeds, categorized into Fun, Library stuff, Blog stuff (feeds relating to my Outreach work which are vital to follow for my other blog), and Science, so that I can keep up to date (ish) with the latest in cell biology. I have set up RSS feeds from PubMed searches, from the Cochrane library, from all sorts of places. Current Awareness is my thing.
RSS feeds, on the other hand, are vital for my work. I used to have a Bloglines account, but when it looked like Bloglines might die a death last year, I switched to Google Reader. I have other 100 feeds, categorized into Fun, Library stuff, Blog stuff (feeds relating to my Outreach work which are vital to follow for my other blog), and Science, so that I can keep up to date (ish) with the latest in cell biology. I have set up RSS feeds from PubMed searches, from the Cochrane library, from all sorts of places. Current Awareness is my thing.
Wednesday, 6 July 2011
CPD23 Thing 3 - My professional brand
Oh dear. Not only am I procrastinating by writing this blog post on my 'brand' instead of making a start on my Chartership work, following my first meeting with my mentor last Tuesday, but I am listening to a Spanish radio station to subliminally absorb some Spanish and get back in that particular game, and I am hanging my head in shame at how my blog presents ME.
Brand Eli.
My sister googled one of my many names recently and found a paper that I wrote for the EAHIL 2010 conference last year in Estoril. She was very impressed with the paper. She found it incomprehensible because it was in library-speak, and not in whatever-academic-field-she-currently-affiliates-herself-with-speak.
The problem with my blog in terms of my 'brand' is that it is a shambles. I started this blog in 2008 at a previous job just to see what this blog thing is all about. I took it up again last year for the Oxford 23 Things project, and then used it to post photos of my friend Lesley and our cat, both of whom died last year, as I wanted somewhere online to view the photos to help me to grieve.
And now I'm back to using the blog for 23 Things - CILIP-style.
And I should probably use the blog to record my CILIP Chartership progress...
Which may involve a bit of re-branding of the blog along the way. I can't change the name, the URL, but I can remove the Flickr photos and the Google Search bar, both of which I consider now to be superfluous and unnecessary, and I can change the strapline of the blog. All of which I've just done.
Back to Brand Eli: The Google exercise
Googling one of my names, the top results are for: posts on a friend's blog; a link to CILIP HLG 2010 conference posters that I created last year; my facebook page; my LinkedIn page (which I don't use. I only signed up for it last year as part of the Oxford 23 Things project); my Blogger profile; the conference programme for the International Clinical Librarians' conference 2011; a post on Phil Bradley's blog about the poor state of the search functionality on the BBC website; a link to my latest ICLC 2011 presentation on ... blogs; and a tweet about the ICLC 2011 presentation.
Page 2 of the Google search results pulls up more work-related results, instead of frivolous social networking pages.
What I would like to come up... the article about my new post here at the KC; conference presentations and posters etc; the transplant blog; and other worthy things. Not the Facebook page, with my current profile photo showing me enjoying a night out with cocktails.
In conclusion, I think I need to work on my Brand.
Brand Eli.
My sister googled one of my many names recently and found a paper that I wrote for the EAHIL 2010 conference last year in Estoril. She was very impressed with the paper. She found it incomprehensible because it was in library-speak, and not in whatever-academic-field-she-currently-affiliates-herself-with-speak.
The problem with my blog in terms of my 'brand' is that it is a shambles. I started this blog in 2008 at a previous job just to see what this blog thing is all about. I took it up again last year for the Oxford 23 Things project, and then used it to post photos of my friend Lesley and our cat, both of whom died last year, as I wanted somewhere online to view the photos to help me to grieve.
And now I'm back to using the blog for 23 Things - CILIP-style.
And I should probably use the blog to record my CILIP Chartership progress...
Which may involve a bit of re-branding of the blog along the way. I can't change the name, the URL, but I can remove the Flickr photos and the Google Search bar, both of which I consider now to be superfluous and unnecessary, and I can change the strapline of the blog. All of which I've just done.
Back to Brand Eli: The Google exercise
Googling one of my names, the top results are for: posts on a friend's blog; a link to CILIP HLG 2010 conference posters that I created last year; my facebook page; my LinkedIn page (which I don't use. I only signed up for it last year as part of the Oxford 23 Things project); my Blogger profile; the conference programme for the International Clinical Librarians' conference 2011; a post on Phil Bradley's blog about the poor state of the search functionality on the BBC website; a link to my latest ICLC 2011 presentation on ... blogs; and a tweet about the ICLC 2011 presentation.
Page 2 of the Google search results pulls up more work-related results, instead of frivolous social networking pages.
What I would like to come up... the article about my new post here at the KC; conference presentations and posters etc; the transplant blog; and other worthy things. Not the Facebook page, with my current profile photo showing me enjoying a night out with cocktails.
In conclusion, I think I need to work on my Brand.
Monday, 4 July 2011
Thing 2: Exploring other blogs
Now, I think I'm rather good at investigating other blogs. As I've been developing and working on the Oxford Transplant Nurses' Information blog (http://oxfordtransplantnursesinformation.blogspot.com), over the last few months I have become aware of the many different uses for blogs, the variety in authors, topics, quality etc. I'm now following a few medics and paramedics' blogs, for work purposes of course, as well as those of some friendly boaters, so as to keep up to date with whatever they are up to on the Oxford Canal. I even follow some blogs written by librarians, such as Digitalist http://www.digitalist.info/about-2/, who I have great respect for. I like the fact that Emma posts her presentations, and posted videos for Library Day in the Life (e.g. http://www.digitalist.info/2011/01/28/library-day-in-the-life-round-6-day-5/), using all sorts of media to share her teaching and experiences. Our jobs are fairly similar and it is interesting to see how she's getting on with her job, as I first met her at a Train the Trainers session two years ago, when her hair was just as quiffy as it still appears to be.
I keep up to date with... let's count them...21 different blogs via Google Reader, as well as the RSS feeds for some Tables of Contents pertinent to my job. My Google Reader feeds are somewhat out of control, as I subscribe to over 100, but I've now categorised them and prioritise reading the Librarianship ones over the Fun ones... most of the time.
Anyway, getting back to the task at hand, this is what I've learnt from fellow CPD23 blogs:
I end by stating that I hope my blog is registered with CPD23 soon...
I keep up to date with... let's count them...21 different blogs via Google Reader, as well as the RSS feeds for some Tables of Contents pertinent to my job. My Google Reader feeds are somewhat out of control, as I subscribe to over 100, but I've now categorised them and prioritise reading the Librarianship ones over the Fun ones... most of the time.
Anyway, getting back to the task at hand, this is what I've learnt from fellow CPD23 blogs:
- Librarians create PRETTY BLOGS! I love the book backgrounds, the birds on Alice in LibraryLand's blog, and all those other blogs making good use of Blogspot features.
- Librarians use WORDPRESS as well as Blogger! See for example: Addicted to Story and New Health Library.
- Healthcare librarians are also participating and blogging about their Chartership! I will keep tabs on this one for inspiration... passionatemedicallibrarian
I end by stating that I hope my blog is registered with CPD23 soon...
Back to librarianship - CPD23 Thing 1
I've recently started on the path to Chartering with CILIP, and thought it might be a good idea to restart this blog and see what the world of Web 2.0 and librarianship looks like 16 months on from finishing the Oxford 23 Things project (http://fredonboard.blogspot.com/search/label/Thing%2023). Welcome to CPD23! Or... the CILIP 23 Things project, 2011.
The greatest thing that I took from participating in the Oxford 23 Things project last year was the confidence to start another blog. I started a blog last December which has begun life as a blog targeted at the nurses working for the Oxford Transplant Centre, and which is branching out and developing so that it meets the current awareness needs of up to 200 nursing staff in the Transplant Centre, Oxford Kidney Unit and in the urology department at the Churchill Hospital in Oxford. What will I learn this year? What will I learn and put into practice for user education purposes?
The greatest thing that I took from participating in the Oxford 23 Things project last year was the confidence to start another blog. I started a blog last December which has begun life as a blog targeted at the nurses working for the Oxford Transplant Centre, and which is branching out and developing so that it meets the current awareness needs of up to 200 nursing staff in the Transplant Centre, Oxford Kidney Unit and in the urology department at the Churchill Hospital in Oxford. What will I learn this year? What will I learn and put into practice for user education purposes?
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