CPD23 Things 2012: Thing 11 - Mentoring

This time last year (ish), I wrote this post for Thing 11 on the subject of Mentors and Mentoring: http://fredonboard.blogspot.co.uk/2011/08/thing-11-i-love-my-mentor.html

Based on this CPD 23 Things post, updated for 2012: http://cpd23.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/thing-11-mentoring.html

Well, Theatre grad needs a mentor: http://theatregrad.wordpress.com/2012/07/27/thing-11-i-am-still-in-need-of-a-mentor/ and I've just had to give up my wonderful mentor, having (hopefully, fingers crossed) finished my Chartership portfolio and epic journey. But I still have my fabulous colleague, T, to cheer me on. She's been encouraging me to apply for jobs at the WHO of late, which I'll look into when I get a spare moment at home, where I can think. It's good to look at job ads, to see which SKILLS I need to develop and work on still, to see what else I can do, and what else I can do right here, in my current job! It is really helpful to have someone at work to talk to and get support from. I hope that I can mentor some colleagues here too, as they are starting out in their LIS careers and need the odd bit of encouragement to apply for jobs, learn some new skills, get some experience out of our library environment.


REMEMBER: 

"A mentor is part coach, part cheerleader, part protagonist, part antagonist, and mostly a realist. As one mentee once said about his mentor, “don’t tell me how great I am, I can call my mom if I want to hear that.” A mentor provides a dose of reality mixed with advice on how to improve." - from http://learnthat.com/2007/12/how-to-find-a-mentor/

CPD23 Thing 2012: Thing 10 - Graduate traineeships, Masters Degrees, Chartership, Accreditation

Since I last wrote about this Thing - http://cpd23.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/thing-10-graduate-traineeships-masters.html -  last year on 23/08/11 [http://fredonboard.blogspot.co.uk/2011/08/thing-10-routes-into-librarianship.html] ... what's changed?

Well, I completed and posted off three copies of my CILIP Chartership Portfolio (application!) last week, so I'm on my way, with luck, to the MCLIP bit at the end of my name. I don't know what's next. I suppose I'll keep a better record of my CPD achievements from now on so that I can revalidate in 3-4 years' time, and to keep a track of where I'm going and what I've done, so that I know how my career is progressing and what I am capable of. I've just applied to join a Mindfulness course in Michaelmas term, for example, to help with my mental health and approach to work, difficult people, stress.

It's less than 2 years since I finished the MSc in Information and Library Management. I've been in my present job for 16 months. There are several areas that I need to develop and work on in the next year, especially presenting to groups and Important Individuals, and promoting the library service. I always need to work on my management skills - line-managing a certain gentleman takes up a lot of mental effort... I need to have a think about what I can put on my next Personal Professional Development Plan. And then do things!

The Hobbit Hole on Thing 10: http://intothehobbithole.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/cpd23-thing-10-revisited.html

CPD23 Things 2012: Thing 9 - Evernote

This is my new favourite favourite thing: http://cpd23.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/thing-9-evernote.html

Why was I so reluctant to try it last year? http://fredonboard.blogspot.co.uk/2011/07/cpd23-thing-9-evernote.html Crazy!

I can clip all sorts of stuff, for work and for play, and organise them to my heart's content with tags. I love tags. I love organising stuff. I've spent my evenings and recent weekends organising physical stuff - cards, photos, letters, mementos etc - and Evernote does it all electronically, online, like magic! This and Dropbox will improve my life. Yes, I'm scared of new things. Yes, I thought it would take me ages to get my head around how it works. Now I'm a convert. I'll recommend this to anyone doing a research project. You can clip and tag stuff and save webpages, articles, photos etc (what about copyright? Oh well) which will make any kind of research project easier (except one which doesn't involve a computer at all ever).

Theatregrad also loves it: http://theatregrad.wordpress.com/2012/07/05/thing-9-evernote/

So does Lisa in the Health Library: http://lisainthehealthlibrary.wordpress.com/2012/06/28/things-8-and-9-getting-organised/ - although she reminds us that we shouldn't be saving any sensitive materials on Dropbox or Evernote, and we must always back up our important work (eg Chartership portfolios, dissertations etc) in many places, as even memory sticks can fail.

The Hobbit Hole: http://intothehobbithole.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/cpd23-thing-9-revisited.html

Staying with the marketing theme...

This is truly brilliant. According to the philosophy of this youtube video, we should be promoting our libraries using... cat videos. An inspired idea. I wonder if a medical library, an academic medical library, has ever brought in extra business by creating a cat video and disseminating it online?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IkOQw96cfyE

Marketing our little health care library

Notes and reflective thoughts from the Ned Potter course on Marketing that I attended earlier this week:

First, answer these questions. And answer them well. Why are we marketing our library service(s)? What is the aim? 

Why do we want people to use us/ services, and engage with us?

My answer would be: We want NHS and university staff/students to use our services because we want to improve the usage of our physical resources (books, PCs, the space for studying and working in) and our staff resources (enquiries, literature searches, 1-1 training sessions or group sessions, our document supply services). Sometimes, it is true, we are  under-employed. It is now the Summer. People have fled our campus. People are thinking about things other than literature searches, research projects, systematic reviews. It is therefore a time for us to get on with the work that we do have on (I refer to other colleagues!), and for me to think about our marketing plan and what we can do, when, and to target which user groups (and why). I need to be busier at work. Usually, the moment I think that, I start to receive requests for help from readers. But this time, we will have our new-look library to promote and increase awareness, and we need to improve our general usage statistics, to demonstrate our impact on stakeholders and generally keep busy. We can help people. We love helping people! We often help people. We can do more, bearing in mind that a softly softly approach is often best as we are quite easily overwhelmed with work (apart from at this time of year, on the whole).

Why do I use the library services that I do? Because my local library has the stuff that I want to read, watch or listen to. Books, DVDs, CDs. I still like to use these physical objects and borrow them from a library. I also like my local library service because the staff are friendly, a variety of people from the community can be found in the building, where it is a nice temperature, clean, safe, quiet. I get that 'sense of community' when I go there. Mind you, I only go there when I need something. I will go there next week when I need to return library books, for example!

Ned talked about the marketing cycle: from thinking about our GOALS (why market??) -> researching who to target ->segment our market (NHS nurses/consultants/ FY1s, University staff, students etc) -> objectives of the marketing campaign for the different segments -> promotional activities (we're good at these, allegedly: leaflets, pens, posters, emails, word of mouth, events!, etc) -> measure the impact (statistics! Qualitative feedback! Surveys!) -> Evaluate the project/ results so far. Has it been worth it? has it had an impact? Reflect!! -> Modify the marketing campaign -> do it all over again.

Just like the reflection cycle: Plan -> Do -> Review. 

So I'm planning what I can do in August/ early September, once our refurbishment is finished. I need to tell the world (aka our campus and the hospital over the road) that we're still here! We're open! We're better than ever! We can help them! We can help them in the following ways...!! etc.

I've created a table with a few target groups, our objectives, how our service can benefit them (i.e. the sales pitch - we can help you with X...), what the key messages are (We really CAN help you with X!), how to get the message out, and the plan of action, before considering how to measure the rate of success with each plan of action. Plan -> Do -> Review.

We aren't doing too badly at promoting our stuff and our staff/ services.

We basically want people to think: I need help! I know, I'll go to the library, and get in contact with staff who will be friendly and quick to respond to my needs. 

A few other points:

• I've deleted my Twitter account (again), as I wasn't tweeting, can't figure out what it's useful for, and can follow the conferences that I might need to know about by just searching for #hlg2012 (or equivalent). Twitter annoys me. Sorry. It's just not for me. 
• Don't ask library users for feedback if we can't change anything, eg. can't physically move our library to the hospital over the road (but can offer an outreach service, whereby I'll come to you with laptop, library materials, a smile and enthusiasm to be available to answer questions and do training-on-the-hoof!)
• People get survey fatigue. Do short monthly surveys, and say in the subject line "3 questions on ejournals" etc. 
• Prioritise any feedback: easy to do, high impact, versus hard to do, low impact, ergo don't do it. 
• Tell people very soon after the survey ends about findings and what you can do in response! Actually, this is something that I learnt at the UHMLG conference in York, in June...
• Use those Library Champions, aka the readers whom I have helped recently who really like our service and are willing to tell their colleagues about us.

Cats and libraries

I was very tired last night, and yet still pondering the issue of marketing and promoting libraries as I tried to get to sleep. Bear with me.

I was thinking that marketing libraries back to the people who pay for the service is a bit like my cat, who I feed and care for, mounting a campaign to remind me how great he is (good for stress levels, brings me mice/birds with loving care and thought, good company, useful trip hazard) so that I keep feeding him. I'll feed him anyway, regardless of any such campaigns, because I just will. He is mine, I am his.

I must admit to being foolishly surprised, as I completed my Information and Library Management masters, that we, librarians, must spend so much time promoting our libraries back to the target user groups. The NHS Trust pays for us, therefore why do we have to remind them that we exist? Ahhhh, because it's bigger than just 'me and my cat', we have several thousand potential users to target in specific ways and say, oi, we can help you, do please get in touch, it would be great to work with you.

How?

How to promote a library service to both staff/students at a university, and staff at an NHS Trust?

Erm.. in different ways. Targeted emails. Inductions for new staff/students. Reference management training sessions for staff/students at the uni, and for NHS staff. Posters up in the relevant places. Emails to NHS staff with whom I have already worked, to remind them that I exist, the service exists, and how can I help you/ we help you/ we help your colleagues?

I'll find out more on this theme later on today at a training session. I thought I'd get some of my crazy reflections down 'on paper' beforehand. I'm also clearing my head a bit before I read through my Chartership portfolio one more time before printing three copies to be spiral-bound (so old-school!), and then posted off to the nice CILIP people. Then.. wait. Hope for the best. Start thinking about my new CPD needs and how to meet them. Oh, and get on with the latest CPD23 Things 2012 project.

Brilliant! Bring on open access!

From today's Guardian:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/blog/2012/jul/17/open-access-scientific-research

CPD23 Things 2012: Thing 8 - Google Calendar

As I wrote last year- http://fredonboard.blogspot.co.uk/2011/07/cpd23-thing-8-google-calendar.html - I still rely on my Outlook calendar to organise myself, rooms, staff, work activities. It works really well, and is a useful reference tool when I forget when I last attended a meeting of the Science, Technology and Medicine librarians' New Technologies group, for example.

I've tried Google Calendar in the past. Google have enough information about me already. They don't need to know what I get up to in the evenings as well as what RSS feeds I subscribe to via Google Reader, etc...

CPD23 Things 2012: Thing 7 - Real-life networks

This post refers to the CPD 23 Things 2012 post: http://cpd23.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/thing-7-real-life-networks.html

I've attended a number of conferences in the last two years and become a member of several different real-life networks. The four CILIP in the Thames Valley meetings that I've attended in the last 10 months have led to my meeting school, FE, private/commercial librarians, as well as HE/NHS/ health sector colleagues. I've blogged a few times about those meetings... let's see... here: http://fredonboard.blogspot.co.uk/2011/09/cilip-in-south-east-meeting.html and here: http://fredonboard.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/yes-princess-eli-you-will-go-to.html

I attended the 2010 EAHIL conference in Portugal, and met some wonderful librarians from Sweden, the Netherlands, the US, and lots of other countries. Attending that conference opened my eyes to other career opportunities... but we'll see. I'm in touch with a few people via Facebook and email relationships, and hope to attend an EAHIL conference in the future, depending on funding!

As I'm a CILIP member, I'm a member of the Health Libraries Group and now Libraries for Nursing, for which I've written an article for their journal (as yet unpublished).

When life calms down a bit for me, I'll try to get out and about a bit more. I'd like to collaborate on a few projects with colleagues from other sectors, for example, but I'll keep it nice and vague for now, until something definite emerges.

CPD23 Things 2012: Thing 6 - Online networks

Reference back to CPD23 Things 2012 post: http://cpd23.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/thing-6-online-networks.html

I use Facebook for personal stuff and to network with colleagues-who-are-also-friends.

I use LinkedIn for... not entirely sure  yet. I have at least 10 contacts, and I've updated my career on my profile, but I'm not sure what I can use it for usefully. If I want to look at careers abroad, I'll use it to network with Australian librarians (in Melbourne, please), and see what I can find...

I subscribe to about ten different Jiscmail listings, to keep in touch with the LIS worlds that I inhabit.

Maybe I should do more online networking, but I find that there's a fine line between online vs real world, working on my day-job work, and networking for work purposes vs networking for the sake of networking.

I will investigate the CILIP communities and see what I can learn from them about the worlds that other LIS professionals, in very different sectors to mine, inhabit and how those worlds differ from the health/NHS/HE sectors.

CPD23 Things 2012: Thing 5 - Reflective Practice

I need a chance to reflect, this morning, on the state of my Chartership portfolio.

PLAN > DO > REVIEW

I'm in planning mode at the moment, before I finish writing (the DOING) the evaluative statement and tidy it all up, and then I'll REVIEW the document before I send it to my mentor to review, check, comment, criticise, adore, etc.

We're currently doing well at project planning, here at the library, as we've planned and planned and planned the refurbishment project which is... drum roll... now underway. Chaps are removing doors, taking up carpet tiles, moving furniture, discussing electric circuits, and generally creating noise and mess. They are, indeed, DOING. We'll review what they do once they've done it. Will our new-look library be fit for purpose? Will I be able to plan, do and review my next phase of the promotional strategy for our little library, to get readers coming back to use our services? Watch this space!

I think reflective practice is crucial. Which reminds me... I need to complete an evaluation form, reflecting on the Management course that I did at the end of last year, and remind myself about what I learnt on the course, what I've put into practice, how I've changed. That's another good thing to do on a Tuesday morning when the library is really quiet (due to the refurb) and my enquiries have dried up for the moment.

I must remember these rules of reflective practice:

1. Recall it.
2. Evaluate it.
3. Apply it.

Link to CPD23 Things Thing 5 post http://cpd23.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/thing-5-reflective-practice.html

re: CPD23 Things 2012: Thing 3 - Brand

re: http://fredonboard.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/cpd23-things-2012-thing-3-brand.html

My life is a bit complicated and difficult at the moment. While certain things are on hold, others are racing ahead, and I'm caught in the middle trying to keep sensible, I've been tidying up my online presence. I've deleted Facebook photos, blog posts etc to clean up my online 'brand'. It is a good thing to do. I look forward to Google catching up with the changes that I've just made...

More soon from me on CPD23 Things 2012!