Library Camp Wales 2014 in Cardiff

After months of planning the day of the first ever Library Camp Wales dawned bright (although sadly not sunny!). If you've never heard of a Library Camp before, it is an 'un-conference', a free, participant driven event. The idea is that instead of booking speakers and presentations, the attendees pitch ideas on the day and contribute to the discussions.

After setting up in our fabulous venue, the Glamorgan Building in Cathays Park, our Library Campers started arriving and got stuck in to playing Human Bingo.



Some of the Library Camp Wales team manning the reception area

After the sessions were pitched and the timetable for the day was arranged the day got under way.

I didn't get to take part in many sessions as I was wandering about making sure everyone had all they needed, but I did get to facilitate the Speed Networking event, which was very noisy!

Speed Networking in action

Lunch involved a lot of food (Library Campers were very generous with their contributions) and we also had our very own customized cupcakes.

In the afternoon I got to attend a session on library skills and qualifications (which I'll blog about separately). Before I knew it, it was time for the wrap up and awarding the prizes for the badge competition, Human Bingo prize draw, and cake competition.

Winner of the Cake Competition!

We rounded the day off in Buffalo, enjoying 2 for 1 cocktails!

A card catalogue in Buffalo Bar, photo courtesy of @karen_gibbins

Check out a Storify of the day here.

Library Camp UK 2013 part 1

Last week I set off for Library Camp UK 2013 at the new Library of Birmingham. I’m not sure how many people were attending, but it certainly seemed as though there was a really large crowd gathered. If you’ve never heard of a Library Camp before, they are a series of 'unconferences' held around the UK. Free to attend, they operate an 'Open Space' policy meaning there is no formal agenda or speakers, attendees set the schedule on the day and the direction of the sessions is guided by the participants.

Session pitches

 

Although I had considered whether or not to pitch a session, in the end I decided not to. There were so many great pitches to choose from it didn't feel necessary.
 

The first session I went to was run by @llordllama on performance in presentation, and it was the perfect start to the day. Unlike some sessions, it was less of a discussion and more of a teaching and learning experience, although still very interactive. He illustrated the ways we might convey confidence using body language, facial cues and voice. It was useful to think about how we can use our style of presentation to engage with people and get the best out of situations. Not to mention learning to recognise what those cues might be telling us about others, and how that could affect how we approach them. A lot of the session involved audience participation, and most people seemed to leave smiling.

The secret garden on floor 7

 

The second session I attended was Evidence-based Librarianship, which was a very, very popular. This meant that the group was large and you had to really raise your voice to be heard. We were also sharing the room with a second session and the noise occasionally made it hard to hear. Such is the burden of popular sessions!
 

However despite those issues, I found the session really interesting and you can read notes from @pennyb [who pitched the session] here. It focused on service led research, and although I didn’t really feel like I had much to contribute personally I still enjoyed it. It was interesting to hear the difference between academic librarians in the UK and in the US, where involvement in research as part of your job is more widely expected. 

Concerns were raised about how difficult it can be to find out about research in the field unless you happen to be actively involved in it. A number of resources were mentioned that could help, such as Educause and the LIRG website. But there was also a call for a more formal bringing together of information centrally, and the thought that it should be the responsibility of CILIP to provide it.

I was also very interested to hear of a scheme run by the University of Brighton that matches dissertation students with libraries looking to undertake research.



The falafel stand was often mentioned in the run up to Library Camp

As I had been so unorganised as to not bring any food to share, I decided to go out for lunch to the explore the Christmas market [way too crowded], and look around the library, which is truly stunning.

CILIP Umbrella 2013 #ub13

Last week I went to CILIP’s big annual conference, Umbrella, for the first time thanks to a bursary from the Cataloguers & IndexersGroup. I will blog in more depth about some of the sessions later, but I wanted to get down some of my impressions of the event as a whole.

Never having been to a conference of more than about 200 delegates before, I was incredibly excited to attend Umbrella, which I think had about 600. Before setting off, I had gone through the list of sessions to try and get a feel for what I wanted to go to and was fairly overwhelmed at the choice, there was a lot going on!

Biddy Fisher giving the opening address at Umbrella

What were my highlights?

Un-brella 2013 - I headed up the night before the conference, so went to the drinks event they put on. It was great for a first timer who didn’t know anyone else there, as it meant I got to know people before the conference began, I would definitely recommend it. Un-brella also ran a number of other events over the two days, including ‘un-conference’ sessions (and ‘Human Bingo’ which was a great ice-breaker) I thought the team were great, and they did a fab job over the conference.

Janice Lachance (CEO, Special Libraries Association) - I found Janice’s talk really inspiring, I could tell from Twitter that not everyone shared that feeling, particularly with her suggestion to ‘release your inner executive’ and proposition that the word ‘librarian’ could be limiting. While I get where people were coming from, personally I did connect with it. I think if you bear in mind the context of what she was saying (many members of the SLA work in corporate environments) it’s more understandable. I found it encouraging that she spoke at Umbrella, it was a recognition that those of us working in less typical library sectors may need to consider different approaches to suit our workplace.

Ben Showers – although much of Ben's session focused on the skills we need for the future, I found his discussion of projects that use technology to open up collections and the work of the JISC/OCLC digital visitors and residents project most useful. Likewise Rebecca Bartlett’s portion of the debate (!) about libraries without walls, outlining mobile technologies and interactive tools at the new Library of Birmingham, was very interesting.

Future skills – I ended up in a few sessions that discussed training for library staff, both formal and informal, I’ll blog more on them later, but it was really interesting to see the approaches of library professionals in the UK and around the world. Transferable skills were definitely the buzz words of the conference!

MOSI - attending a wine reception in such an unusual venue (Museum of Science and Industry) and hearing about some of the amazing life changing and life saving activities that libraries are involved in at the Libraries Change Lives award ceremony. It really hammered home the amazing impact libraries can have on their community.

Photo courtesy of @Librarianpocket (Victoria Treadway)

Any down-sides?

Timings – a number of the sessions had four talks squished into the hour, it wasn’t long enough. A good proportion of the presentations I would have really liked to have heard more from, but there just wasn’t enough time to go into them in detail. Perhaps less choice would have allowed for longer sessions?

Seating – or lack of it! It meant eating lunch (it seems wrong to complain, it’s not the lunches you are there for, but they were terrible!) while sat on the floor. At coffee breaks you’re trying to juggle bags, conference programme, cup and saucer with nowhere to sit or a table to rest belongings. I wouldn’t ordinarily mind, but I don’t think it helped to facilitate networking.

But, overall it was a fantastic experience, and I’m so grateful that CIG gave me the opportunity to go, it certainly left me feeling inspired, and with things to mull over, which I suppose is the purpose of a conference!

Watching Phil Bradley give the closing speech

Check out presentations from the conference on the CILIP website.

Library meet up in Cardiff

CLIC (Cardiff Libraries in Co-operation) is organising a meet up for library staff in the South Wales area. The meet up is open to anyone working in libraries in Cardiff and the surrounding area, or anyone from nearby who fancies socialising with fellow library staff.

It will take place in the upstairs section of Barocco in Cardiff city centre from 5.30pm-9.30pm on Wednesday 24th October. Parking is available not too far from the bar (click the link to see a map of nearby car parks), and as we discovered last time we went there, Barocco does a two-for-one deal on cocktails!

It's a chance for us to get together and mix with others from different library sectors in an informal setting. If you fancy coming along, but want more information you can contact me via this blog or my Twitter account @KrisWJ

Hope to see you there!

CLIC Marketing event

CLIC (Cardiff Libraries in Co-operation) held a free training event for staff on the 29th May at the University of Glamorgan's ATRiuM building. This was my first event as a member of the Staff Development Group, and I had the added responsibility of looking after the @CLICLibraries Twitter account during the event and tweeting using the #clicmarketing hashtag.

We had three presentations, but kept to a very loose timetable. Previous CLIC training sessions tried to pack a lot in to the half-day, but this one had a much more relaxed feel to it and I think most people preferred that format.

The first presentation was from Alice Percival and Helen Staffer 'Marketing Champions' at Cardiff University, who are responsible for;

• co-ordination of library marketing projects
• sharing of good practice and ideas
• providing advice & guidance
• liaising with the communications team & communication working group
• managing the marketing fund

Alice and Helen described some of the recent marketing activities they had been involved in, such as the Love your Libraries Day. Aspects included sticking up Post-it notes, offering sweets to patrons and running competitions.

 

@ButeLibrary ran a Twitter draw, students retweeted a message and names are drawn randomly from a hat. Prizes were mugs with a picture of Bute Library on them.

Photo courtesy of @ButeLibrary

The Love your Libraries Day generated so much positive feedback that it was a real morale booster for staff, and they found that they didn't lose their professionalism by engaging in 'fun' activities.

They explained that students using the different libraries (Cardiff University has 14 of them) often behave in different ways, so they try to combine central themes with the freedom to tailor events to individual sites, rather than a 'one size fits all' approach.

Alice and Helen rounded off their presentation by pointing out how valuable the marketing strategies were as 'ensuring wide knowledge of their services is a crucial precursor to measuring impact'.

The second presentation was from Nicola Richards at Cardiff Central Public Library who shared a (very impressive) list of marketing events they hold, including;

• Student Fashion shows
• Psychic nights
• Speed dating
• Laughing matters - empowers young people, builds skills
• Vibe - market to ethnic communities
• Poetry & pints

Nicola then addressed the question 'How do they do it (on no money at all)!
A lot of their events are made possible through working with partners. They are always upfront with their partners that although there is no funding available, they can offer;

• promotion of their business
• to raise their profile in the community
• access to potential customers

Working with outside partners can also help to alleviate the workload, and in some cases they may take on the bulk of the organisational work. Members of the marketing team tend to fit it in around their regular work, so having that kind of help can be vital to the success of an event.

They also rely heavily on electronic promotion, not just their website, blog, Facebook and Twitter accounts, but also listings on 'What's on' websites and places like Gumtree.

'The best marketing tool we have are our staff'
Information packs are provided for all staff so that they are all fully briefed on what's happening and can pass that information on to the public. Although many of the events tend to happen at the Central site the branch libraries can also get involved by promoting the events, organising book displays that tie-in etc.

The final presentation was from Jane Purdie about the resources available to us on the librarywales.org site. Even though I had heard of the site before, I had no idea there was so much on there.

Library staff in Wales can log into the toolkit section of the site which includes;

• Reports - such as the Library Innovation Project of 2006/07 that looked at applying retail techniques in libraries
• Details of winning entries for the Marketing Innovations Awards which can be used as inspiration
• Presentations that can be used in training sessions
• Photo bank - over 500 photos cleared for consent for library promotional activities until 2016
• Story bank - testimonials from library users that can be used in promotional material
• Advertising templates in a range of formats (poster, banner, leaflet) for lots of different events, all free to download

It was a really impressive list!

The day finished with a tour of the ATRiuM library, famous for its very long loans desk! Presentations from the day can be seen on the CLIC website here.

CLIC Social Media in Libraries

On the 16^th November CLIC (Cardiff Libraries in Co-operation) organised a free training event on Social Media in Libraries hosted at Cardiff University’s Trevithick Building

It was advertised on the CLIC website (http://www.cliclibraries.co.uk/) and promoted on Twitter with the #clicsocmed hashtag set up by @CLICLibraries.  During the event there was plenty of live tweeting and a number of people were inspired to loose their Twitter "virginity".

As there was no budget to put on the event, CLIC were unable to provide any refreshments, but no-one seemed to mind as there was a coffee shop in the building, and @Gemma_DS very kindly brought some cakes, which were much appreciated.

There were six presentations in total, I'll blog about each one separately, but they included;

• Using social media for personal and professional development
• Using social media for networking, current awareness and to support staff and students in Glamorgan Business School
• How Cardiff University are managing their social media presence
• Cardiff Public Library blog and use of Twitter
• Cardiff University Virtual Librarian Service
• CPD23: Learning about tools for professional development

The event was a great success with in the region of 60 attendees, and a really enthusiastic buzz about it all during the whole thing. 

Thing 21 - Promoting yourself in job applications and at interview

The theme of Thing 21 is promoting yourself in job applications and interviews, which isn't something I'd previously thought about that much.  My employers paid for my MSc in Librarianship on the understanding that I would stay with them for a minimum of two years after completion.  This meant I didn't join the rush of newly qualified people trying to find their first professional post, and I have to say that was a bit of a relief to be honest.  Also, I'm already in the job I want, just not at the grade I would like (I'm currently a para-professional) so why would I want to leave?  Ideally I would rather have a promotion in my current workplace, rather than have to go elsewhere.  And, as I mentioned in Thing 20, I work a second part-time job, so job-hunting might mean having to say goodbye to two jobs I love.

However, given the current employment climate, it is probably wise to plan for every eventuality.  I know I would feel a little more confident, should I find myself having to look for alternative employment, if I had done some preparation in advance.  And of course, you never know, a dream job that is impossible to resist, could always present itself!

One of the first things I did for this Thing was to update my CV, it had been so long since I was last job-hunting I had rather neglected it.  I then decided to create an 'application form' document.  One of the aspects of filling in application forms that I always dreaded were the sections detailing your personal skills and how they met the job specifications.  I would spend ages trying to decide what to use as supporting evidence, and then even longer drafting and redrafting it.  I downloaded a couple of relevant application forms to give me an idea of the usual questions and criteria that are requested, and tried to get down as much information as possible.  Should I find myself applying for jobs, all I'll have to do is edit them to fit the particular specifications.

I already have a file at work for my PDR (Performance and Development Review) where I note down work activities I've been involved in.  I decided to expand on that to describe the role of my current job, but also added information about non-work activities and my non-library job.  In the past I've always kept my two part-time jobs very separate (or as much as possible) but recently I've come to feel this isn't such a good idea, I have skills I use in both jobs that could be applied to the other.

I had a brief look over the section on the CPD23 post giving advice on job interviews, but as I am not yet at that stage, I feel it is better to come back to that if I do end up needing to attend interviews.  It has made me more aware though of where I can go to find the information I require when I do need it.  Particularly the knowledge that CILIP members are entitled to two free sessions with a careers advisor a year.  I wouldn't have known that if the CPD23 team hadn't pointed it out, as it had somehow managed to escape my notice when I signed up to CILIP, but that will be very useful.

Thing 20 - The Library Routes project

I'd been on the Library Routes wiki in the past, as I always like to be nosy into why other people had decided to choose librarianship, but I had never posted myself.  I was happy to remedy that by adding a link to my Thing 10 post.

I then started looking through the other entries to compare people's paths to librarianship.  I was struck by how many people, like myself, had come to the profession after originally training or studying in a different area.  So many people had first degrees in subjects such as English, Art or Humanities, and only considered becoming a librarian after graduation.


The Wikiman's visual description of his career options

I was also interested to see how many people work part-time in libraries, particularly those who combine two part-time jobs to create a full-time equivalent, as this is what I'm currently doing.  One thing I certainly noticed when I started working in libraries was the wide range of  flexible working patterns that were available.  

Both my library jobs so far have been part-time, because when I was doing my first Masters (in ceramics) I got a part-time job as a pottery technician in a local community learning centre.  I love that job, but the hours and pay are limited.  When I graduated rather than give it up to do a full-time job, I searched for ones that could work around it, which is how I first ended up in a library.  When I realised that libraries were where I wanted to stay, I was heartened to discover that part-time roles were a common feature. 



In the time since starting my current library job I've also added teaching to my pottery technician's job.  I'm relieved that for the moment I don't have to choose between two (very different) jobs that I love, they work side by side very well.  Long may it last!



LibCampUK11 Session 3: New Library Models

I'm not entirely sure of the correct name for this session, I had it in my head that it was New Library Models, but I might have got that wrong.

The idea for this was a bit of a rip it up and start again mentality – if you had no budget/policy/time constraints what changes would you like to see made.

I have to be honest of all the sessions I went to this one turned out to be the one I got the least out of, I just felt it didn’t really deliver on what was pitched.  Instead of focusing on outrageous, there are no limits types of ideas we seemed to get bogged down very quickly in the more practical, realistic side of things. While it is understandable that we would, we do after all live in the real world, and we do have limits on what we could do, I was hoping for more radical ideas to come forth.

At one point we started discussing the way users search for information, and how they will often choose the path of least resistance.  I mentioned a study (I couldn't remember who by) that was done that showed that if users have to choose between the best source of information which takes effort to find, or 'good enough' sources of information which are very easy to find, they'll choose the easy option.  And that in some cases 'good enough' is just that, good enough for their purposes. 

This led to a discussion about falling research standards in academic sectors, students who would rather Google everything than use library resources, and that if these were the academics of the future wasn't it worrying.  I didn't speak up during the session but this attitude made me uncomfortable because at one point it started to stray worryingly close to territory that I'd seen here (also discussed here and link).  The comment I'd made was not to say, they are searching for information in the wrong way, but to try to highlight, if this is how people want to access resources, then shouldn't the library be doing everything it can to replicate that process.  Don't we ideally want to make it as easy to access the best sources of information as it is to access the 'good enough' material, so that people will always want to choose that instead.

We also had an interesting discussion on classification vs. categorisation, and one person gave an example of a very strange system of shelving, which seemed to rely solely on the discretion of the shelver as to where they felt it belonged.  This drew gasps of horror as we all imagined how completely impossible it must have been to actually find anything.

Finally we had a rather random discussion about trying to persuade Frank Skinner to be a library advocate, I can't remember now how it came about, but it seemed to involve us all stalking him on Twitter till he agreed.

I'd love to hear from anyone else who was at this session, and whether their perception of it was very different to mine.  At times I felt rather disconnected from it so I'm not sure I always followed the discussion correctly, I blame the post-lunch slump.