Thing 23: Reflection – what have I learnt and where do I want to go from here?

When I started this course back in June 2011, I had no idea just how long it would take to complete; it was supposed to have taken one year but instead it has taken two. Now, I hasten to add that this lengthy run has nothing to do with me being disinterested or lazy, I had to deal with two fairly major personal traumas that took my time and attention. However, I am happy to report that both turned out okay in the end so I was able to bounce back and here we are, this is IT, the very last “Thing”! Let’s start off with what have I learnt, which is SO much, it’s difficult to know where to begin…

 

The very first “thing” we were required to do was to create a blog and this old blog of mine has become very important to me. Mostly because it has become both an outlet for my interest in our special collections here and, in photographing the items, it has also become something of a creative outlet. I have learnt that I love taking photographs, I love the whole process; setting up shoots, taking the photos, editing them and posting them.

I have also learnt the vast benefits of using social media to promote and improve my library career. I would say for this, Twitter has been the best outlet [I’m @SquirrelLib] as I came to a conclusion very early on that librarians love to Tweet! There are thousands of them out there; all sharing valuable information resources [of course], experiences, breaking news, gossip, cat pictures, recipes, film reviews... you name it, they'll tweet it! 

Another important thing I learnt was not to try and do everything. The course advocates trying everything of course but very early on you realise just how many social media vehicles are available and therefore the best thing to do is to pick and choose what works for you. This has worked perfectly for me, I use my Blog and Twitter accounts for work and Facebook and Flickr for my little crafting business and right now, these four accounts are quite enough thank you very much.

 

Doing CPD23 has made me a better librarian, I’m much more aware of information resources, new technologies and I’m definitely much more in tune with what’s going on around me, and I was pretty rubbish at that last one.

Where do I want to go from here? Well, I have just been given permission to upload my blog posts on to the main museum blog and this is very exciting as so many more people will get to see them. I love the idea that doing something I really enjoy is also promoting my library, myself and our museum's collections and I consider that ending on a real high!

So goodbye and thank you to CPD23, it has been a pleasure :-)

 All photographs in this post taken by Squirrel Library

Thing 21: Promoting yourself in job applications and at interviews



This one was always going to be tricky as I have not attended that many interviews. To those people who read my posts regularly, this will come as no surprise. I’m not a person who jumps from job to job – I found a job I loved I stuck with it.

That said, I obviously have attended interviews and at times, been successful but, if I’m truthful I believe that may have been more luck than judgement.

If I had to give someone advise on applying for a job I would say that you need to prepare of course but… do not over prepare. Years ago, whilst I was a Museum Assistant here, I applied for a job in the Art Dept. I really wanted this job and had waited a long time for it to come up and both myself and another Museum Assistant [a good friend also] were going for it. The post was for a Curatorial Assistant for Applied Arts and I was quietly confident as I held an Art History Degree [whilst my friend did not]. However, as I became convinced that this was my dream job I over prepared and on the morning of the interview I started suffering with a serious attack of nerves. That said, the first half of the interview went ok but then a classic “curve-ball” question sent me spiralling in to an anxiety attack that ended up with one of the Art Curators leaning over and asking if I was okay [the shame!]. It was a disaster after that, my mouth went so dry that I had trouble speaking and at one point I couldn’t even string a sentence together and thought I might be having a stroke! Suffice to say, I didn’t get the job but [yes, you guessed it] my friend did.

The point of relating this sorry tale is to illustrate that it’s not good to want something too much and that over preparing can be as bad as under-preparing.

Okay, since I have already admitted my lack of experience in this area, I think we’d better take a look at people who do know a bit about it…



 Lauren Jury has written a very informative Thing 21, breaking up the post into three sections as laid out in the Thing 21 write-up:

Part 1: Identifying your strengths; capitalising on your interests

Thing 21 recommends “[Making] sure that you keep up-to-date with yourself, and if you are unhappy in your current situation, acknowledge what has changed and take action.” I know I’m capable of doing this (as do people who’ve got a more personal insight into my life at the moment), and it’s a strength I have that I didn’t know about. I guess you never do until you’re in a situation where you need it.

Part 2: Applying for a job

I don’t plan to be on applying for a job in the near future, but I do need to build up an accessible record of activities, experiences and skills because it’s increasingly important to keep track of this kind of thing. I do have lists of interviews, presentations and publications, which I update fairly regularly... I try to keep my CV up to date when I know I’m likely to need to send it to places – this isn’t just for jobs, but for bursaries and applications for other things, and if you’re considering Chartership – so it is very handy to be able to quickly send it off without too much effort updating it.

Part 3: Interviews

I found the advice for this part of the Thing pretty spot on. I’ve recently been on the other side of the interview table and had the unfortunate experience of interviewing some truly dreadful applicants. Here’s some advice that I hope nobody needs to pay attention to!

• Dress smart…
• Make eye contact…
• Be enthusiastic…
• Don’t apologise for what you consider to be a lack of experience. Big up what you do know and what you have done…
• Let the interviewer finish the question before you start answering it! Don’t be afraid of (a little bit of) silence. Take the time to think of an answer if you don’t know where you’re going to go with a response.
• Think of a couple of questions to ask at the end of the interview…

The full version of Lauren’s post can be read here and I strongly recommend reading it if you are in the process of applying for a job as she has written it from the perspectives of both interviewee and interviewer.

Another very well written Thing 21 is by Karen Pierce at dark-side-of-the-catalogue where she relates a similar interview experience to mine but in reverse – she says that one of the best interviews she ever gave was for a job that she knew she was never going to get so she just relaxed and got on with it and was brilliant. However, Karen also discusses her interest in European folk dancing and then relates how the skills and energy required for that has been easily transferred on to her work CV:

The ability to learn new skills, to apply these skills in practice, and combine them with previous knowledge, to work by one-self, and with other people, teaching others new techniques, becoming the secretary for a local group, which organises monthly events and an annual festival (lots of organisational skills there!).  I’m sure there are more things I could think of, but it makes my earlier interests of ‘reading’, and ‘walking’, and ‘art’ pale in comparison (not that there is anything wrong in any of those activities!).  These days (as I’ve got older and done more things) I am far better equipped to fill in the CV/application form than when I first left University  – as I would guess most people are.      

I really like the idea of something you love to do that is completely separate from your work self but that still enhances that work self and this ties in with one of the tasks related to Thing 21 -Identifying your strengths; capitalising on your interests.

I have all the “normal” interests: reading, cinema, theatre and going to the gym [no-where near as often I should though] but over the last few years another interest has recently taken over all of these and that is “crafting”. I make cards, gift boxes, brooches, pendants, note books, calendars, decorations and collages and sell them through shops and craft fairs. I use primarily recycled paper and card [99% of which comes from the library here!] along with magazine and general bric-a-brac type scraps. I’m not yet completely sure how this past-time might be used to enhance my work as a librarian but it has had a profound effect on how I see the books here in the library. I know find myself looking at the book as an object in its own right and not solely for its content. I’m starting to take an interest in the archaeology of the book and looking with new eyes at some of our rarer books as museum collections rather than library holdings. Of course setting up a craft business also takes a lot a hard work, concentration and dedication and these old fashioned attributes never go out of date J

Finally, I would like to point you in the direction of the ever brilliant thewikiman and his informative post What's the key to a good interview - beyond the truisms we all know already?

By the way, the images dotted over this post are all my own work [yay to me!] and if you’d like to see more please take a look at my Flickr and Facebookpages:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/66082485@N02/   http://www.facebook.com/Mayfifth1935].                                   

Thing 20: The Library Routes project

The homepage of the Library Routes Project states its intention as:

… to bring together the thoughts and experiences of Information Professionals on how they got where they are today, and why they chose to work in libraries at all.

 And it is just that; a platform on to which have been uploaded many wacky and wonderful stories posted by librarians and information specialists on how they dipped their toes into our world of books [‘n stuff] and loved it so much they decided to build a career around it.

My story is not like that but okay here goes [in a nutshell]; shamefully disorganised [career wise] from a very early age I never envisaged myself as a librarian at all. When I left school I had absolutely no idea what I wanted to do so did what many panicky and confused school leavers did… I started work in a shop. It was Laura Ashley [Cardiff] and I ended up staying for 8 [most enjoyable] years until I started their managerial training course and decided it most definitely was not for me so I left. A month later I started a degree at Cardiff Metropolitan University [Howard Gardens campus] in the History & Theory of Art and Design partly because I was confused and panicky again [still not knowing what I wanted to do]; a really good friend was starting it; but mostly because I had always harboured an interest in art history.

I thoroughly enjoyed every aspect of the course and came away with a not too shabby 2:1 and a plan to get a job in the Art Department [here] at National Museum Cardiff but had to wait until a vacancy came up so I got another shop job, this time at Next [Newport branch] and ended staying for another 3 [not quite so enjoyable] years. Eventually, I got a job as a Museum Assistant here at the Museum and [I’m sure I’ve mentioned this in a previous post] when a job finally did come up in the Art Department, I applied but didn't get it so I side-stepped over to the Visitor Services Department as an administration assistant  whilst rethinking how I could utilize my Art History knowledge within the Museum [because I was by this time ensared with love for the place and didn't want to leave] and then as if by magic [after about a year] a vacancy was advertised in the library for matenrity cover and the rest [as they say] is history.

I think you can gather from my story that I’m not the kind of person who is focused and driven to making plans and strategies. I tend to drift, bobbing along and seeing where the wind/tide/path takes me and in one respect, I’m doing okay. I love working in the Museum, it’s an amazing, vibrant and exciting environment. I really enjoy my work [primarily managing the journals collections plus many other things] and I’m now qualified with an MSc in Library and Information Studies. However, the downside to being so unambitious is that, qualification notwithstanding, I’m still working as a Library Assistant and at my age [please don’t ask] I should be on a much higher grade.

Hopefully you can see why I have not [yet!] uploaded my story on the Library Routes Project, especially when Laura Woods talks about it being a good resource for careers advice! That said, I do enjoy reading the posts [as any decent nosey parker does over their afternoon cuppa] and some recent gems are  Adventures of a Librarian, Librarians on the loose and particularly Librarians on the loose [Emma's story].

We were also asked to look at Library Day in the Life Project, which I already took part in last year [read it here], I thoroughly enjoyed this and will definitely do it again soon.

Thing 12: Putting the social into social media

This is the one Thing I have not been looking forward to as I’m quite ANTI social media generally; however, that mostly relates to my personal life which is not on discussion here [thank heavens]. No, as far as using social media for professional and work purposes, I am finally coming to the realisation of just how beneficial it can be. Therefore, this post will mainly cover my experience of social media as a tool used for 'professional purposes' rather than an active tool for career develpoment as promotion of one's workplace is in essence, promotion of oneself.

I started off by reading Debbie Raven’s CILIP article with interest; she discusses how the images of sites such as Twitter and Facebook when used for work purposes have changed recently and are now seen in a more positive light. Moreover she says that by being part of what she calls an active community of practice helps the individual’s professional development. She mentions the research carried out by Karen Butterworth in LIS professional’s use of blogs and the surprising statistics this has unearthed [e.g. 54% regularly reading blogs with only 5% never reading them and 93% reading LIS specific blogs]. These LIS professionals saw this activity as a practical strategy making their daily networking and information-gathering tasks more efficient. However, on the downside Raven comments on the fact that there are still many libraries that do not encourage such activities in the work sphere and [apart from the odd tiny bit] I am not actively using these new social media tools during my work day but I hope this might change soon.

  

I also read a few Thing12 posts by other CPD23 participants and found those by Dark side of the catalogue, Palely loitering and Taken for binding not only very well written but also encompassing a lot of what has been my experience with social media so far. For me personally, the most amazing benefit [with regards to social media] from CPD23 is the access to a vast melting pot of like minded professionals who are all sharing their experiences and opinions via their blogs. The majority of them are streets ahead of me but that’s okay – I’m constantly learning about new things and picking up tips all the time. Secondly, I am really starting to get into my stride with Twitter but it has taken time. I didn’t take to its immediacy and transient languages straight away but have persevered and am now starting to Tweet about LIS and work related subjects instead of just replying to others and re-tweeting [although I am also enjoying a bit of Downton Abbey chit-chat J]. Thirdly the very act of writing these posts about my library experiences has given me [as an LIS professional] a new confidence and relevancy I have been [in the past few years] sorely lacking.

 I have only signed up to the very minimum of the social media tools covered during CPD23 but I can honestly say it is only because the time I can spend on this course right now is very limited and not because I couldn’t be bothered. That said, I also need to remember to use them when I do get the time and I can give you two examples of missed opportunities over the last few weeks. Firstly, we [that is my Library] were on television – prime time Welsh news [BBC Wales Today]! The Librarian had been contacted by the BBC and asked if we had an early Welsh map [yes just a fewJ] so he brought out a Humphrey Lhuyd map [published 1573 and showing the original county boundaries] as they wanted to show it in relation to a news story on recent new Welsh county border shifts. So he was filmed with said map along with two other members of staff working dutifully by [I was on leave - another opportunity for stardom missed]. Now, the Librarian did tell me about it two days before the piece actually aired, ample time for me to have a good old Tweet or blog about it but did I? Err no. The next example concerns the Librarian again, this time giving a lunch time talk in our lovely shiny new Clore Discovery Centre [on Powys: Land of Castles?] which by the way, was full to capacity. Now again, I knew about this talk months in advance but did I Tweet or blog about it? Err no. That said; I am getting better and only last week I Tweeted [in good time] about another talk given by the Librarian [on Siege and Destruction at Raglan Castle but this time at St Fagans: National History Museum] and you can see it in all its glory if you care to follow me at @SquirrelLib. I did sign up early on to follow Stephen Fry on Twitter but he posts so many Tweets and it was taking so long to trawl through them I had to “unfollow” him; am now concerned I have committed a sacrilegious act of epic proportions.  

In conclusion and with regards to personal career development, my blossoming relationship with social media has made me feel, on the negative side, a little "exposed" but on the positive side, more "visible" and I think both will do me good.