LIS New Professionals Network

Reproduced from here because it's particularly relevant for New Profs...

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I have a theory: I think the 2nd job you ever get in libraries is the most important. We’ll come on to the why in a minute – first of all I wanted to see if others’ experiences backed up my hypothesis. I put a poll on to Twitter, asking this:

Which job was most significant in getting you to where you are in libraries now? Which most influenced you onto your current path?

I didn’t want to prejudice the outcome so I didn’t mention my theory. The results were interesting – they did seem to (just!) back me up:

Now, this is a very specific question. I’m not asking which factor is most significant to where people are now (a lot of people would say professional development outside of their 9-to-5 jobs, or their Masters perhaps) and I’m not asking which job is the most important in terms of people being in the information profession at all (presumably that’d be the first job for the vast majority of people) – it’s all about where you are, the path you’re on, the area of librarianship you’ve ended up in or the role you’re currently doing.

So I believe the 2nd job you ever get in libraries is arguably the most important because it dictates much SO of what happens to you afterwards. Obviously all jobs have an effect on what comes after them to some extent, but the 2nd job is something of a tipping point whose significance is, I’d imagine, not appreciated at the time most people are applying for it. Most people’s first library jobs fall into one of two categories – securing an entry-level position prior to doing the Masters (or becoming a graduate trainee), or securing an entry-level position because you’ve sort of stumbled into libraries accidently, and then finding it was a lot more interesting than you thought, so you stay in the sector. As has been discussed before, almost no first library jobs are beyond the entry-level – even people who have the Masters have to start at or near the bottom.

So – as a result of this, there’s not much proactive career choice about your first library job: you just need a job. Most people start as something like a ‘Library assistant’ – often a customer facing role, in the library itself, issuing books and helping with queries etc. You only really start to mould you career when you apply for that 2nd job – and my argument is that you need to make a really sound choice here, because it has a vital domino effect on your subsequent career. And actually, it’s tricky to divert off the path you choose for yourself at that 2nd job choice, because the 3rd job will (probably) be a higher up or better or related version of that 2nd job and (probably) pretty good, meaning you build a career off the back of it.

I’m obviously generalising here, and of course there will be exceptions – and throughout I’m imagining someone staying in more or less the same place, rather than having accrued several jobs at the same level on their CV simply because they’ve relocated a few times. But generally speaking, if you’re in that position that so many of us were in – you’re in your first library role, thinking it’s actually pretty good, wondering about making it into a career – you need to think carefully about the path you choose and, not least, how long that path is in reality.

I’ll take the academic library as an example, because that’s what I know best. Your first role was in Lending Services on the desk, so where do you go next? If you choose to stay in Customer Services then you’re looking at a Reference / Enquiries Desk role perhaps, otherwise there’s a big jump up to something like Customer Services Manager or Site Manager. If you go into the cataloguing side of things you could go for an Assistant Cataloguer post. You could try and move towards the subject librarian side of things by going for a Team Assistant post in an academic librarian subject team. Or there might be a ‘Digital Library Assistant’ type role, to do with digitisation or e-Resources. Whichever of these you choose, your 3rd job will probably also be in this area, is my point. And your 4th job too, perhaps. Of course people change all the time, but it’s quicker to develop a career in a roughly straight line. (I know this, because I didn’t - and have only in the last few months arrived at the job I actually wanted to do all along, and have much younger colleagues who took a more direct route…)

To use a building analogy – our 1st job in libraries is coming in through the front door. We can see a lot more now we’re inside, and we understand it more and want to stay. The second job is like choosing what floor to go to, and subsequent jobs tend to be a choice of doors on that floor. Of course it’s possible to change floors, but it often takes a lot of work… And we often just stay on that floor for ages becuase it’s naturally the floor we know most about.

Part of the reason I’m writing this is because I know some people who’ve been working in libraries a good while, and are just sort of treading water – because that second job took them down a path, and now that path is blocked for whatever reason. There just aren't any more senior jobs than they're already doing, in the area they've come to specialise in. So I’d recommend getting hold of one of those organisational structure charts for your library (or the library you’d like to work in) and literally plotting your ideal route upwards, seeing what’s feasible, where the obstacles are, when you’d be waiting an age for people to retire or leave, etc. Some paths have very few destinations so are more competitive. Some might not even exist by the time you get to the good bit. Some paths might look like their beyond you in terms of expertise, but actually you could get there over time. Some paths have loads of destinations but aren’t well paid. Money certainly isn’t everything, but progression means a lot – you don’t want to get stuck in a rut.

It would be nice just to live in the moment, just to ‘be’ and not worry about all this stuff. But librarianship is a hugely competitive profession, with far more qualified librarians than there are jobs for qualified librarians. So it’s really never too early to be thinking about the career path you’re embarking upon – ideally, you need to start making informed choices almost from the very start.

If you’ve made it through all that - do you agree with my 2nd Job Hypothesis?

- thewikiman

Thank you to Ned, Lex & Rachel for offering me the opportunity to write about cataloguing here. This piece is a response to the earlier Anatomy of a cataloger post but it is also a shameless plug for cataloguing, cataloguers and the High Visibility Cataloguing site that I helped to set up. 

Let’s just get this out of the way first: cataloguers have a bit of an image problem.  But, let’s face it, so have librarians and you’re here at LISNPN so we already know that you – my esteemed reader - can see past lazy stereotypes and tired old clichés, right? So let’s just move on…

I love solving problems. Each piece I catalog is a puzzle. I can use that talent  to help end users and my colleagues in reference @erinaleach

I love being a cataloguer but I can’t give you a catch-all description of what life is like as a cataloguer. There are as many types of cataloguer role as there are types of library: what is involved with vary with the size and nature of the collection, the types of materials acquired, the balance of in-house versus outsourced record creation, the software used. Cataloguing could mean dealing with books. Or serials. Or purely online resources.  Or institutional repositories. Or artefacts, teaching materials, [fill in the blank yourself]. I can tell you that cataloguing takes place in a constantly evolving environment, so cataloguers need to be adaptable, forward-thinking and, at the very least, not afraid of technology. 

…it’s never boring: the challenge of figuring out how to make things accessible/findable @slmcdanold

There are many job titles for what we do: cataloguer, metadata technician, bibliographic services librarians, technical services/acquisitions/collection description. There are also plenty of library roles which involve some cataloguing without being defined as a “cataloguer”: for example, subject specialist, dealing with a special collection or solo librarian-who-does-everything.

To get some ideas of why people love cataloguing, whether they are full-time cataloguers or just do cataloguing as part of their wider role, I asked on Twitter for people to complete the sentence “I love cataloguing because…”. The quotes throughout my post are just a handful of the many replies I received within a couple of hours. These short quotes paint a better picture of the heart and soul of cataloguing than I could ever do myself.

...because my precise yet creative descriptions facilitate discovery by stealth. Patron: ‘Wow! I didn’t even know that existed’ @angefitzpatrick

...because it makes me more familiar with the books & therefore with the library, which means I can answer readers’ queries better @lemurph 

...because I feel like the anatomist of a book, I discover internal  intricacies,  pin down inner meaning, & enhance findability @darklecat

If you want to find out more, I’d advise you to start with the comments on the Anatomy of cataloger post, where many eloquent and passionate cataloguers explain what they do and why they love it. For even more,  try the High Visibility Cataloguing site (or, for those of you on Twitter, try searching for the hashtag #hvcats). At High Visibility Cataloguing, we are planning more ways to explain what cataloguers do and give a better sense of what it means on a practical, day-to-day level to be a cataloguer. It would also be a good place for anyone interested in getting in touch with cataloguers, to ask questions and find out more.

… because information is power,  and I control the information ;) @evil_jen

...gives ability to be a well-rounded librarian:  we wear many hats,  cat[aloguing] is a good foundation @hippylibrarian

This post is 2nd in my series "Library Team Task Force", a description of roles performed by librarians (sometimes the same one!) so that we might come to a better understanding of what our colleagues do and so students might have more realistic ways to potentially decide which track to focus on.

Quick: who do you go to when you walk into most libraries?  A reference librarian.  Chances are, they get more circulation questions than the circulation desk (especially if there happens to be a line at circulation), plus all the reference questions they field in person, and via telephone and email.

Reference librarians can get the reputation of the "cool librarian" because they're the ones who know where the Anarchist's Cookbook is, where you can find information about things like pornography industry statistics, and why men have nipples (hint: there's a book for that!); from the patron's point of view, the reference librarian can get you answers to questions you'd never ask another person, and show you how to get it yourself in case you don't want to ask why that itches next time (disclaimer: see a doctor, not a librarian, for any and all medical questions).  They boldly go where information lives, returning victorious with an answer in their hands.

Reference librarians also, in my experience, have a high rate of burnout.  Besides answering questions, they keep stats about all the work they do.  They have to be politically savvy, or should be, at any rate, and learn how to balance needs of "normal" patrons with needs of VIP patrons.  They need to learn about what exactly the First Amendment covers when it's a minor asking a question, or how to deal with someone who either as a joke or in earnest wants to know where to buy drugs or hire a prostitute.  Reference librarians face tremendous pressure from both outside and within the profession to provide information regardless of their personal feelings.  A classic example: should a reference librarian who also happens to be Catholic be required to assist a patron in finding a clinic that performs abortions?  Should a reference librarian who suspects a patron is severely depressed also help that patron find information about methods of suicide?  Ideally, these questions are answered in policies and the library director/manager is available to escalate the situation if needed.  Ideals don't always happen.

Reference librarians do what our lofty goals tell us is important: they match those who have information needs with information that meets those needs.  They see sides of enquiry that other types of librarians don't, but they also deal with sides of our patrons we might rather not meet.  It's a high calling, but the job can be stressful and, from what I've been told, sometimes disappointing because of patron attitudes toward scholarly work and repetitive questions about the location of the bathroom.  This job isn't for every personality, so ask yourself if you can deal with the types of "boring", "everyday" questions that make up a fair amount of reference work.