Leadership in Libraries: A focs on ethnic minority librarians

I managed to publish this book.  I worked with Chandos/Wood head Publishing which has now been bought by Elsevier. Check it out here: http://store.elsevier.com/product.jsp?isbn=9781843346586

It was published in 2012 and has received positive reviews - I am proud to say, if I may say so myself!!

Here is one from a Canadian Journal:  https://journal.lib.uoguelph.ca/index.php/perj/article/view/2696/2848#.UqeS9tJDuuI

Here is one from Australia:
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/00049670.2012.10739076

The one from United States can be found through the Journal of Academic Librarianship, Vol. 39, Issue 5, pg. 439. 2013.

Hope you have had a chance to read this book.  If not yet, hope you will soon :)

Back again? Maybe

I cannot believe there are still visitors to this blog. I haven't posted any updates since I moved to academia. Life has been busy. I was hired to maintain an online library providing resources to licensed health care practitioners all over the province.  After three years there I have moved on to becoming the liaison librarian for nursing and biomedical sciences. It has been a lot of fun, meeting new people and learning a lot about nursing and biomedical science resources and needs.

Most of this summer was spent organizing files towards promotion and tenure. Waiting on pins and needles to know the results in March and April.  Spent the fall orienting nursing students and faculty to many library resources, adding to the collections, teaching and of course, lots and lots of learning.  

Resume for Librarians

Here are some links that will help with your first resume:
http://www.lisjobs.com/jobseekrs/resume-advice.asp

http://www.resumesguru.com/librarian-resumes



If you are interested in having your resume reviewed for academic positions:
http://www.cla.ca/AM/Template.cfm?Section=Resume_Reviewing_Service_for_New_Librarians

General Resume Layout help:
http://www.liscareer.com/allen_resumes.htm

http://www.scribd.com/doc/6907954/Resume-Resources-for-Librarians

More help with interview questions

I didn't realize that one of the commentators had sent this link in her comment. Here it is:

http://jobinterviewquestions.biz/library-interview-questions

Where am I now?

It has been 8 months since I started in Academia. While I got a handle of my job - my everyday duties fairly quickly - learning the ropes of how academica functions (the formal rules) is still a struggle. But I stumble along and find my way eventually. One surprise was that job descriptions can be changed when you are on the job. Fortunately not much has changed for me. Okay, okay, one of the responsibilities has been taken away from me and I am not sure how I feel about that. My title has changed to indicate that I am a "librarian." It was hard to explain what I did as a "co-ordinator." Now I am going to be a Resources Librarian, which I did as a co-ordinator anyway. I don't remember learning how to deal with academic or any work setting while at library school. There were no lessons on problems solving, conflict resolutions, how to stand your ground, how to negotiate what you want whether it is with your colleagues or vendors, how to put together an argument, hmmmm -----what did I learn? I did learn about libraries and collections. But collections did not stretch far enough to include conversations with vendors. That is something library schools should consider including in their curriculum. Just rambling.....

My Day Today

8.40 - came to work

8.45 - 9.15 - cleared some emails and responded to some phone calls (there were 40 of them)

9.30 10.15 - walked over to another building for a meeting. Fortunately it is 0 degrees today.

10.30 - 11.15 Another meeting in the same building

11.15 - 11.30 - went to the book store to get some supplies

11.40- 1.40 - answered some more emails, processed 3 invoices and sent them for approval

1.40-2.30 - lunch

2.30 - 3.30 - go through my first license agreement from a vendor

3.30- - 5.00 - keep answering emails - they don't stop coming

Somewhere along the way I cleared some ILL requests. And did some more paperwork for our strategic planning.

Still feeling "NEW" on the job

The strategic planning session is over. It ran over two days - the first day with all stakeholders present and the second with just our team. We brainstormed our vision & mission statements and nailed our values. SP is a great way to learn more about your organization (both the past and future) especially if you are new to your job.

I have been told it will take me 2 years to comfortably settle into my job - that is how complicated it is :) So it was good to clarify some things in this session and set achievable future goals.

Just when I thought I can relax, Computers in Libraries contacted me to see if I would be interested in writing up my presentation for them. I couldn't say no, could I? Thanks to my co-presenter who agreed to write up his part on such short notice too.

I am still looking for those minority leadership articles.......

Australians, Americans and librarians from UK

I see hits from these regions so I know someone from these areas is reading. If you are a librarian I would be really interested in a conversation about minority librarians in your country.

Leadership and Minorities

I am working on this subject right now. There is plenty of information on leadership and there is a lot on minorities - their psychology, behaviour, etc, but not much on the two of them together. This is probably a good thing too. But if you know of any I am all ears.

Strategic Planning for your library

I am involved in strategic planning for my organization. I haven't sat in any planning committee before. So if you are like me and want to know how to go about strategic planning, there are plethora of books out there in amazon and just about any library. There is also a course on strategic planning offered by Medical Libraries Association. Its focus is for medical librarians, but I am sure anyone can get pointers from this course for any library.


Here is another webpage with many articles on strategic planning for different libraries

If you know of any let me know and I'll post it here.