For several years now Marie Kaddell, an information professional with Lexis/Nexis has run great blog - Government Info Pro. Each Spring Marie invites librarians and other information professionals from government libraries to contribute toward a best practices compilation for the year.
I have contributed in years past and she recently republished my article from 2010 on her Blog. The article I wrote is Advocacy, Competence, and Service: Experiences in Librarianship.
The 2011 edition of the best practices guide should be coming out soon! Look for it!
Monday, May 30, 2011
Serendipity of librarianship
At some point in my life I became vaguely aware of a file system used in libraries called the McBee System. The McBee Company exists today - though I'm not related to those McBees The company made its name as the creator of a product called Keysort.
My sharing the name McBee with the developers of this system came into play another time when a librarian showed me a children's book Library Lion written by Michelle Knudsen.
When I was working at the FDIC Library one of the librarians, Len, came across an ad in a periodical from the 1940's featuring the following:
Truth be told - this McBee man is also a fact fancier with great ideas and over two decades of experience working in special libraries.
So if you're looking for someone who enjoys research and digging into facts, who provides excellent customer service and gets along well with colleagues, executives and patrons - contact this McBee man!
My sharing the name McBee with the developers of this system came into play another time when a librarian showed me a children's book Library Lion written by Michelle Knudsen.
When I was working at the FDIC Library one of the librarians, Len, came across an ad in a periodical from the 1940's featuring the following:
McBEE is a fact fancier ... with two decades experience in the care and culture of internal business information, of higher yield and earlier delivery in reports and records.
Does your corporate thinking ever have that tired feeling? Suffer from delayed decision deficiencies, sluggish judgment, management manana? .. Put your front office on a fresh fact diet! Call a McBee man - nearest office, or New York direct ... No miracles - but several thousands of satisfied users!
Truth be told - this McBee man is also a fact fancier with great ideas and over two decades of experience working in special libraries.
So if you're looking for someone who enjoys research and digging into facts, who provides excellent customer service and gets along well with colleagues, executives and patrons - contact this McBee man!
Saturday, May 28, 2011
Putting the E in Library
Article written for document for Government Info Pro.
The late Gilda Radner created a character for Saturday Night Live named Emily Litella who would speak out on various topics. Unfortunately, Miss Litella didn’t hear things quite right so she was against the efforts to remove violins from television programs. She was corrected that the effort was to remove violence from television programs. As this new information would sink in she would realize that it was very different from what she had been thinking and she would end her spots with an apologetic, “Never mind.”
I wonder what Miss Litella would have thought of e-braries and e-books and e-journals and e-patrons and e-librarians and who knows what will be next.
It started with e-mail and as that caught on we all started living in an e-world. And to no one’s surprise this didn’t simplify our life in the least. We have to make distinctions between e-mail and postal mail (or the pejorative snail mail), and e-journals and print journals. Having been a cataloger I can appreciate the many challenges this created to the folks describing our collections.
From everything we read and experience we know that a lot of users will still prefer print resources, but more and more will want information made available in a variety of electronic formats ported to multiple devices. And we, being the service industry that we are, will strive to meet that need explaining to our budget folks that it doesn’t mean it is cheaper nor that we will reduce the footprint of the library.
The January/February 2011 issue of Information Outlook was all about mobile applications. Coincidentally in my last job that was a big push as well. The agency rolled out mobile devices to about 1,000 research staff and we let them know what the Library can provide for them on their new tool.
As in other instances, this is not something the Library can do on its own. We need the help of our IT folks – the ones who control access to what is on the mobile devices – to open the gates for the Library content. We have to work with our vendors to find a good solution for subscriptions that will work in our total environment – desktop, physical collection, and mobile devices.
It is exciting when you find a partner for a project who understands the value of what we are trying to deliver to our end-users. Often we have to educate in many directions – and we have to learn. What devices is our agency buying? What information resources have mobile applications? What is the pricing structure for the access? What products will we make available?
The Oxford English Dictionary may have a mobile app, and it would be oh-so-cool to have it, but how many of us would actually push that out to our mobile end-users?
We need to keep up with the wave of e-information. The demand is there and if we don’t do it, someone else will. Like all the other tools for information access this needs to be part of our expertise.
The same way we went from print to dial-up, to software and then to Internet – we need to help our end-users get their information on their mobile devices and keep up with what the next platform will be.
Once you find the IT and Communications folks who are managing the mobile devices work with them to develop the Library application – pointing to the Library resources that staff can access on a mobile device. Talk to your vendors to make sure you are licensed properly to give access to your users.
Review and refine your list. If you already have a page on your website listing online news resources you have a head start! Just as we had to rethink presentation and writing for the web – we have to be even more concise on a mobile device. A segmented list of resources on a website is easy to navigate – on a mobile device keep to the basics until users ask for more.
If you have been around the Internet since the early days then you’ll remember those Under Construction pages that we used to put up and use. Those are long gone – everyone understands that the Internet is under continuous development and updating. It is the same with mobile devices. People will expect additional resources and upgraded applications. Let the vendors take care of upgrading the apps. But don’t worry if you have a great news resource that you have finally been able to contract. Roll it out. If it is a significant resource, then roll it out right away. If you have a couple new resources in the works then roll them out together.
Two agencies I worked for had a lot of agents in the field who were then still using dial-up access for the Internet when they were on the road. For that reason we designed our pages with as little graphics as possible and did our best to avoid anything other than html.
This experience taught me something about our users. You need to take care of your biggest user group. By minimizing graphics we didn’t hurt our onsite users with a fast connection. Our efforts helped them too. Government librarians are looking at a finite set of end users with mobile devices. Yes, they seem to breed like rabbits, but they are still expensive enough that not everyone in your organization will have one. So you don’t want to license solely for the mobile devices. Even the mobile users will want to read the Wall Street Journal on their desktop or even in print. (Print? Remember that?)
To be good librarians we need to see what our patrons are doing and listen to their questions. We don’t need to pounce on everything – but we need to be aware of trends so we can be ready to ride the wave and not get caught by the undertow.
So – there isn’t and E in Library, but there is an E in Libraries and end-users and mobile devices. And there are two E’s in people and those are the folks we are here to serve as librarians.
The late Gilda Radner created a character for Saturday Night Live named Emily Litella who would speak out on various topics. Unfortunately, Miss Litella didn’t hear things quite right so she was against the efforts to remove violins from television programs. She was corrected that the effort was to remove violence from television programs. As this new information would sink in she would realize that it was very different from what she had been thinking and she would end her spots with an apologetic, “Never mind.”
I wonder what Miss Litella would have thought of e-braries and e-books and e-journals and e-patrons and e-librarians and who knows what will be next.
It started with e-mail and as that caught on we all started living in an e-world. And to no one’s surprise this didn’t simplify our life in the least. We have to make distinctions between e-mail and postal mail (or the pejorative snail mail), and e-journals and print journals. Having been a cataloger I can appreciate the many challenges this created to the folks describing our collections.
From everything we read and experience we know that a lot of users will still prefer print resources, but more and more will want information made available in a variety of electronic formats ported to multiple devices. And we, being the service industry that we are, will strive to meet that need explaining to our budget folks that it doesn’t mean it is cheaper nor that we will reduce the footprint of the library.
The January/February 2011 issue of Information Outlook was all about mobile applications. Coincidentally in my last job that was a big push as well. The agency rolled out mobile devices to about 1,000 research staff and we let them know what the Library can provide for them on their new tool.
As in other instances, this is not something the Library can do on its own. We need the help of our IT folks – the ones who control access to what is on the mobile devices – to open the gates for the Library content. We have to work with our vendors to find a good solution for subscriptions that will work in our total environment – desktop, physical collection, and mobile devices.
It is exciting when you find a partner for a project who understands the value of what we are trying to deliver to our end-users. Often we have to educate in many directions – and we have to learn. What devices is our agency buying? What information resources have mobile applications? What is the pricing structure for the access? What products will we make available?
The Oxford English Dictionary may have a mobile app, and it would be oh-so-cool to have it, but how many of us would actually push that out to our mobile end-users?
We need to keep up with the wave of e-information. The demand is there and if we don’t do it, someone else will. Like all the other tools for information access this needs to be part of our expertise.
The same way we went from print to dial-up, to software and then to Internet – we need to help our end-users get their information on their mobile devices and keep up with what the next platform will be.
Once you find the IT and Communications folks who are managing the mobile devices work with them to develop the Library application – pointing to the Library resources that staff can access on a mobile device. Talk to your vendors to make sure you are licensed properly to give access to your users.
Review and refine your list. If you already have a page on your website listing online news resources you have a head start! Just as we had to rethink presentation and writing for the web – we have to be even more concise on a mobile device. A segmented list of resources on a website is easy to navigate – on a mobile device keep to the basics until users ask for more.
If you have been around the Internet since the early days then you’ll remember those Under Construction pages that we used to put up and use. Those are long gone – everyone understands that the Internet is under continuous development and updating. It is the same with mobile devices. People will expect additional resources and upgraded applications. Let the vendors take care of upgrading the apps. But don’t worry if you have a great news resource that you have finally been able to contract. Roll it out. If it is a significant resource, then roll it out right away. If you have a couple new resources in the works then roll them out together.
Two agencies I worked for had a lot of agents in the field who were then still using dial-up access for the Internet when they were on the road. For that reason we designed our pages with as little graphics as possible and did our best to avoid anything other than html.
This experience taught me something about our users. You need to take care of your biggest user group. By minimizing graphics we didn’t hurt our onsite users with a fast connection. Our efforts helped them too. Government librarians are looking at a finite set of end users with mobile devices. Yes, they seem to breed like rabbits, but they are still expensive enough that not everyone in your organization will have one. So you don’t want to license solely for the mobile devices. Even the mobile users will want to read the Wall Street Journal on their desktop or even in print. (Print? Remember that?)
To be good librarians we need to see what our patrons are doing and listen to their questions. We don’t need to pounce on everything – but we need to be aware of trends so we can be ready to ride the wave and not get caught by the undertow.
So – there isn’t and E in Library, but there is an E in Libraries and end-users and mobile devices. And there are two E’s in people and those are the folks we are here to serve as librarians.
Friday, May 27, 2011
Librarian for hire
I'm doing all the other things one should do when looking for work - research, networking, applying - but I thought I'd put my resume out there. One never knows - I have 25 years experience working in all areas of the library and at most levels.
Hire me! I'm a great librarian!
I am a librarian with over 25 years of experience working in federal libraries. I started out as a library technician and worked my way up, eventually earning an MLS from the University of Maryland in 2000.
You can see by my resume that I have worked at three US banking regulatory agencies - the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), and the Federal Reserve Board (FED).
At the FDIC I held a variety of positions including cataloger, webmaster, reference librarian and electronic resources librarian. In addition to being the cataloger I was responsible for managing the Library’s database system – STAR from Cuadra Associates.
From 2004-2010 I was a Senior Reference Librarian at the OCC and provided reference and research support to our legal department, economists, bank examiners and other staff. For part of my time I served as the library webmaster.
At the FED my principal duties have been to review contracts for database resources. As part of my duties I have worked on several databases including the Library’s Millennium OPAC from Innovative Interfaces, Inc.
I provide excellent reference and research support in banking, legal, news, politics, the arts and more.
Senior Librarian February 2010 - May 2011
Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve
Washington, DC
Review contracts for Library resources and other databases. Work with vendor representatives, end-users, library staff, attorneys and agency procurement staff to shepherd contracts through the process and help negotiate terms and pricing.
Senior Reference Librarian September 2004 – January 2010
Office of the Comptroller of the Currency
Washington, DC
Perform news, business and legal research. On average about 125 reference questions per month - questions range from the simple requests for articles or single documents to those needing considerable research such as a literature search or legislative history.
Search corporate, news and legal resources such as Factiva, Lexis/Nexis and Westlaw; ProQuest, JSTOR, S&P RatingsDirect, Fitch and Moody’s databases.
Electronic Resources Librarian October 2002 – September 2004
Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation
Washington, DC
Coordinated access issues related to 60+ databases. Met with vendors and clients to determine access needs. Shepherd software for databases testing with agency IT. Maintained the library's database system. Provide training on database and web resources as needed.
Reference Librarian June 2001 - October 2002
Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation
Washington, DC
Perform news, business and legal research. Search news and legal resources such as Factiva, Lexis/Nexis and Westlaw; academic resources such OCLC FirstSearch, ProQuest, Ebsco and EconLit and business resources such as S&P RatingsDirect, and Mergent Online.
Serve as Library Webmaster, creating new web documents for library resources and services and access to online databases.
Additional Experiences:
Paley Center for Media, New York City, New York
Volunteer internship for two weeks – indexing news articles.
DC’s Different Drummers (Non-profit music performance group), Washington, DC
President 2007 – 2009, Vice President 2008-2009. Currently serve as Membership Director.
FDIC Library, Washington, DC
Cataloger - May 1988 – February 1998
Education
University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland
Master's Degree in Library Science - 5/2000
Christendom College, Front Royal, Virginia
Bachelor's Degree in Philosophy - 5/1983
West Virginia University, Morgantown, West Virginia
Bachelor's Degree in Liberal Arts- 5/1980
Hire me! I'm a great librarian!
I am a librarian with over 25 years of experience working in federal libraries. I started out as a library technician and worked my way up, eventually earning an MLS from the University of Maryland in 2000.
You can see by my resume that I have worked at three US banking regulatory agencies - the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), and the Federal Reserve Board (FED).
At the FDIC I held a variety of positions including cataloger, webmaster, reference librarian and electronic resources librarian. In addition to being the cataloger I was responsible for managing the Library’s database system – STAR from Cuadra Associates.
From 2004-2010 I was a Senior Reference Librarian at the OCC and provided reference and research support to our legal department, economists, bank examiners and other staff. For part of my time I served as the library webmaster.
At the FED my principal duties have been to review contracts for database resources. As part of my duties I have worked on several databases including the Library’s Millennium OPAC from Innovative Interfaces, Inc.
I provide excellent reference and research support in banking, legal, news, politics, the arts and more.
Senior Librarian February 2010 - May 2011
Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve
Washington, DC
Review contracts for Library resources and other databases. Work with vendor representatives, end-users, library staff, attorneys and agency procurement staff to shepherd contracts through the process and help negotiate terms and pricing.
Senior Reference Librarian September 2004 – January 2010
Office of the Comptroller of the Currency
Washington, DC
Perform news, business and legal research. On average about 125 reference questions per month - questions range from the simple requests for articles or single documents to those needing considerable research such as a literature search or legislative history.
Search corporate, news and legal resources such as Factiva, Lexis/Nexis and Westlaw; ProQuest, JSTOR, S&P RatingsDirect, Fitch and Moody’s databases.
Electronic Resources Librarian October 2002 – September 2004
Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation
Washington, DC
Coordinated access issues related to 60+ databases. Met with vendors and clients to determine access needs. Shepherd software for databases testing with agency IT. Maintained the library's database system. Provide training on database and web resources as needed.
Reference Librarian June 2001 - October 2002
Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation
Washington, DC
Perform news, business and legal research. Search news and legal resources such as Factiva, Lexis/Nexis and Westlaw; academic resources such OCLC FirstSearch, ProQuest, Ebsco and EconLit and business resources such as S&P RatingsDirect, and Mergent Online.
Serve as Library Webmaster, creating new web documents for library resources and services and access to online databases.
Additional Experiences:
Paley Center for Media, New York City, New York
Volunteer internship for two weeks – indexing news articles.
DC’s Different Drummers (Non-profit music performance group), Washington, DC
President 2007 – 2009, Vice President 2008-2009. Currently serve as Membership Director.
FDIC Library, Washington, DC
Cataloger - May 1988 – February 1998
Education
University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland
Master's Degree in Library Science - 5/2000
Christendom College, Front Royal, Virginia
Bachelor's Degree in Philosophy - 5/1983
West Virginia University, Morgantown, West Virginia
Bachelor's Degree in Liberal Arts- 5/1980
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