Medlibs Chat: Presidential Priorities, I Have No Priorities

Join us tomorrow (6:00pm Pacific / 9:00pm Eastern) on the #medlibs chat as I try to successfully balance watching the Cavs in the NBA playoffs and moderating the discussion on the changes happening within MLA, specifically the MLA strategic plan.

(reposted from #medlibs chat blog)

In the past each MLA President has presented their list of priorities for the upcoming year for MLA.  This year is a little different. I have no priorities.  OK, that sounds a lot different. But it really isn’t.  Instead of coming up with priorities each year the incoming president will look at MLA’s strategic plan and evaluate the goals within the plan.  If we are near accomplishing a goal, then the incoming president looks at other potential goals that we should add to the strategic plan. The idea is that these goals live long enough for accomplishment and are not specifically tied to the president’s term. They are part of the entire MLA strategic plan which is tied to MLA, the board, staff, etc. As in the case of MLA’s technology goal, a goal could be accomplished in less than a year.  In the case of the Education goal, it may take more than a year.  However, steps toward accomplishing that goal will be continually happening.

Speaking of continually happening… In years prior the time line for getting things done always seemed to be centered around the meeting in May.  Why? There are probably a lot of reasons, but I think (total guess on my part) is that it is a legacy of when we (librarians) did less business electronically.  We live in a time of email and other forms of online communication. Now days things can happen faster because we can communicate more easily and more often. We agree to take on projects at MLA then scurry around next March/April to make sure something was accomplished before the meeting again in May. We don’t even read and approve the prior meetings minutes until a year later at the next meeting. This has given us the nimbleness of an AT-AT in regards to change.

We need to look at ways to speed up processes and work towards the evolution of our organization as well as the groups (Sections, SIGs, Committees, etc.) within our organization.  So this Twitter chat will focus on ways that we as a group can work toward improving the speed at which we accomplish things.  Because waiting a year to approve something makes any organization sluggish and less adaptable to responsive change.

What are your ideas for making us more nimble?

Come share your thoughts and perspectives! Never participated in a #medlibs or other Twitter chat before? Check out this overview and come on in, we’re a supportive community and are especially keeping an eye out to welcome and support your participation if you’ve just heard about this community for the first time during the meeting.

 

 

Join the #medlibs Discussion on 2016 Meeting Changes

Join us tonight May 7, 2015 at 6pm Pacific/9pm Eastern for a chat on Twitter regarding changes to the 2016 Annual Meeting and brainstorming what changes we could do for future meetings.
(reposted from #medlibs chat blog)
The 2016 meeting will be in Toronto and will be a joint conference with CHLA-ABSC and the International Clinical Librarian Conference (ICLC).  This gives us the perfect opportunity to work with the conference structure and see where we can make some changes that better fit the needs of members.  The Futures Task Force listed several suggestions for changing the annual meeting.  So tune in to the chat this Thursday May 7, 2015 at 6pm Pacific/9pm Eastern to learn about some of the changes that will be happening.  Also help us brainstorm any changes that we can work on for future meetings.  Just like Rome was not built in a day, planning a conference takes years. So some great ideas may take a while to get in the system but we are listening.

Get to Know the New Executive Director of MLA

Kevin Baliozian, the new Executive Director of MLA, has graciously agreed to be the special guest for the weekly #medlibs Twitter chat the evening of Thursday, April 16. The chat starts at 9:00 PM Eastern / 8:00 PM Central / 7:00 PM Mountain / 6:00 PM Pacific. Teresa Knott and I are regular participants; we agreed to facilitate the chat. Information about the chat is outlined in a blog post at http://medlibschat.blogspot.com/. If you want to get a feel for how conversations flow, please take a look at the transcripts from the previous chats.

If you are interested, please join us. You’ll need a Twitter account. Typically, I use TweetChat.com when chatting in Twitter since it groups all the tweets with the same hashtag (#medlibs) into the same room. In addition, if you tweet into the room, the chat box automatically adds the #medlibs Twitter hashtag so your tweets are seen by chat participants.

If you have any questions, please let me know. Hope you can join us!  Lurkers are welcome too!

Discussion About #Medlibs Discussion

Last week’s #medlibs chat was about conference codes of conduct and it was co-hosted with officers from the MLA Relevant Issues Sections.  

I was on vacation when I participated in the chat so forgive me for the tardiness of this post.

Increasingly, professional and tech conferences are adopting anti-harassment policies and codes of conduct. The Relevant Issues Section of MLA would like to explore having one for MLA meetings.

 

For background, check out:

The discussion centered around previous incidents at library meetings (including MLA) where attendees felt harassed (by fellow librarians and/or vendors). The moderators asked the #medlibs participants about having a code of conduct at MLA meetings.  It was noted that some speakers no longer will speak at meeting without a code of conduct policy and that those who have been harassed need to know they can report problems.

For some reason the code of conduct discussion slid into a discussion about breast feeding at meetings and the need for child care at meetings.  I can kind of see how the topic of breast feeding sort of made it in the discussion because that could be something is harassed about.  However the issue of child care at the meetings was kind of out of left field for me given the pre-determined code of conduct topic.

There was a group of people who thought that MLA need to provide child care at the meetings for working single parents.  I did note that MLA usually includes information from the hotel on finding a sitter during the meeting. But, this was not what they meant, they wanted to child care.  While I am not a single parent, I do have three kids and those three kids were all in child care at one time and I can tell you first hand that it is flipping crazy expensive and I am living in Cleveland where our cost of living is pretty reasonable.  I can’t imagine the costs of providing child care at an annual meeting.  When I brought up the cost barrier there were some who thought we could get a vendor to sponsor it or that we could add it to the cost of registration. (The registration aspect confused me, I wasn’t sure if they meant the person who selected it paid or if it was spread across the entire registrants to supplement those who needed it.) After being on two NPCs and fundraising for one of them, I personally don’t see a vendor paying for it.  It took a lot of work to get the conference wide wifi to get paid for.

So my questions for you, readers…..

  • What are your thoughts on a code of conduct policy for MLA meetings?
  • What happens if somebody violates the code of conduct? (Are there teeth to the policy?)
  • Is child care needed at MLA’s annual meeting and how should it be paid for?
  • Instead of having official MLA child care, is there a better child care option for single parents to attend meeting other than the hotel babysitter info that is provided?
  • What about the MLA online annual meeting conference package? Would that help single parents who couldn’t travel to the meeting?

I look forward to your thoughts and comments and don’t forget to join tonight’s #medlibs chat.  The chat will be open mic (meaning no moderator?) on whether existing CE meets what we need for research .

#Medlibs: Love & Hate in Medical Libraries

(post duplicated on http://medlibschat.blogspot.com/)

One day you are Katrina and the Waves and you are “Walkin’ on Sunshine” everything is good and falling into place.  Your searches are matching up just perfectly with MeSH, patrons are writing thank you emails, the CEO just praised you, and a new project is going like gang busters.  Life in the library is perfect.

BUUUT the next day (or week) you are Joan Jett growling, “I Hate Myself for Loving You” as nothing you do seems to be working.  PubMed keeps crashing, patrons are upset because you can’t get the article from the  Journal of Big Toe Science written in Hindi rushed the same day and translated into English, your budget was cut more than expected, and administration or IT (take your pick) throws cold water all over your pet project.  Life in the library is like a bad relationship.

Like any career, medical librarianship has its ups and downs.  Friday is Valentine’s Day and to get in the spirit the #medlibs Twitter chat group will be having fun discussing our love/hate relationships with medical librarianship.

So grab some wine and chocolate, after all it is the day before Valentine’s Day and curl up with your laptop and chat with us this Thursday 9pm eastern.  Don’t forget to follow the word #medlibs to watch and participate in the discussion.  Lurkers and late arrivals are welcome.  Nikki Dettmar and I will be moderating and we look forward to seeing you online.

For more information or questions tweet @eagledawg or @krafty or drop us an email.

New Year, New Job Directions?

Don’t think of it as a New Year’s resolution, think of it as just taking inventory of your career path.  Whether you are looking to find a new job in a new organization or just trying to add a new direction to your current job, it is a good idea to think about, evaluate, and discuss (pick people’s brains) your ideas and options.

So tune in to #medlibs on Twitter tonight at 9pm Eastern.

See you there. 🙂

 

Reposted form (Medlibschapt.blogspot.com)

Join Heather Holmes (@LaMedBoheme73) and Michelle Kraft (@Krafty) for this week’s #medlibs talk as we discuss all good things related to jobs, such as: looking for a new job, preparations to move (yourself, your family, etc), learning or brushing up on skills, transitioning to a new position in the same institution, or transitioning to a related but totally different position. What are some of the positive reasons you are looking for or have accepted a new position or are seeking new skills and abilities? This won’t be a rant session, we want it to be a positive and constructive discussion so please join us and spread the word – we’d love to welcome library students and others interested in learning more about the field!

Some resources to consider:

Perception of Libraries

I heard someone say, “Change the way you look at things and the things you look at change.”  This is easier said than done, especially for librarians.  The results from the Pew Internet and American Life survey “How Americans Value Public Libraries in Their Communities” were recently released.  I have seen many in the library world praising what are definitely good results. Such as:

  • 95% of Americans ages 16 and older agree that the materials and resources available at public libraries play an important role in giving everyone a chance to succeed
  • 94% say that having a public library improves the quality of life in a community
  • 81% say that public libraries provide many services people would have a hard time finding elsewhere

These are definitely things to be proud of.  However, there are some statistics that concern me and I don’t seem to be hearing about them from the library world as much.

  • 52% of Americans say that people do not need public libraries as much as they used to because they can find most information on their own, while 46% disagreed.
  • 54% of Americans have used a public library in the past 12 months
  • 77% of those who have ever used a public library said they know only some of what it offers.  (Of that 77% about one in five say they don’t know very much about what is offered, and 10% say they know “nothing at all.”)

If 94-95% believe libraries are so important then why have only 54% used a library in the last year?  Doesn’t quite make sense.  So while people love their libraries, they don’t know much about their offerings and they don’t use them very often.

This is frustrating because it seems as though people like the idea of the public library as it exists in their heads, but have no idea what it does in practice.  Sounds familiar medical librarians?  I think in order for us to survive we have to do a better job of changing their perception of the library.  Thankfully they like us….but liking us isn’t going to get the tax levy renewed or the keep administration from cutting our budget.  We need to do a better job of demonstrating to our users and non-users how we can help them.  Informing users is tricky enough, but non-users…yikes!  But that is needed for us to turn the perception of a library and the know more about our other services and resources (not just that we have books).

This Thursday #medlibs will discuss the what we see coming to libraries in 2014 and beyond. What is the future of the library?  What do we need to do and where will be going?

Some ideas for the discussion are:

These are all important things to consider, but I also believe part of our future rests with changing perceptions.  If we don’t do that we are going to be the Norman Rockwell of professions. Nice to remember, or as somebody on Twitter said,  “an emotional remembrance.”So tune in on Thursday http://medlibschat.blogspot.com/ as we discuss the library of the future.