Blog Every Day in June day 9: Breaking the librarian stereotype – My love/hate relationship with being a librarian by Alex Cato

For day Nine of Blog June we have guest poster Alex Cato, Law Librarian. Alex was on the panel of the "Let's Talk" event held at the Customs House Library in May. 

This post was originally published to Alex's incredible blog under the title "Breaking the librarian stereotype- my love/hate relationship with being a librarian"

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I am a Librarian.

I am a Research Librarian and sometimes I think it would be easier if my job description didn’t have the word librarian in it.

Don’t get me wrong I love my job. I love the trill of the chase, going down the research rabbit hole and coming out the other end with the right answer. I’m addicted to it. But sometimes I find myself not liking or struggling against one of the many versions of the stereotypical librarian.

Like many other professions, the Librarian has some established stereotypes, hey I work in the legal industry and I’m not quite brave enough to ask the lawyers I work with what they think of the lawyer stereotypes.

 

 

Lawyer or librarian are any of the stereotypes actually true today? Now this isn’t an attack against subcultures; the lovers of the 1950s or the hipster librarians. Subcultures are a very different kettle of fish (and great!). What I’m struggling with is the residual perception of what a librarian can and can’t do. We are coming up against the stereotype every time someone says:

 "Oh!, I didn’t know the library could do that!"

Fighting against the perception that Librarians can help you with a select often very traditional set of tasks: find the right book or database, find an article. We can do a lot more and do it EVERY SINGLE DAY!

But sometimes I get a little cranky and think maybe it would be easier if I had a title like information manager, knowledge consultant etc cos hey even the industry itself has been trying to work out for the past 20 years what it actually is…..Being defeatist won’t help. So here are my ideas on how to nip the unhelpful stereotypes in the bud:

• Become a master of the elevator pitch – Its tough but know what people are working on, what issues they are facing and ideas on how you can help them when you come across them. You don’t need to know everyone but choose some select people and read up, if you do a good job they will let people know and word of mouth will do the rest!

• Infiltrate where your clients are meeting – Use the information and hints from the meeting to pre-empt your users needs. This really only applies to corporate, academic or specialist libraries. If your in a public library – don’t infiltrate someones house thats not cool, its a crime.

• Ensure that your service offering is consistent across the board – if one librarian is helping with something and its useful make sure that everyone can do it, is aware of it and offers it.

• If it comes from the library, make sure it has your name on it! Own your awesomeness.

By Alex Cato

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Learning to See

On the weekend I was coaching a teenage friend of mine in learning to become a netball umpire. Among other pieces of advice I shared, I reminded her that when you are an umpire you look at the game in a whole different way. You are not a player, you are not a spectator. You are looking for different things, and your experience of the game is quite different. Later I reflected that this is quite similar to experiencing libraries, depending on what you are doing there.

As a library user, I am assessing libraries in quite a different way than I do when I am working there, or when I am touring a library as part of a professional development visit. This is one reason it's so valuable to visit, use, or tour other libraries.

I recently started working in a public library. Once I knew I had secured an interview for the position, I looked at the web presence of the library and took myself in for a look around, seeing it as a user. In my mind I was comparing the physical space, the collections, and services to other libraries of which I am a member. Later I thought about it more in the way I would if I was touring a library as part of a professional visit. You can't really see the problems or challenges clearly, and this is part of the way we all present our workplace to peers, but you can appraise things that are working well and assess them to see if that success is translatable to your own workplace. Then, on a quieter moment I was talking to a long standing staff member who told me about plans to renovate the library and change the floor plan around, and pointed out parts of the library that needed renewal. Until then I had been blind to those faults, so this gave me a different perspective.

It's a natural progression when you are new to a workplace to take all these different views. But it's pretty hard to generate a new perspective of your own workplace when you've been there for a while, to put yourself in the shoes of the other. It's conversely easy to discount the familiar as being boring or underwhelming, to look and see only the problems or frustrations or the things that could have been, if only. This view is also valuable, because it's only through dissatisfaction with the status quo that advancements are made. In the book "Against Happiness: In Praise of Melancholy" by Eric G Wilson, the Publishers Weekly review mentions that the author "argues forcefully that melancholia is a necessary ingredient of any culture that wishes to be innovative or inventive." The work concentrates especially on art, but I think it's true of many things. However, a constructively critical eye needs a balance, and to be able to assess both the parts and the whole, to recognise the ideal and work with the possible.

So I encourage you to continue to seek out new ideas, share successes and failures, and store these ideas and insights safely, even if they are not relevant to your situation now or don't even seem remotely possible under current realities of budgets and permissions and competing needs. You never know how a different perspective may work it self out in the future.

Lauren Castan

Don't Judge a Librarian by its Cover

A customer is approaching the information desk. I am available, as are my colleagues. Who will the person choose to approach? In the slow times of exam periods or late shifts, I often stand wondering why the customer didn’t approach me first. I was definitely sporting the mandatory “I am the happiest person in the world” smile, so really, they should have picked me. But they didn’t. So how do I cope with such rejection? I can either push my colleagues out of the way, or I can solve my problem like a true librarian. So off I went to do some research.

I was in luck. Really, it was fate, serendipity, or maybe just plain old coincidence. An advance view of First Impressions and the Reference Encounter: The Influence of Affect and Clothing on Librarian Approachability was available through The Journal of Academic Librarianship. It was twelve pages, so I skimmed. I only needed the conclusions and I did not have time to waste. My career and my self-esteem depended on me being the most popular person at the reference desk.

So what did I learn?

1.       Smiling consistently increases approachability. But I was already smiling like I’d won gold at the Olympics so moving on…

2.       Don’t look down. Especially if you’re a woman. Unless you are young and looking at a book. Oh the confusion. I’m young, must go find a book. But I’m also a woman, so should I just hold the book up to eye level? Yes, that could work!

3.       Wear a name tag. Especially if you are young. Hmmm, I wonder if I make my name tag bigger, will that help?

4.       Formal clothing – a must for men and older people, and a definite no for women and younger people. Well this is cause for celebration. I’m kicking off my heels and stepping into my Cons. And as for that pencil skirt. It can go to Vinnies. I’ll stick with my jeans.

5.       Last lesson – even clothing colour matters. If you are a woman, don’t wear red. This is funny because red is supposed to enhance attractiveness. So evidently, if you’re pretty, you’re up the creek without a paddle. Ok, off to the shops to stock up on white and blue t-shirts.

So where does all this leave me? I’m smiling, I am reading a book BUT not looking down. I’ve got my name tag on and looking like I’m going to the movies. I’m all set to be inundated with pleas for assistance.

PROBLEM. I’m 25. Told I look around 18. I have been asked if I’m a student on many occasions. I’ve also been asked “Can I speak to someone more senior?” – even when that senior person will give the exact response that I did. Usually, they’re not even more senior, just older. So now I’m standing in my casual wear looking even younger. I just don’t get this research, but how can you argue with evidence?

It’s easy – I’ll argue with the arrogance of youth.

So I think I’ll continue dressing like I’m going to a job interview. Let’s face it, appearance matters. But more than looking approachable, I want people to trust that I know what I am taking about. I’ll wear my jeans on Fridays, and see if I notice a difference.

Dimity Flanagan is an Information Services Librarian at UNSW Library