My presentation focused on how you can develop leadership skills through professional engagement, particularly through supporting professional organisations. It’s no secret that I’m a keen advocate for professional organisations – my volunteering for them is a reciprocal relationship. I benefit greatly from getting involved in a wide variety of things I wouldn’t ordinarily be able to do within the scope of my day job (thus developing a broader skill set), and the organisations benefit from my input to committees/projects/task forces/working groups.

The main message I hoped to get across in my presentation is that anyone can develop leadership skills by just going a little bit outside of your comfort zone and trying new things – it’s all about learning more about yourself and about others. I was initially inspired by a blog post from Meredith Farkas and as I continued to try new things, my experiences widened and my skills developed which has benefited me enormously both within my working life and my life in general.

My presentation is embedded below (or follow the direct link to the online presentation):

I’m not sure what I was expecting but it was a mixed experience. Some was very common sense, other bits were really useful as they addressed areas I struggle with. The networking afterwards however, well I’m not so sure. I guess I just have to accept that I’m well outside my comfort zone and that corporate networking events are likely to attract a certain type of person.

The workshop

The speaker, Vinay Parmar, has utilised networking to generate business and now speaks on the topic to share tips with others.

His approach was interactive in nature which I enjoyed, though the room wasn’t really set up for it and we were up and down from our seats like a yo yo! I lucked out and sat next to some fascinating people which made the exercises a lot more fun.

Rather than share everything from the session I’ll just share the main networking tips to help in the business networking situation (e.g. conference socials).

• Define your aims and objectives for networking to help you determine which networking events to attend
• When networking, smile first and foremost
• Good topic starters for small talk include family and friends, occupation, recreation and money (remember with acronym FORM)
• Don’t ask people how they are as you may not be interested in the answer
• Ask people about their current projects/products/services to identify problems you may be able to help with
• If people are already in groups, you can ask them if you can join them. Hang around close to the group and make eye contact with someone, then smile, then try to join. Can also leave a group when someone new is introduced – introduce them to each other and then say you’ll be back later
• If someone is rambling, just ask them “So what happened in the end?” to get to the conclusion of story
• Being a good networked means being a good listener
• Only offer business cards if you want to connect with someone in future
• If you tend to forget people’s names, repeat it to yourself in your head or use word association to remember
• If you want to leave a conversation, stop mimicking their body language (I.e. do the opposite of what they are doing)
• Remember that networking isn’t a sales pitch – it is about getting permission to follow up
• If you tend to forget people’s names, repeat it to yourself in your head or use word association to remember
• Add value to connections by sending relevant links and information. It’s all about following up

The networking

Having networking directly after a session on networking was extremely interesting. Naturally, some people were trying out new techniques but because we’d all learnt them it was pretty obvious! There were also some people who were quite shameless in their networking and I really felt sorry for some of the people who worked for the larger corporations as they were the target of many of the networkers, even though they may not have anything to do with the area the person was looking to sell to. I also think some people really forgot all about the fact that networking isn’t about a sales pitch – it’s about meeting new people, understanding more about them, and beginning to build a connection. If it’s beneficial for both parties it may result in future business but you have to build up that trust first and I saw some really bad examples this evening.

However, there were also some really great people there and it was inspiring to talk to them and watch them in action. One person in particular really impressed me – I know a bit about the work they do and vice versa, and they were willing to chat to me to find out why I was there and give me tips. I hope we can keep in touch – there might not be any immediate business potential there for either of us, but who knows what connections it could lead to in future. I’m much more comfortable with this sort of networking – learning about people so that you can help each other in future and pass on useful information or put them in touch with others.

So what?

I found the event really interesting – the tips in the workshop were useful but participating in the networking afterwards (and observing others) was where I found the most value.

It made me really appreciate the nature of online networking – particularly the fact that you can choose more easily which conversations to join in with (and duck out of!), which I find really tricky in person.

It also made me realise that my network on Twitter is really beneficial – I already knew this but a few points reaffirmed that for me. One thing in particular was a point the speaker made about a ‘peer group’, a deliberate group of people to keep you performing to your highest level. These are the people who inspire you and encourage you to pick yourself up and keep trying when things aren’t going so well (as opposed to friends who give you a hug and a shoulder to cry on). This level of support and inspiration is one of the things I love about my Twitter network

What next?

Although I found some of the tips and networking tactics too intense (and a bit creepy at times!), I did pick up some useful tips which I hope will help me in future, particularly around joining and leaving group conversations. I’m sure this will help me in conference social occasions and I’m looking forward to putting it into practice, particularly at ALA Annual Conference in June.

The session also reminded me that I need to sort out some business cards from work – I have my personal ones but not work ones so I’ll see if I can get some ordered. One interesting idea I might consider in future with business cards is leaving a space for notes on the card (so people can make notes about you or the conversation you had) – I tend to write on cards I receive but hadn’t thought about designing cards with space to write notes.

I’m attending another training session on networking soon – hopefully I won’t be so wary entering a room full of groups of people soon! Do you have any other networking tips to share? Please let me know in the comments if so.

Workshop for CILIP CDG

What worked well?

Post-it note exercise
I decided to try a technique I used to use when teaching students and got each participant to write their aims for the session onto a post-it note as they arrived. This worked particularly well in this session as there was half an hour for people to arrive, mingle, drink and settle in. As I was being introduced, I spent a bit of time reading these and grouping them into different areas (as can be seen in the image above). I also picked a few to mention to the group to set the scene for the workshop. I found the exercise really useful for checking why people had chosen to attend (and reassuring me what I was planning to cover would help them!), and it helped during the session as I could refer to problems people had highlighted and demonstrate how what I was talking about could help. Unfortunately I don’t think I can help with this one but it gave me a giggle and I hope I gave some tips to help them do it for themselves:

One of the post-it messages

Informal approach
When given the option, I usually adopt a relatively informal approach to workshops and this was highlighted as good practice for interactive workshops in the book I read (particularly sitting at a similar level to attendees rather than above them like a lecturer). For this session I chose to sit on the table next to the laptop which also made it easy to control the presentation. I felt much more comfortable with this than I would have done standing behind the lectern in the room and fortunately some of the attendees liked the more informal approach too:

That was acers. I hope I'm half as poised and friendly as @joeyanne when I'm teaching.

March 28, 2012 8:35 pm via Twitter for iPadReplyRetweetFavorite

@samanthahalf

Samantha Halford

Combination of approaches (presentation, individual activities and group activities)
I wanted to make sure the workshop offered variety and was interactive. I encouraged contributions from the participants throughout and I designed activities to help cement knowledge and to give the opportunity for participants to place learning into their own context. This combination seemed to work well, one participant commented:

Good mix of talking from the front and audience participation

Worksheets and presentation
I enjoyed creating the worksheets for the session (I made them in PowerPoint which I find easier for layout than Word), and got some compliments on them. As well as the activities, I encouraged participants to use the worksheets for personal reflection – I allocated space in the sheets for them to write why they chose to attend the workshop, what they had learnt, and how they were planning to apply this learning. I emphasised that these would be useful for reflection purposes, particularly for CILIP Chartership candidates wanting to use attendance at the workshop in their portfolio. I also took a different approach to creating the presentation; instead of creating it during planning, I planned the full session before even starting to create the presentation. This really saved time and meant the presentation was completely tailored to the session including breaks and activities. I also made sure the attendees were aware that the presentation would be online with all links and information after the event, which some people appreciated:

Excellent PowerPoint slides and thank you for making them available online – for once at such an event, I just concentrated on the presentation and DIDN’T take notes!

Learning outcomes
I spent time before I planned the session refining the learning outcomes to make sure they framed the session and made it clear what the purpose was. I followed the advice in the book and kept the learning outcomes clear and concise, stating specifically what participants would get out of the session.

What didn’t work well?

Session design
The main problem I experienced (and this is a big one!) was that I had designed the session for a completely different environment to the one I found myself in. I’d designed it for a medium sized room in cabaret style but I found myself in a large room with rows of chairs. Fortunately I did find out the morning of the session so I had a bit of time to plan how it might work, but it wasn’t until I got there that I was able to assess the situation properly. I’d planned group work which needed tables but this had to be adapted at the last minute utilising the tops of special collections display cabinets!

Timing
I also messed up with my timing which was frustrating. I’m not sure quite how I managed to do this but I had scheduled an extra half hour in the session which I didn’t notice until on the journey to the venue (fortunately it was in London so I had a couple of hours to rejig timings slightly). I still found it a struggle to fit everything in though, and had to cut one activity out and race through the last few sections of the material. I also wasn’t able to allocate time during the workshop for people to complete the reflective portion of their worksheets. One attendee commented when asked for improvements:

Less time socialising in order to cover full programme? Or allow more time.

I could have cut down (or missed out completely) the break in the middle but the breaktime is a good way to encourage discussion and networking and allow people to recharge. When I’d been asked to run the session I had initially thought I didn’t have enough material to fill it, but as I was developing it realised I definitely did, especially when you factor in time for the activities and feedback for each activity. I could easily fill a full day workshop with this topic!

What needs work?

Music
One of the elements I took from the book I read was the importance of controlling the environment using music. This can be used to create an environment conducive to the type of activity you are doing, or just to separate different parts of the session. I planned to use it during the breaks and activities as light background music and to act as a divider. This seemed to work well as people were arriving but I didn’t remember to use it during the session. I think it would definitely help, not just for the attendees but also for myself as I struggle to get the attention of the group when everyone is talking. Definitely need to try to get some suitable music.

Voice projection
This issue was partly linked to the type of room (much larger, grander, and more prone to echoing than I am used to), but I did struggle to project my voice clearly. I chose not to use the microphone as it would have meant standing up behind a lectern and away from the laptop, but although I checked that this was OK with the attendees, some struggled to hear at times which is a problem I need to work on. One attendee commented (when asked about ways to improve):

Sound/audibility of speaker. Speaker chose not to use microphone – I feel it seriously affected audibility. I struggled to hear what was being said.

When I was gathering the group back together I had to ask someone else to shout to get everyone back to their seats too, though I would hope use of music would help here.

Timing
It’s more difficult to plan timings for an interactive session than it is for a pure presentation, but it’s something I definitely need to improve on. If anything, I need to have slightly less to cover than I think might be possible in the time – it will be far more beneficial to attendees to learn one thing fully and allow time for reflection than for me to cover a whistle stop tour of everything but too quickly to take anything in. I need to learn to factor in plenty of time for each activity – to explain it, get people working on it, for me to go around to check everyone understands the task, and for them to provide feedback afterwards.

My takeaway tips for future workshops

These are the things I need to remember for future!

• Confirm room layout in advance

Make sure you know what to expect from the venue – what type of room it is, what size, what layout, and what facilities. Do you want people to work in groups? How many in each group? Will you want them to write down anything (individually or as a group)? Will you need a table for any activities? Will you need a flip chart and pens?

• Don’t be over ambitious in content – if it looks too much to cover it probably is!

Be realistic about timings and what you can cover in the time allocated. You might not be able to cover absolutely everything you want to, so try to focus on the key areas you highlighted in your learning outcomes.

What next?

I learnt a lot from this session and it was great to put some of the theory and ideas I had read into practice. I definitely need to work on timing and amount of content, as well as projecting my voice better. I need to remember to confirm the type of facilities before planning too.

I’d like to run the session again – the feedback overall was very positive (12 excellent, 10 very good, 2 good for speaker) and I’m sure I can improve on the areas I’ve raised in this blog post. One attendee also commented that a follow up for this event would be useful – to comment on progress and share experiences:

Maybe a follow up? e.g. 1 year on how are you coping now? Has your time management improved?

I’d certainly be interested to know how people got on with implementing the points I covered and I’m sure it would benefit the rest of the group to share their tips and techniques. Maybe a more informal discussion would be useful, or a method of communicating this online.

If you’re interested in the Managing yourself session, please let me know – I’d be happy to run it again for different groups.

Pocket Boom (next to iPhone for scale)

I have to be honest, I was very intrigued about the Pocket Boom. As someone who usually listens to music via headphones it’s not necessarily something I had a huge need for, but I did think it could come in handy when travelling (i.e. in hotel rooms). So what it is?

Well, it’s basically a portable speaker system but as the name suggests it’s pocket sized. It’s battery powered (needs 2xAAA) and connects to any standard headphone connection – I tested it out using my iPhone as this is what I usually use to listen to music. You just connect it to the device (in this case my iPhone), attach the other end to a solid surface, and turn the power on.

Pocket Boom setup (any excuse for some Electronic 80s Anthems!)

What makes it such a clever product is that you can attach it to pretty much any solid surface and it will amplify the music by vibration. Depending on the surface chosen it will result in a slightly different sound, and it’s good to experiment. It’s a sticky foam pad so should be able to stick to most surfaces, not just on horizontal surfaces. I quite like the sound produced when it’s attached to the side of one of our drawer units.

Pocket Boom stuck to side of drawer unit

One problem I do have with it is I get quite a lot of feedback from using my phone which is a pain. I also have to confess that despite having it for a couple of months now I keep forgetting to take it with my when I travel, so it’s clearly not yet become part of my essential travel kit. I’ll try to remember to take it with me the next couple of time and see if I use it. I wonder if it may also be a useful way to include music in my training sessions so will also give it a go for this next time I have opportunity to do so.

So would I recommend it? I probably would given the relatively low price point, though it’s not blown me away. It’s certainly an easy way to play music, and extremely portable. I’m by no means a music expert so I can’t really comment on the quality of the output but it’s certainly better than playing it through my iPhone speakers. It gets distorted when on full volume on my iPhone but that may be the fault of the iPhone (or the surface). It’s definitely a talking point too, and I can imagine it would be good fun at social gatherings.

The slides are embedded below and available on Slideshare: http://www.slideshare.net/joeyanne/managing-yourself-how-to-be-productive-with-your-time

If you’re interested in learning more about anything in the presentation, please leave a comment if it’s something I might be able to help with, or I would recommend checking out the following resources:

• Allen, D. (2001) Getting Things Done: How to achieve stress-free productivity. Piatkus.
• Hines, S. (2010) Productivity for Librarians: How to get more done in less time. Oxford: Chandos Publishing.
• Houghton-Jan, S. (2008) Being Wired or Being Tired: 10 Ways to Cope with Information Overload. Being Wired or Being Tired: 10 Ways to Cope with Information Overload. Ariadne [online]. Available at: http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue56/houghton-jan/
• Maggio, R. (2009) The Art of Organizing Anything: Simple Principles for Organizing Your Home, Your Office, and Your Life. New York: McGraw Hill.
• Osman, H. (2011) How to design the ultimate home office (e-book) http://www.thecouchmanager.com/ultimatehomeoffice/
• Lifehacker blog – http://lifehacker.com/

The book was recommended by my manager, as Nikki used to facilitate workshops with Evidence Base (my workplace). I’ve heard tales of some of the interesting things she did in workshops and was really looking forward to reading the book. The book begins with an overview of facilitator style, as well as considering different learning styles and how you can ensure you have variety in your session to accommodate different styles. A main focus of the book is on whole-brain learning and engaging participants throughout. I have to confess, some of the ideas were a bit too extreme for me (particularly BrainGym which is recommended a lot throughout the book but I just can’t see me bringing exercise into my sessions!) but there was a lot I took from it. Some of the most useful tips for me included:

• Give adequate breaks
• Use music (useful for background during exercises and to evoke a certain mood)
• Consider theming the session (utilising metaphors and help bring different parts of the workshop together – Nikki even suggests fancy dress but I think that’s another tip I’ll give a miss)
• Plan the timings and structure for the session before creating materials
• Utilise the space your workshop is in, particularly if it is a full day workshop (participants will appreciate a change in environment)
• Think about zoning different areas of the room for different activities to help get people into the right mindset

Although some of that may sound like common sense, putting it into practice isn’t always straight forward. I have put a lot of thought into the structure and activities in the seminar I’m giving tonight, but as much as I tried I just couldn’t come up with a theme that would work and not be cringeworthy! I also discovered this morning that my requested layout (cabaret) couldn’t be provided so the table activities I had planned will have to be adapted on the fly depending on what the room is like when I get there. I’ve also struggled to get music in time – I do of course own music but not any suitable for playing at public events. The planning did seem to go well though – I spent a long time sketching ideas (I also tried mind mapping as recommended in the book but reverted to lists as that’s how my brain works!) before committing to creating the materials or presentation. This meant the material came together really quickly as I knew exactly what I needed. No more rearranging slides and frantically searching for images the day before the event.

I’d recommend the book to anyone involved in delivering workshops or training (including information literacy), but a lot of the ideas are more suited to a creative mind (which sadly I don’t have). I’m definitely going to try to add more variety into future workshops though and we’ll see how this evening goes to see what worked well and what to ditch (or work on).

I know there are some people on Twitter currently at, or approaching, this stage and for those of us just beginning it will still be useful to start considering how we’re going to turn our evidence into a portfolio with the evaluative statement.

Please join us and if you know anyone who has chartered, please ask them to join us to share any tips and advice too. I’ve even prepared a tweet for you – just copy the message below to let your followers know about the chat this week.

Join us on Twitter to chat about writing your evaluative statement for #chartership this Thursday 29th March at 6.30pm BST.

I'm not one of these (though I did use this in my presentation at my first library job interview!)

Well, you’re reading Joeyanne Libraryanne so I’m guessing that after reading the title of the blog post you’re thinking, “erm…. Yes, you’re a librarian! Aren’t you?”. Well I’m not so sure anymore. I’ve been mulling over a few things recently, partly due to the struggle to define what I do whenever I meet anyone, and partly because of some excellent blog posts to do with the CILIP Future Skills project which have really made me think (if you haven’t yet read Tina‘s post, A plea to CILIP, please do so – it’s excellent).

The main argument in Tina’s post is that to be a profession, we need to have skills that set us apart from other professions and define us as librarians. I totally agree. But what are our librarian skills? Well, I guess managing information is one, but isn’t that something most people do in their jobs? Then there’s understanding the needs of our users and delivering appropriate services for them – but again doesn’t that describe many jobs? So what is it that defines us as librarians?

The more I think about it, the more I doubt my identity as a librarian. All my work is involved in some way with library and information services, but does that make me a librarian? I have my qualification, but a qualification doesn’t define someone (I don’t think anyway). It definitely benefits my job that I am a qualified librarian and have worked as a subject librarian in an academic library so I can understand the needs of many of the people we work with, but you could do my job without the qualification or library experience (it’s not a requirement in my job description). Really, my job is a researcher who specialises in supporting library and information services. That’s not a librarian. So I have a slight identity crisis.

I’m heavily involved in professional organisations to support other LIS professionals (and para-professionals), as evident with my committee roles for CILIP and ALA. This year I’m an ALA Emerging Leader and I’m working on my CILIP chartership but is this the right path for me? To highlight the difference between my role and that of a librarian, here are my chosen areas for development which I’m focusing on for CILIP chartership:

• Research skills
• Formal communication skills
• Face-to-face networking
• Presentation skills
• Event organisation
• Project management
• Leadership

All of these are a key part of my job role, and all are skills I develop through my committee involvement too, but when you look at them as a skill set do they say librarian to you? I don’t think so. I think that describes any academic researcher. And even the marking criteria for chartership, again they aren’t really specific to librarians:

• An ability to reflect critically on personal performance and to evaluate service performance
• Active commitment to continuing professional development
• An ability to analyse personal and professional development and progression with reference to experiential and developmental activities
• Breadth of professional knowledge and understanding of the wider professional context

Then we cross the murky waters of an information professional and what defines that. Maybe I’m not currently a librarian but I am an information professional? I’d like to think so, but again that could describe any researcher really – we all collect information, analyse information, and repackage it for our user/client’s needs. I differ from Tina in my views on this topic – I think the commonalities between librarians and information professionals mean that they should be part of one profession, whereas I know Tina feels they should be separate (and I do question whether my views are totally objective!). I think it’s interesting that in the UK we have the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals, but in the US it’s still the American Library Association. Where do information professionals fit in the US? Do they still come under ALA?

I’m still figuring out my identity, as well as working out what I want in the future. I love being part of this profession and don’t want to leave it (not for the foreseeable future anyway!), but the things I really enjoy about my job aren’t necessarily specific to this profession. I could do a lot of what I enjoy doing in a different field. I could be a psychology researcher for example, and I could still be working on developing all the areas I’m focusing on for chartership, just with a different subject context. In one sense this is probably a good thing (i.e. the skills I’m developing are transferable), but it does lead me to question where I fit. I can still see a lot of potential for things I can bring to both CILIP and ALA so I don’t plan on leaving either organisation, and I very much hope I can still gain my chartership, but I do think I need to accept that I’m a researcher specialising in library and information services, rather than a librarian.

What do you think? Does it matter?

ETA: As I’ve been drafting this post, Simon has posted on a very similar topic - worth a read.

ETA2: Previous posts of my own on similar topics – What makes a librarian a librarian? and What do I do?

Please do vote and pass on the link to any others you think might be interested in joining in the next #chartership chat – the direct link to the poll is http://poll.fm/3lnco.

@joeyanne How about useful tools and techniques for gathering and organising #chartership portfolio evidence? This seemed to come up a lot

March 1, 2012 8:43 pm via webReplyRetweetFavorite

@kcquaye

Kelly Quaye

It’s a really common topic people want to discuss so I think it will be a really useful conversation. In preparation for the conversation I thought I’d share the methods I’m using to collect information about my activities and potential evidence, the main one of which is a Google form.

There are a number of different tables or matrices for collating information about your evidence and I thought it would be useful to set one up as a Google spreadsheet and populate it using a Google form. The idea is that I can use the form to add information to the spreadsheet from anywhere at any point without having to load a document up first.

This is the form I complete (you’ll probably want to click for a larger version):

Chartership evidence collection form

This is what it looks like once the information is in the spreadsheet:

Chartership evidence collection spreadsheet

I’d be happy to share the template with anyone wanting to do similar or you can set up your own:

1. Log into Google Docs
2. Click Create and choose either a form or a spreadsheet (whichever you feel more comfortable for creation – both results in same end product)
3. Add the areas you want to record and set up the form so it’s easy to complete (e.g. tickboxes for marking criteria)
4. Share the form to the different places you may want to add information from (I sent it to my email and starred it so that it’s always in my inbox, set it as a bookmark in my browser, and set a shortcut on my iPhone)
5. Start recording anything you do that might be relevant to chartership

Other tools I’m using for chartership

• I’m using a PBworks wiki to collect information and this is helping me get more of an overview of where I am at and start building the different elements of the portfolio (this is also shared with my mentor so she can comment on my progress and make suggestions).
• Any raw evidence (i.e. non-web based) is stored in Dropbox in an Evidence folder.
• I’m using Evernote to collect any tweets I post tagged with #chartership, and copies of any emails in my chartership folder (I set this up using IFTTT). I’m also sending some things to Evernote from other emails and creating notes directly in there.
• I’m using Twitter to discuss chartership with other people going through the process as well as mentors who offer support

What is anyone else doing? Any useful tools or tips for organising chartership information using online tools?

Please join us on Thursday March 15th on Twitter using #chartership to share your ideas.