Collaborative Librarians

Recruitment for our study has been an interesting task. Our goal is to reach the largest number of non-traditional librarians in biomedical research as we possibly can. That has required thinking about the Librarian Universe in a whole new way. If our target audience isn’t really engaged in traditional library work, are they subscribing to traditional library listservs? Are they still networked with other librarians or their iSchools? Where can we find them?

Another interesting question is whether or not our target audience actually still consider themselves librarians. Throughout grad school, I resisted calling myself a librarians, because it wasn’t what I wanted to do. Post-graduation, though, I realized I could do non-traditional work and still embrace the label. Plus, it made it easier to explain to people what I had studied and why it was relevant to my work.

And really, what does a librarian look like these days? How many recent grads end up with the traditional librarian role, something that would be recognized by past generations? Even those of my cohort who took more traditional library jobs are integrating new, cutting-edge technologies and doing their jobs a bit differently.

One of the interesting things about sitting at the intersection of so many different fields is trying to find a professional “home.” No one professional organization covers all the different aspects of my job, which means I need multiple orgs to stay current.

I belong to the Special Libraries Association and generally find their content relevant, despite not actually working in a library. I like the breadth of experiences represented in SLA and the strong focus on e-science and cyber-infrastructure.

I also recently joined the Society of Research Administrators. They seem a little less active in pushing content to their members than SLA but research administration is such a big part of my job now, that I find them equally useful. Maybe research administration just isn’t as rapidly changing a field as information science? I recently did a certificate program in Grant Writing at one of the section meetings and came away with fantastic advice and a much better understanding of the process. At lunch, talking to some of the other participants, they (research coordinators and grants office managers) immediately got our thesis of integrating information professionals into scientific research.

There’s a lot of interesting stuff going on at ASIS&T but it seems a bit more academic than is useful for me and not really focused on my areas of interest. This fall’s conference is in Vancouver but after reviewing the program, I don’t think it’s worth the drive for me.

How do others in non-traditional roles keep up on professional development?