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The Learning Rollercoaster

Kathryn Greenhill, one of my favourite Australian librarians, has written an amazing presentation for her Educause presentation (Fabulous slides too – wish I was there):
Why learning about Emerging Technologies is part of every librarian’s Job
The intro pictures are very powerful!
Here’s some of her bullets:
1. Performing core business better
2. Increased productivity
3. Gaining international perspective
4. Finding out what other libraries are doing
5. Understanding all formats of information
6. Our skills are useful – metadata, tagging, indexing, data mining
7. Dealing with Vendors
8. Dealing with IT departments
9. Understanding redefinition of our core concerns
10. Managing tech-savvy users
11. Match user needs to new possibilities
12. Professional clients required to keep up
13. Experimentation increases skills
14. Fun
15. Trend watching
16. Repurposing our traditional skills
17. Understanding technical background when dealing with vendors
18. Being prepared for when a tool moves out of early adoption phase
19. Understanding the redefinition of our core business
20. No-one else knows your users as well as you do
21. Buddy up – mentor
22. Ask a teen
23. Can’t predict the future–-so experimentation is insurance
24. Crowds are fickle
25. Collaborate better
26. Be the expert
A valid expectation of librarian is that we are information professionals and can acquire the knowledge we don’t already know.
Do other professionals get to say “I don’t have time”?
Does the doctor say I’ll just have to let that patient die – I don’t have time to keep up?
Does the CPA say I’ll just use the auditing standards from 1999. I don’t have time to keep up?
Does the pharmacist say I haven’t had time to learn the contra-indications for the last few years of new drugs?
How would you feel as you stand in jail and your lawyer says I didn’t have time to learn the changes in the law?
Professionals don’t get to say oooops.
As THE professionals for the information and knowledge based economy, we have to make time, as a team.
It’s a continuous learning world now!
Stephen

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Posted on: May 11, 2009, 8:22 am Category: Uncategorized

By: stephen

rev="post-2394" 4 comments

4 Responses

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  1. Deb Hunt said
    on May 11, 2009 3:57 pm

    This is the BEST reply I’ve seen to the “I don’t have time to learn that” when I ask colleagues when was the last time they test drove a Web 2.0 or other leading edge product. Thanks for sharing, Stephen!

  2. Stephen Abram said
    on May 11, 2009 4:14 pm

    Thanks Deb. Too bad it would be so hard to say to someone to their face!
    SA

  3. Kathryn Greenhill said
    on May 12, 2009 10:22 am

    Thanks for the heads-up Stephen. I’ve just added audio to the slideset on slideshare to make it into a slidecast, so it is now clear why I showed an image of my sons at the start and an axolotl half way.
    You even get a mention – on slide 66 … apart from the fact that I added an “s” to the end of your surname. I got your job title right, though, which must mitigate a bit???

  4. Batarang said
    on May 13, 2009 3:39 pm

    It still amazes me that people involved with libraries don’t see how this “information age” plays to so many of their strengths. Yeah, you’ve got to give up some control, but the amount of data (both accurate and otherwise) that results just solidifies the need for the navigators and organizers.