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1 | ID | What is your current role and where do you work? e.g. your job title, organisation type (public, academic, health, special, etc.), and area of focus | What does a typical day or week look like in your role? e.g. key tasks, projects, who you work with, balance between user-facing and behind-the-scenes work | How did you get into this profession? e.g. education, previous roles, career changes, or unexpected routes in | What are the most important skills for your role, and why? e.g. technical, interpersonal, digital, or sector-specific skills | What’s something about your job that people often misunderstand or don’t see? e.g. hidden responsibilities, challenges, or misconceptions about the role | What would you recommend LIM students focus on during their studies to prepare for roles like yours? e.g. particular modules, skills, tools, or types of experience | What has been the most valuable experience or skill in helping you get to where you are now? e.g. placements, volunteering, part-time roles, specific projects, or networking | What makes a candidate stand out when applying for roles in your area? e.g. applications, interviews, portfolios, attitudes, or transferable skills | How do you see your role or sector changing in the future? e.g. impact of technology, changing user needs, new skills required, or emerging opportunities | 10. Finally, what is one piece of advice you would give to new professionals ? e.g. This could be about the reality of the profession, tips for starting out, or something to keep in mind! | Would you like to be contacted by any curious up-and-coming professionals that would like to learn more about your story ? | If answered yes, please drop your email address and name below. | |||||||||||||
2 | 2 | Academic Liaison Librarian in an academic Library. I look after Science and Engineering subjects. | There is never a typical day. It can depend on the time of year or the demands of the service. However, a through line is always communication with stakeholders! I am always be on the look out for opportunities to get in touch with stakeholders and develop those relationships. | I was a teacher after graduation. After deciding i never wanted to mark coursework again I ended up in libraries entirely by accident. But I'm glad I did! | Interpersonal skills. In a liaison role, you need to take everything in and use it to build a business partnership. Approach everything with curiosity! | I think how much it is a people business. The most important meetings you have may be over a cup of coffee! You need to be able to develop strong relationships but also maintain a clear sense of your own professionalism! | I'd recommend that you focus on your personal and communication skills. This is a people business. You need to be able to find out what makes a person tick and that will help you identify their information needs. | I think networking is essential. Be curious and interested. It is a small profession and those chance connections are so important. And keen trying, keep applying and keep learning. | I think it is is being able to demonstrate how you hit the person spec in both interviews and applications. But being able to marry that with a strong sense of your own personal ethics and values. If you can do that, you will stand out! | I think change is the only constant. Being open to innovation is really important but I'd recommend that all information professionals focus on those things that cannot be automated. Having a sense of your own professionalism and being able to build relationships will never be done by an AI! | I would recommend taking advantage of opportunities. Everything is a learning experience! | Yes | a.wheeler@mmu.ac.uk | |||||||||||||
3 | 3 | Learning Resources Manager at Oldham College | Behaviour management, space management, reading support, study skills support. Currently almost no capacity for behind the scenes work. | Unexpected. I graduated from a History MA, then got a temp job as an exam support tutor at a 6th form college, but then got kept on as part of the library team. I gained experience then moved to a job as an LRC Team Leader. After a few years in this role I was promoted to Manager. | Good IT knowledge. You have to be good with people. Being a problem solver is key. Creativity is important. | People don't see the behviour management challenges, and think we sit there doing nothing. | If you want to go into the education sector, unfortunately you need to learn about quality management and KPIs. Boring, but essential | Honestly just being passionate and very good at what I do | Attitudes, and a range of different experiences. Sometimes the best applicants are those that actually have worked in other areas/sectors as they bring something unique to the team, and new knowledge. | There's a worrying trend of FE colleges deciding to dispense with libraries and go all online. However in my experience students nowadays don't want ebooks. | If you're going into education, you do need to know how much of your time will be spent on behaviour management. Its also a sector that has very little understanding of what libraries do (and don't do) and many librarians are made to do extra roles like break duty, cover etc. but you should not agree to this! Agreeing to this is why the profession is being eroded, and its because a lot of librarians won't say no and stand up for themselves. Also, don't cave to ettempts to censor your library! | Yes | laura.butterworth@oldham.ac.uk | |||||||||||||
4 | 4 | Learning and Digital Support Manager, Wrexham University. I manage library service, IT support, Academic Skills, Librarians, Digital Learning. | Very diverse workload. Focus on operational planning and ensuring effective service delivery that supports staff and students. Current emphasis is on digital transformation across the institution, and how my area supports this. Involved with academic liaison work. Small team means I also have responsibility for library management system, content and discovery, database subscriptions. | Started as a shelver at Chester public library and have worked my way up through a variety of roles. I am not a qualified librarian. In the earlier part of my career I was in customer service delivery roles - library assistant, senior library assistant, user services manager, site librarian. The site librarian role gave me the opportunity to transition to roles more involved in academic liaison, information literacy support, acquisitions. These have included assistant subject librarian, learning resources advisor, academic and digital support librarian and academic support manager. I had a short stint away from libraries for teacher training with a view to a career change but this didn't work out. | Interpersonal skills are key, they underpin all the roles I've had, both in terms of customer interactions and managing/leading teams. I have developed a broad understanding of lots areas related to library service development and delivery - acquisitions, cataloguing, collection management, systems admin, electronic collection management, customer service delivery - though wouldn't say I specialise in a particular skill set. | In my current role it is the background work that underpins what we do that I don't think people understand. Delivering a library service involves a very wide range of skills, and expertise that isn't understood. | Understanding the realities of working in libraries. Depending on the type of role or sector you are interested in, for me it has been more about people than books and resources. This probably stems from the type of roles I've had. Certain librarian roles within HE involve teaching so an understanding of information literacy, and how to teach is important. Management and leadership of teams requires practical experience, theory isn't enough. | Taking opportunities to progress whenever I could. In my early career I was always interested and motivated to move to something else. My average time in a role was around 3 years before I moved on. The ability to demonstrate my enthusiasm and motivation has helped my progress. I have been flexible in my approach to the roles I've had, and line managers have recognised this. | Their experience and how this is articulated on applications and at interview. As much as I recognise that qualifications are important for me it is about the practical application. Again, this probably stems from my career progression based on my experience rather than my qualifications. | impact of technology and emphasis on digital transformation will probably have the biggest impact | Take every opportunity you can to develop your understanding of the profession. Be flexible in your approach and get involved in things that may be outside your comfort zone, or remit of your role. In my experience this has been recognised and helped me progress. | No | ||||||||||||||
5 | 5 | Academic Support Manager (Research) in an academic library. I manage a small team in an academic library which focuses on open research, open access publishing and research data management ans repository management. I currently manage two specialists (one colleague is a qualified librarian, one joined us from publishing). | I'm a manager so I spend a lot of time in meetings, and very little time with library users. My days and weeks are very varied. I seem to spend a lot of time communicating by email or Teams, chairing and attending meetings, project management, line management, writing policy, process and strategy-related documents, analysing data about the service, making decisions with the team or tackling problems they escalate. I manage a small budget for open access publishing. I set the tone for how the team works together, and basically let them get on with being the specialists. Often my role requires me to be a connector or a negotiator. | I started out as a shelver when I was a Graphic Design student. Once I realised working in libraries had potential for me, I pursued a graduate traineeship in an academic library, which lead on to a PG Diploma in Information Studies. I got my first professional role in 2007 in a University library as a subject librarian. I would say my route in was fairly typical. | Technical skills are less important to my role than in the past: I need to understand how academic research works, how the scholarly communication industry works, how systems like repositories are configured to be usable and beneficial, but I rely on my team for their technical expertise and knowledge. Interpersonal skills are incredibly important as a manager and service owner. Communication skills are key. My work relies on trust, clarity and engagement. Research support can struggle with being overly technical and jargon-filled so I need to be able to adapt my communication style and language constantly. Academic libraries are digital workplaces as well as physical now. I need to be confident with digital tools and applications, and be able to learn new systems. Problem-solving and decision-making are critical skills. Connecting policy and practice is key in my role too. | This is a great question! I don't work with students or books/collections any more, but I still see myself as a librarian/information professional. People tend not to see the creativity and problem-solving that is required in my role. There is also a tremendous amount of cross team working, peer relationship building and influencing. There is a tendency for a person holding a job like mine to take responsibility for functions that are adjacent to the role. This can cause serious mission-creep and overwhelm, so holding boundaries is important. People often don't see how much time and energy is spent trying to understand how a large organisation actually works and coping with inevitable areas of dysfunction. | I think all LIM students should understand the core technical skills such as information classification and retrieval regardless of which sector they are aiming to join. Despite what people say, AI won't do it all. Digital and data skills are increasingly essential. For aiming for academic libraries or research support, your research methods module is also very useful. Time spent talking to working professionals can help demystify the profression. Contributing to projects, placements or professional networks is worth the effort so you have real world examples to call on in job applications and interviews. | This is a hard question. Every time I have started a new role I have realised what my prior experiences taught me that I can apply, and recognised what I'm going to need to learn. So I think an appetite for change and a reflective learning mindset have been the most valuable skills. | Authentic applications that answer the person specification are essential. Generic AI-generated responses will not get you an interview or a job. Introducing examples using the STAR technique in your interview - situation, task, action, result - can really help you shine in terms of your competencies, knowledge and understanding your impact. | I think automation has great potential to change the sector. If we achieve the goal of (almost) universal open access to knowledge without barriers then the future will be more about knowledge translation, knowledge mobilisation and trust than purely access. | 1. Stay curious. 2. Do something small and practical when it all seems too much. 3. Connect with people - librarianship is built on networks of people who love helping and sharing what they know. | Yes | t.h.williamson@salford.ac.uk | |||||||||||||
6 | 6 | Associate Information Support Assistant. I focus on customer service within the University of Salford's library, tending to the many administrative and logistical systems we have in place. | Over the course of the day I will gravitate between the different floors of the library, being placed where needed to cover the areas. I will also, from a desk, complete whatever administrative tasks need doing. These tasks usually revolve around contacting students or updating our systems. | As an associate ISA rather than full time, I am employed on a contracted basis for a period of approximately 8 weeks. In previous roles, I have demonstrated a strong aptitude for both customer service and administrative roles; I have also always had a passion for understanding how libraries work. I have worked extensively in part time or contracted roles within the University of Salford, so when this opportunity appeared I was quick to apply knowing that my expertise, skillset, and knowledge aligned well with the position. | The most important skill I would say would be interpersonal skills. Being able to deescalate situations or just being a friendly face for students is an imperative in the role. The administrative capabilities are important, but they can be learned quickly. Having genuine people skills and understanding the customer is crucial. | There are many systems, policies, and procedures that are needed to be thoroughly understood to best serve the role. Often, students will not realise the importance of these and will sometimes be frustrated when we remind them of policies (specifically the need to have a valid student/library card on them at all times, especially after 5pm). Understanding and enforcing these systems make the library run smoothly, and a lot of effort goes into it behind the scenes that are not seen by the students. | Experience working with either young people or in a fast paced customer service environment would be very useful. Understanding the systems and infrastructure of the library is of course essential, however it can be picked up quite quickly. Developing the skills around customer service and confidence with speaking to a range of people face to face is essential. | Whilst studying at the University of Salford for my undergraduate degree, I regularly took on part time work as a Student Ambassador. My main responsibilities here were to conduct campus tours for small groups and oversee/facilitate workshops or seminars. This experience aided in developing my public speaking and interpersonal skills, alongside developing a strong knowledge of the University's campus and systems. That knowledge and experience has put me in good stead for this role as I have wide ranging knowledge and can answer obscure questions. | Having the ability to handle and compartmentalise often complex administrative tasks. Alongside this having the confidence to speak well to students, staff, and members of the pubic. | I foresee AI aiding with many of the administrative tasks which are undertaken. Numerous tasks which are currently manual are already possible to be undertaken by automation, such as sending text reminders to students for missing items, conducting inventory reports, and compiling accurate statistics. This will result in the Information Support assistant taking on differing responsibilities within a library space, potentially more in the realm of event planning, customer support, and creativity. | Whilst it may seem quite overwhelming at a glance over the amount of data and systems utilised, you will not be doing these tasks without support or guidance. | No | ||||||||||||||
7 | 7 | Knowledge & Library Manager for health (acute and community). Sit under Workforce Transformation. | It is very variable. First thing, I review the health Service Journal and flag key articles to relevant people across the Trust and flag content mentioning the Trust to the Board. Just now I am sorting data and improving the capture of organisational improvement projects so we understand the benefits and challenges in implementing projects and can prove impact of the Trust process. Starting a couple of research projects around AI use with unpaid carers to improve access to healthcare and a longitudinal study on how AI is changing the workforce. Been rolling out training in Copilot & AI literacy, managing problematic classrooms and public speaking. I'm involved in a crisp packet project to recycle them into bivvy bags and blankets for the homeless (scaling this up just now with a number of different external partners). I am a leadership coach, mental health first aider and improvement coach so support people daily. I also have the budgetary management and just finished end of year procurement and now into annual report and national statistical returns. I review the workforce policies and do the equality impact assessments for them and support guidelines. I am the digital inclusion lead (through social value plan have managed to get some supplier funding to start a local public library project to lend lap tops to enable digital inclusion and health literacy), and heavily involved in our Comms workstream (currently working with the Archives to capture Leighton Legacy stories to prepare for a new hospital), we are developing a new research centre and I have been working on the IP policy to support and looking at branding. I work in partnership to deliver functional skills training in maths and English. Embedded in the Digital workstream looking at modernising the hospital (we evidence check supplier solutions and claims). Also seconded to support NHS England to support AI upskilling in libraries and supporting the development of an AI Academy in the Trust. I can work with anyone and need to be visible and working with the people in the organisation to understand what is the best use of my time and what it is they value. Although I spend a lot of time at my desk, a good part of the day is meeting with people. | Started as a countryside ranger / falconer and needed a change. My partner moved and I followed. Got two job offers one in a corn mill and the other in a health library. My first experience of libraries was as a student rep at agricultural college I was asked to start an evening service. I later worked part-time doing local history and reference in public libraries. Took a few years to realise I really enjoyed the role and decided to qualify. Always found it really diverse and interesting. | Listening, coaching and problem solving. I am the go to person for things people don't know in the organisation. I get some really strange enquiries or problems than I need to support. Sometimes my job is just to listen and help people come up with their own solutions, sometimes it is about finding evidence to support, ideas to inspire or people to connect with. | People still associate us with books. It is a hard image to shake. They also think it is an easy job and nice and quiet. They are often surprised by the sheer volume and breadth of work we support or have some involvement in the organisation. We are embedded in some systems, so our services are not always visible. It means it is really important to be out there at the table, championing what the library does and the technical skills we possess. | Change management, advocacy skills and working as a team. You need a very good working knowledge of library work and keep an eye on what happens across sectors, but don't be afraid to take ideas from other roles. Have a growth mindset and be curious. Also be yourself and work with others that can supplement your weaknesses. You can draw experience from other jobs and personal life too. Use the experience of being you. | Shadowing and not being afraid to step outside your comfort zone. Understand where your professional support network is when you do. The Library & Information Health Network North West (LIHNN) has been mine for years and I have found friendship and support through it. | Not AI generated, be authentic. Read the job role and specification. Don't be afraid to visit or call and ask questions about the role beforehand. I tend to look for enthusiasm and willingness to learn. Many skills can be taught in the role. Key skill I look for is organisation and time management. | AI is another tool and we are the guardians to make sure it is used safely and effectively. Knowledge mobilisation will become more important. My role will be further integrated into research and supporting spin-out initiatives and patent checking. Also co-ordination of more 'neighbourhood' projects with other companies, charities, organisations and patients as partners. | The job will always change and can do at faster pace than other library sectors. Although the news has lots of uncertainties about the profession and the NHS, we are used to change. Personal resilience can be built over time as you get used to how the NHS works. It is a rewarding place to be, even though it has its challenges. | Yes | susan.smith2@mcht.nhs.uk | |||||||||||||
8 | 8 | Service Support Manage; health - NHS England; supporting NHS librarians with access to electronic resources and systems. | Answering queries on our service desk. Supporting our first line agents, who I line-manage. Training for other support desk agents. Training session on the national authentication system for administrators. 1:1 meetings with library service staff who need extra support, or a discussion about how to manage their resource access when they merge with another Trust. Collating statistics for various reports. | Undergraduate degree in social anthropology; library assistant job at a university afterwards; postgrad LIS course part-time while continuing to work in academic libraries - but in the training team. First NHS job - as a library skills trainer. Led me into a training role with the national team providing electronic resource access. Moved from organisation to organisation with the job. Had a variety of roles, all within the NHS library services - training, critical appraisal for evidence summaries, lecturing at uni, website creation, contract management. Never actually worked in a physical NHS library! | Communication/interpersonal. Understanding of library systems - authentication, link resolver/enhancer. | Although I'm behind the scenes, I spend a lot of time working with NHS librarians across England, so relationships and face-to-face time is very important. | Getting experience working with people - training, talking about systems. | Networking. | Willingness to learn, ability to see that their skills are transferable. | AI will have an impact on access to evidence - we need to ensure people understand. | Keep talking to people - make contacts, go to face to face events, say hello to people and be curious about what they do. | Yes | cardygeek@hotmail.com | |||||||||||||
9 | 9 | Teaching and Research Librarian in a health library. My focus is building up information literacy skills in staff and students. | Developing and delivering teaching Providing ad hoc teaching for users in need Working with lecturing staff to tailor sessions and also asking them about trends they're noticing in assignments to allow me to tackle broad issues. Populating our current awareness bulletin Running mediated searches for staff Providing advice about search strategies | I have a background in history and heritage, but have had a lot of library work and volunteering experience as well as admin roles. This meant I was well positioned to take a library assistant role that came up, and I was then able to develop my skills and progress. | - Customer service is one of the biggest ones, teaching is better when you're considering the person you're delivering it to and how they'll learn best. - Teaching skills (I realise this is very similar to above, but being able to recognise how effective teaching works and looks for different people is really important.) - Research skills, being able to find resources is important. There's a need for an ability to consider sources and dismiss them too - we need to be strong on nearly all of the elements of the research process really - Knowing the resources and being able to connect people with something helpful in the right moment. You will often get asked a question that isn't actually what the person wants, being able to parse what they actually mean and know enough to get them the information they're actually asking for is important. | - How technical elements of the job are. I get a lot of "oh what a nice little job" / "I'd love that, I love to read." etc. (as do many of us!) I wish I got paid to read. - The amount of research and work it takes to know what I do. I recently had a meeting with our IT team head who was surprised I knew so much about generative AI despite it being a meeting set up about generative AI. | Teaching and training resources, looking at different approaches and methods in relation to different student and population groups. Identify common barriers and consider learning disabilities and neurodivergence. Experience in libraries generally is helpful | Library experience Working a variety of jobs with customer service and administration requirements Research skills | Admin and/or library experience Not treating Drs like the be all and end all (we don't have a hierarchy of users and literally have a question in the interview regarding this because it has been such an issue.) Positive attitude to working and being able to adapt - we are a small team and have to do a lot day to day including making quick pivots in tasks/having to creatively problem solve. | I'm undergoing some big changes at the moment with a focus on redeveloping the teaching of information literacy and associated skills. I think that the impact of generative AI has currently been relatively minimal, but I have a feeling I'll be seeing repercussions of it in future (although we have already seen an uptick in inter library loans for documents that don't exist.) Our main goal is looking at increasing research in the organisation, so this will be a change in my role as I'll be refocusing on that once I have redesigned the teaching. | Really look into the reality of library work, don't romanticise it. I love my job and I love working in libraries, but it can often involve a lot of fighting for budget, making do with less than you need, having to state your value regularly, and stress associated with the above. That said, it's a wonderful career and has so many different branches. Consider your skills and think about where they'll be best suited. Also, don't chase promotion for the sake of it - think about what you actually want from your job, you'll be doing it a lot, make sure you enjoy it. | No | ||||||||||||||
10 | 10 | Library Systems Support & Subscriptions Manager, Academic, Health Research | My key tasks in a week begin on Mondays, in which I log into our research repository and check what articles our academics have published have come through onto our system over the weekend. A big function in my team is we need to make sure any articles published by our staff have a record on our repository and the list I make I then pass to a member of our team who then makes sure these records go onto the system and that they meet various levels of compliance around Open Access. From there my week can vary, but we have a regular meeting in the systems team specifically around our Research Repository as it is used for a lot of other functions of the school, and it is a new system we are still learning how to manage and develop. As the Library Systems Support I try to resolve issues people have with all of our library systems- our catalogue, our interlibrary loans system, open athens single sign on to authenticate users to our subscriptions and so on. I also try to support and manage if any of these systems have changes or upgrades. Another member of my team looks after Patron Data. Unlike some universities we don't have a huge number of students as we only have postgraduate courses and a lot of them come for only a term at a time to do a specialist course. My colleague uses a system linked with IT and HR to then enable her to upload the user data needed onto the library systems- we've had a big piece of work over the past six months around this as one of the automated feeds stopped working and it's been a challenge to work out why and how to fix this. The subscriptions part of my role involves managing what journals and resources we subscribe to. This includes monitoring our budget and our usage statistics to work out whether we are subscribing to the right titles for our users - this isn't a weekly thing but off the back of this I'm involved in things like helping my colleague around teaching staff and students about publication options and things like Open Access, - this includes actual teaching but also creating help guides, advice, maintaining webpages andso on. In addition to these I also lead an AI Working Group in the library and am supporting a big project we are doing about our physical journal stock- essentially auditing the collection to improve the information on our catalogue and pushing on repairs to our rare materials. | My first jobs after leaving Uni were in the public library as a Saturday assistant and in the NHS as an admin person in Medical Education. Medical Education shared a corridor and kitchen with the NHS Library team and I was often in there using the resources for my work and for study, as I was studying via distance learning. I got a secondment into the NHS Library team in an assistant role first developing my skills there and then by covering other roles getting experience in more and more aspects of librarianship. I was supported to study for my qualification (MA in Information Service Management via Sheffield Uni, distance learning again) and after qualifying got a job as an Evidence Reviewer in the NHS - this is the main librarian role that involved everything from acquisitions to - the main function of the role- conducting searches for staff. So for example a nurse might want to know what the latest research is on different types of wound care, a consultant might want to know if people with Condition X may be at higher risk of developing another type of illness than others or a senior manager might want to know what the current research is around race and inpatient care inequalities - my job was to find out the latest research, distill it and present it and a top page summary on the information. I loved doing that. From the NHS background I then applied to work in higher ed in a research-heavy library! | I have found over the years that the most important skill is curiosity and an interest in learning new things. I am not a specialist, I have done so many different elements of librarianship and while there are some I might like more than others (I love teaching for example) the biggest thing is that curiosity- and willingness not just to learn How and Why we do a thing but always looking for ways to improve. In terms of practical skills however I'd say a high standard of literacy, solid foundational computer skills and the ability to communicate well with others from all walks of life are the most useful. Just being willing to help, efficient and being able to communicate clearly and ensure you understand people's needs goes a really long way. Having a good understanding of excel - or a willingness to learn! - is a big asset. Also being able to research concepts yourselves and ask if you are unsure! | The thing that takes the most work is usually the unseen part- the going in between departments and suppliers confirming quotes or troubleshooting problems - there's always something happening. | Anything that teaches you about working with data I think is really valuable for my current role. Whether that's about metadata and cataloguing or other types of data- it's something that's really needed and a lot of it I learned more on the job and would have liked a better grounding myself! I'd also recommend modules that cover things like putting together a business case, understanding budgets and suppliers etc. The modules I did at Sheffield myself around those have proved really useful when leading projects. | The things that have been most valuable for me have really been the opportunities to cover and learn other people's roles- even a bit. Before I did my library qualifications I got to see how evidence searches were done from the librarians I worked with, I learnt more from being given a task and doing because the need was there. Curiosity is really the best thing- when I applied for my first role in academic libraries I was quite open that I didn't know everything but the things I did know about - how certain systems worked together, how to manage that information flow- were in part due more to learning from others- going outside of my role and being curious and/or helpful than anything I could have been trained for. I also want to mention listserv email lists - there are so many of them and I've learned so much just from reading what other librarians write on there and what queries they talk about! | In my area the things that make a candidate stand out are: - high quality of literacy, good clear writing on application - an interest or experience of working with data and/or a demonstrable willingness to learn - strong indications that they have researched topics related to the role- in academia system this might be things such as an understanding of Single Sign On options, an understanding of Open Access and licensing or of library systems and suppliers - even if they've not had a lot of experience signs of having researched go a long way. | There are some big needs in our sector for people to understand things around copyright law, intellectual property and the implications of AI. | Keep in mind when searching for librarian roles they are very often not called libarian roles! In the NHS I've known Knowledge Specialists, Evidence Specialists, Evidence Reviewer, Knowledge Support Assistants - it's the same in academia - in my whole team only a handful of us have the word library in our job titles | Yes | Helen.Kiely@lstmed.ac.uk | |||||||||||||
11 | 11 | Information Services Manager. Regional full service law firm | Most days start with current awareness. Using a newspaper aggregator I curate articles for our lawyers on clients, targets, sectors, legal topics. There will also be legal and business research waiting in the team shared innox. As a manager I will review these and delegate, providing guidance for junior members of the team or reach out to lawyers to scope out their requirements to ensure we pull together the information they need. If I pick up complex legal research it will involve a few hours of searching our online legal databases, checking our hard copy texts and sometimes liaising with the professional support lawyers who can provide some expertise. Other elements of my day involve liaising and negotiating with suppliers about our subscriptions. I take time in the day also to check in with team members, it might be a day where I have a 1:1 with a member of my team. We use this time to discuss workload, any challenges and also discuss their ongoing professional development. Other days may involve a 45 induction for new joiners to the firm. This initial training involves ensuring the person is set up correctly and has access to all the external knowledge resources. We will also discuss the team’s role and how we can support them with legal and business research. We will show users the features of the databases and ask them if they would like further training on the databases. | I did a history degree and loved researching. I never had a set idea of what I wanted to do but in the late 1990s I went to a careers fair where CILIP had a stall and they did some myth busting about librarians and really made the profession sound interesting. I was drawn in by all the different sectors that librarians could work in. I had never heard of a newspaper or law librarian! | In my role I would say being commercial. We do a lot of business research. You need to understand what’s going on in the world and be able to anticipate what news or development would be interesting to our internal clients but also understand why they might consider it relevant to a particular client. Also you need to be curious and flexible. There’s been so much technological developments since I started nearly 25 years ago. You need to be curious about how new tech works, embrace the changes because otherwise you will be left behind. Listening and good communication skills are also really important when you need to check with people about their research requirements. | So much of what we do can be hidden away. We’re often seen in law firms as just support and can end up supporting business development teams who forward the output to the lawyers without acknowledging the information team. A common misconception can be that we are only interested in working quietly with books. Information Professionals actually have to interact all the time with their users if they want to provide a really good service. | I think a session on business knowledge for librarians working in professional services would help junior be able to ask lawyers for example the correct questions when doing business research. Also training the trainer courses. A big part of the role is training internal users but this isn’t something that many people have been taught to do. | The most valuable experience for me personally was having an excellent manager who really stretched me and gave me opportunities to grow in my role. I always think it’s important if you are being interviewed to ask questions about ongoing professional development and what other team members’ journeys have been like. | On the application I am looking for people who don’t provide generic descriptions of what they have done but provide real examples of their experience in a succinct way. At interview I am not only looking for examples of people’s experience but I am also evaluating the person. I look for someone who demonstrates enthusiasm for the role, who has done their background research on the firm, who is curious and asks questions. | The impact of AI is undoubtedly huge. There is concern in the sector that the entry level role is disappearing with many of the tasks at this level either being swept up by AI or being absorbed by other members of the team. AI will definitely impact how much legal research is sent to an information team especially with the development of AI tools froubdedy in authoritative content such as Lexis and Weslaw. I think Information Professionals will need to flex and think about their role in new ways. I think training will still be a big part of the information professionals’ role as users will still need to know what they have available to them, what to use when, how to prompt effectively and how to verify and validate AI outputs. In terms of business research, information professionals may use AI tools to do this but the information professional is skilled at knowing what the end user is interested in, what is relevant and also being able to provide context and analysis that provides a better report than something generated by AI. I think information professionals will continue to be responsible for liasing and negotiating with vendors because they know and understand the value of the product. | I wish that I had networked more in my earlier days. Don’t underestimate the value of this. Build networks, reach out to people, use LinkedIn and go to as many free webinars and conferences as you can manage. Also seek out a mentor, ask someone if they will mentor you. The profession is really friendly, librarians always want to help! | No | ||||||||||||||
12 | 12 | Evidence Specialist, public organisation, focus on public health. | I work from home, and whilst I'm part of a larger team, we all have our own solo work and only work together on internal projects. The main focus of my role is to do literature searches on public health topics that come into our team from external bodies. I also provide training on using databases, how to construct search strategies, and how to evaluate evidence. Our searches involve devising a search strategy, and then running these on the most appropriate databases for the topic. The average literature search uses 5 or 6 databases, and then the results are screened so the client only receives the most relevant data. Depending on the request the results are presented either as a bibliography, or a themed bibliography where I have grouped articles together under topics. A lot of my time is spent on searches, and the majority of that time is spent screening the database results. Some weeks/months are busier than others, with a lot of internal meetings or a queue of searches. Some of the internal projects involve having to do presentations on any internal projects we're involved with (lots of little working groups that look at things like AI, value and impact, internal tools we use to organise our data). I work slightly more closely with one colleague as we've found a way to support each other and share some of the training and administration. So we have regular Team calls, and I think without that element some weeks would be quite silent. We use Teams a lot, mostly for formal communication but we also have an informal group team with just a few of us shooting the breeze. I do meet with external clients maybe 3 times a months. This is either to arrange training for their team, or if I have questions about the search they have requested. | I started as a library assistant in a Special Collections library which was part of a larger academic library. My undergraduate degree was history-based, which worked well but I soon realised that I couldn't advance without a library qualification, so I returned to university as a mature student to get my Information Management MSc. I stayed at the same establishment for about 15 years, and by the time I left I was very much enjoying my role of having subject specialisms in my undergraduate degree subject area. I left as we moved for family reasons, and I found myself in a very rural location with little chance of picking up a similar job. For three years I worked as a school librarian, which was a completely different change of pace and extremely hard work. Honestly, it was as equally rewarding as it was frustrating! Librarians are not treated the same as teachers in schools, you work entirely on your own, there's no flexibility, and the library was part sickbay/babysitting/classroom - none of which I had much influence over. But students can be very special and unique people to work with. If it weren't for the terrible salary I would have stayed longer. | Digital is essential, as are search skills and communication - which for me are all done online either through Teams chats or meetings. In my current role I'd say having a professional manner is also quite important, and a designated work space without distracting noise and background movement. A knowledge of public health is also pretty useful, and I didn't have it when I started and I look back at some of my earlier work and feel it shows. Because I now work for quite a large organisation, I do sometimes feel that my experience isn't always used. My sole main role is to do literature searches, so I'm never asked about knowledge or collection management despite having experience in both. | I find my job title means nothing to most people, so sometimes I say "I find Public Health evidence" which most people find interesting, and sometimes I say "I'm a librarian" and people will "ssshhh" me (as a joke). I find people rarely know that this job requires qualifications, that it involves any expertise, and depending on the nature of the job can be done from home. They are very stuck with this idea that a librarian is someone who guards books and tells people to be quiet. It is an enduring stereotype. The biggest challenge I have faced has always been that in all my roles I have had to either present, train, or teach. I don't think I'm terrible at it, but I'm certainly not comfortable with it and I've never fully felt prepared for it. I also found that my "search skills" are something I've learned as I went along. Working in an academic and school library didn't use these skills a great deal, it was more about showing others how to access tools rather than performing the search themselves. Prior to this current job my only experience of searching was for my own dissertation. | There's such a broad range of specialism in LIM. I've never been in a role where I didn't need people skills, even now when I work from home, I need to be able to communicate and present myself well. I think you have to be interested in the topic (health, history etc), and you have to quite like attention to detail. If I were at the start of this journey, I would be looking to focus on AI, because I believe we really need to be playing an active role in AI literacy. | I think the most valuable experiences have always been finding something that I am fully engaged in. So a topic of interest to me, or having a real passion to make something work and be the best it can possibly be. In my early career I was often given jobs that were someone else's admin, or the leftovers of a project they started and cared about but I wasn't involved in from the start and had no influence over. The COVID lockdowns were a great opportunity for innovation and problem solving - not everything worked, but I was inspired to keep trying new ideas to engage students with resources. | Enthusiasm and interview skills. Research the post and organisation as much as possible and be familiar with the names or types of databases you are likely to be using. I was once on a panel interviewing for a library assistant, and whilst no experience of libraries was required, 3 out of 4 said they didn't have a favourite book or enjoy reading (they weren't offered the position). | Sadly I think AI is going to change things for the worst. I think we will see a large reduction in the number of jobs available, and the variety of what those roles cover. If I were starting again I'd be investigating prompt engineering and AI literacy. | I think this applies to all industries, but something to be aware of: when I started I focused everything on my job. I had the time and energy to read, learn, develop new ideas, and throw everything I had at it with enthusiasm and gusto. I was provided with a variety of tasks and it seemed as though there was a lot more scope for trying things out and specialising. I'm now at a point in my life where my family and other commitments are more demanding, and I don't have the mental capacity to continuously keep up with rapidly changing technologies. My priorities in a job are now based on how flexible the role and employer is so I can fit it around other commitments, and not the other way around. Be aware that not all library structures offer opportunity for promotion - it might not matter in the early days, but a stagnant salary can be a cause of frustration later on. | No | ||||||||||||||
13 | 13 | Deputy Library & Knowledge Services Manager in an NHS mental health and social and community care Trust. It's a medium-sized service by NHS standards, with 3 library assistants and 6 qualified librarians (we don't all work full time). We have two physical libraries but we mostly work remotely because our kind of Trust has lots of sites so our user base is all over a wide geographical area. | Because we work remotely we start each day with a 15-30 minute catch up over Teams. I line manage four librarians, so a part of each day is taken up with work relating to that - putting meeting dates in diaries, writing up notes from 1:1s, supporting them with their various projects, making sure priorities don't fall off the radar, approving annual leave and expenses. I also support the library manager with things like budgeting, collecting and collating statistics, feeding into the library strategy, annual delivery plan and overall project planning and setting priorities. The rest of my time, around 50%, is spent on professional service to support our users. So that's things like literature searching and synthesising evidence to support practice and policy-making, planning and delivering training, supporting specific departments by attending meetings and picking up on any need for information, and working with the Research department to support researchers in the Trust by providing training, literature searches and answering queries about, e.g. identifying journals to publish in, research reporting standards, appraising research quality. | I was the school kid who escaped the playground by helping out in the library :-) My first degree is in English so I trained as a teacher after that, but hated teaching (more accurately, I really don't like children) so I got a job as a school librarian first, then moved into a university library, then did my library MA at UCL. While I was doing that I got a bit of student work in the uni library in one of the many medical libraries UCL has, and I loved it and have stayed in medical and health libraries ever since. I've just finished a health library-related PhD :-) | All of the above! Medical libraries are a lot smaller than, say, university ones, so the job is very varied. Technical skills are always necessary with so much being delivered electronically (ebooks, remote training, troubleshooting the library management system, thinking about automating tasks e.g. putting pivot tables into Excel so that your stats take care of themselves, or using Power Automate to take some of the work out of things like current awareness alerts). Advanced literature searching skills are really important in our line of work as everything hinges on finding the best evidence to support decision-making, whether that's clinical or around service design and delivery. Confidence in delivering training is important. Good interpersonal and communication skills with lots of different audiences as we attend a lot of external meetings and need to communicate what we can do for our users, way beyond providing resources. A familiarity with medical terminology and the way healthcare delivery is organised is also necessary. | There is still the perception that the service is about passive information provision tied in with a physical site, when we are so much more than that. | If students already have a sense of the sector they'd like to work in, it's helpful to find a course that offers modules in special librarianship that covers that sector. In my case I didn't have that. But library roles change fairly rapidly anyway - what a library degree should offer is a grounding in transferable skills, an emphasis on reflective practice, a sense of the potential breadth of the role, and an idea of whether the student wants a customer-facing or behind-the-scenes role; both are important. | Honestly, nothing in life is ever a waste of time. I have a failed medical degree, a postgrad certificate in teaching, an English degree, a hiatus working in sales to libraries and a very recent PhD. Every one of those things has been helpful - I came into the field with a good understanding of the medical terminology, I developed an ability to write and critique writing in my English degree, the teacher training has been really useful in making me a good trainer in my work, the sales job meant I got to know all the medical libraries and library managers across half the country and to understand the issues they were dealing with, the PhD has trained me as a credible researcher which gives me authority when I in turn support researchers. Like I said - transferable skills :-) | The first thing is a well put together job application. Most of it is a form, but the personal statement tells you a lot. If it addresses each essential and desirable point in the person specification clearly, with sections and headings that match the job description, witch clear formatting and accurate spelling and grammar, and a focus not just on what the candidate has done, but how it contributed to a project/an outcome/their learning and development - that's what gets a candidate shortlisted. We're looking for the person's voice, we're looking for signs that the person cares about this job they're applying for and has thought about how they fit the job description and what they can bring to it. And we can smell an AI application from miles away - don't do it! It's not so much about specific skills, those can be learnt on the job. | In my sector, things change every few years. In the time I've worked in health libraries we have penetrated new areas which we wouldn't have thought were our responsibility e.g. critical appraisal training, getting involved in systematic reviewing. Resource provision has changed from a focus on print books and journals to much more electronic and digital delivery. Post-Covid, we have found new ways of working which are mroe flexible for us and our users and have freed up time and made collaboration easier and less expensive in a time of dwindling budgets in the NHS. This is reflected in a change in staff skills mix in health libraries, with more qualified staff delivering professional services compared to 10 or 20 years ago. The current big things are claiming our right to be knowledge mobilisers not simply knowledge brokers, and leading on the ethical, responsible and effective use of AI in finding and applying evidence. | Focus on developing your transferable skills, and develop your confidence. Don't be afraid of going down rabbit holes, everything you do, every apparent failure, will help you at some point if you reflect on it and learn from it. | Yes | Ruth Muscat, ruth.muscat@mpft.nhs.uk | |||||||||||||
14 | 14 | Academic Liaison and Training Specialist Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine (LSTM) (we are predominantly a specialist research-led institution with several hundred postgraduate-level students) | We are a very small library team (12 people) and I am the sole teaching librarian responsible for delivering all student teaching/staff training around use of library resources and EndNote software. I'm also responsible for all electronic reading lists across our MSc and Diploma programmes. Onsite days (x 2 - mostly user facing) - teaching students, delivering training to staff, running drop-in sessions for students, attending meetings Offsite days (x 3 - mostly behind-the-scenes) - working on literature reviews, updating training materials and resources such as videos, updating electronic reading lists, Teams meetings with offsite PhDs | I worked as a library assistant for about 3 years in my 20s in London. At 35, I did the MA Librarianship at Sheffield Uni and have been working in academic libraries ever since (at MMU, Huddersfield Uni and now LSTM). In the period in between I worked in marketing and communications but I didn't particularly enjoy it. | On a typical day, you might be meeting a Professor, an MSc student, a PhD student or other member of Professional Services so you have to have good interpersonal skills and be good at reading people/interpreting their needs. Increasingly, I am involved in literature searching so I have had to develop my database skills considerably over the last 3-5 years. I also engage daily with different online platforms such as our website, VLE and reading list software so technical skills are useful. | I think generally people underestimate how long many library-related jobs take. For example, updating reading lists with scanned chapters, correct article links and liaising with colleagues to acquire material to be added to reading lists. This would be just one example. | Firstly, decide which library sector most interests you. Then, if possible, try and speak to those that work in your preferred sector and find out more. Ideally, find out where the gaps are or what are the emerging new areas as these are the jobs most likely to be advertised in the future (e.g. Open Research). I've been looking at library jobs for 15 years and I find a lot of librarians like to stay put so look at new or evolving roles. | Thinking about the current demands of my job, I would say that having done 3 lots of systematic review training (externally) has been very helpful. Look out for any free or low-cost events, webinars or training you could attend, geared to your specific interests and network if you can to find out about up-and-coming opportunities. | I don't get involved in interviews but at the moment, I imagine it would be someone familiar with current and emerging trends in research/academic libraries and with a positive 'can do' attitude. | AI is seeping into library systems and workflows so there is an increasing role for librarians to act as mediators and guides, particularly those involved in teaching or training. | Do lots of research into your preferred role/sector and take advantage of any free training and events to broaden your knowledge and prepare you for your ideal job. | No | ||||||||||||||
15 | 15 | Clinical librarian, Bolton NHS Foundation Trust | Due to staff shortages I currently do a lot of front desk work - registering new library users, inducting new users into the library, fulfilling article requests and book requests and answering general queries. The more standard parts of my job include carrying out evidence searching, training library users in carrying out evidence and promoting and marketing the library service, | Career change | Inter-personal, customer service, evidence searching, training and education. | Most people outside the NHS have never heard of NHS libraries and many of them think the role involves pushing trollies of books around the hospital wards! In the NHS there are many people who are largely unaware of NHS libraries and their services or who think they are only for medics or clinicians. There is also a tendency for people to think that the NHS is one massive organisation with one single approach to everything - if only! In reality it is made up of 100s of organisations, each of which has its own policies, procedures and culture. | Gaining work experience can be very helpful in deciding if it is the right sector for you. Getting some experience of evidence searching can be helpful, as can shadowing front desk roles. | A placement in an NHS library when I was studying, networking with librarians across the sector, willingness to travel and/or take on temporary roles. An understanding of the NHS, its library services and what kind of roles are available. | Some knowledge about the Trust and the library service; a personable nature; experience of literature searching or willingness to learn, willingness to undertake training with users; interested in career development; enthusiasm. | AI and user reliance on it; increasing pressure on finance and budgets; growth of knowledge management; potential for further merger of services and/or their management | Be open minded and prepared to go for jobs against your peers - NHSD librarianship is a small world! | No | ||||||||||||||
16 | 16 | Principal Consultant Information Specialist, working in biomedical research in a commercial consultancy. I've specialised in evidence retrieval for systematic reviews, health technology assessments, economic models. For the most part, identifying evidence (literature) and managing data relating to medical topics, pharmaceuticals, medical devices, diagnostic tools, by conducting extensive database searches at an expert level. | Whilst working remotely, I liaise with colleagues and clients to develop the scope of new topics, plan the steps needed to translate research questions into viable database searches, devise and conduct searches to retrieve potentially relevant literature. I manage these data over the life cycle of projects, documenting the process, keeping a tight audit trail of numbers, and report the final methods. I regularly attend virtual meetings and planning sessions, as well as conducting continuous current awareness on methodological developments and challenges in my field. As well as contracted client work, I carry out ongoing methodological research, and present at conferences. I also deliver training across my organisation. | I was the first person in my family to go to university, and didn't really have a path planned after my degree. I loved the process of researching for my dissertation, rather than the topic itself. And decided I really wanted to conduct research and find information as a job. I was a bit insulted when my university careers service suggested librarianship, as all I knew was the stereotypical 'old lady in a specs and cardi saying Shussh' librarian! But it takes allsorts. To get pre-library school experience, I worked in a health authority resource centre, cataloguing books and leaflets. Before then, I wasn't aware of "special" libraries; and was keen to continue working in health/medical research. My grad trainee placement was in a University Library for Accounting and Business School students. I knew this wasn't the type of library work I wanted to pursue. Halfway through my grad traineeship (before starting my Info Masters), I spotted my 'dream' health research job in the old Library Association job supplement. I took a chance and was appointed to a professional post before qualification. Whilst working there, I started my Library course part-time. This experience helped me get my next professional post (still unqualified), and I finished my post-grad course a few years later whilst working full-time. Initially I thought library work involved books and customers, however my field is nothing like that and I work remotely. | Attention to detail, being methodical and able to work systematically, excellent IT skills and expert-level knowledge of database syntax for major databases & interfaces. Meticulous record keeping, so that there is a transparent audit trail from project inception to completion. | Expert systematic searching is not the same as using Google! In this job, you learn something new every single day. A well-conducted search is the foundation of a good quality systematic review, so it's critical that this stage is planned and carried out carefully and mindfully. The results of the search dictate the budget and duration for the whole project. Even now, some people don't realise that expert systematic searchers are not glorified admin support, rather we are researchers in our own right. | Try lots of different modules and get as much experience as possible. There are so many career paths that aren't visible when you first start studying; take some time to explore options and talk to people. Build your network early and send cheeky emails/messages to make contacts and get experience. My post-grad qualification didn't teach me how to do this job, but being qualified enabled me to start off as a trainee. The majority of skills for my career have been developed 'on the job'. | Tenacity and being methodical are fundamental in this field. I was really lucky to find out about a reasonably new research centre early in my career, and decided that's where I wanted to work. I applied for a few jobs there that I clearly wasn't qualified for and didn't even get interviews for, and was then anonymously sent a job description for a job that was perfect for me! | Well-written application letter, rather than formulaic copy-&-paste. Personality at interview, along with good examples for key competencies, such as time management, attention to detail, ability to prioritise workload, eagerness to learn, curiosity. For trainee roles, no-one expects you to be an expert or arrive with all the skills, but we want to see your potential, willingness to learn, and examples of your problem-solving skills and how you deal with problems. | New technology always has an impact on the technical aspects of this field. GenAI is obviously the 'next big thing', we need to adapt constantly and not believe the hype about every new tool. Over my whole career I've heard that each new piece of tech will be the 'death of the profession'. We are still here, often at the front line of change. | There's so much more outside of traditional public or academic libraries. Information work is incredibly broad and many specialisms are so niche they aren't visible to you when you start out. Send out cheeky emails and messages asking for diverse work experience or placements, try different fields and roles until you find something that really interests you. | yes | kate.misso@yahoo.co.uk | |||||||||||||
17 | 17 | Enquiry Services Librarian, commercial library, focus on user enquiries services and support. | The major element of my role revolves around managing a global LIM enquiry service on a day to day basis, while future proofing our service in an ever changing environment. I have to communicate and collaborate with my immediate team e.g. with the Collections Librarian, Access Librarian, Digital Services Librarian, wider team and sometimes external parties such as vendors. There is a lot of behind the scenes work to ensure that the enquiry service runs as smoothly as possible e.g. that our knowledge base is current, comprehensive and easily accessible. Our services has a large network of users and stakeholders. | After my Undergraduate Degree (English Literature and Sociology) I entered the LIM profession as a Library Assistant in a Law Library. This wonderful first LIM role sparked my interest in continuing further in the profession and this turned into a reality when I began my post graduate studies at Liverpool John Moores University while simultaneously working as a Trainee Librarian within a bustling public library service. I have had two major career changes which have both brought unique and fantastic opportunities, from public libraries to academic (HE) libraries and from academic libraries to a commercial environment. | Communication, marketing and promotional skills! I don't think these skills are specific to my role right but all LIM/KM roles. As new professionals you need to quickly adapt to the fact that if LIM professionals and services don't shout out constantly about what fantastic support and services we provide, that our potential users and collaborators will not find out about us. I have often had really positive working experiences that developed out of being in a meeting or networking event when I could highlight how my service could provide support or show that we were already were...showcasing our success stories. Similarly, if you make changes based on direct user or stakeholder feedback...publicise these changes! You said...we did! Otherwise what was the point in gathering the feedback in the first place. Library services interact with virtually all other internal departments in an organisation, so be open to making connections within other departments through communication and marketing. Then over time these connections develop positively into supporters and champions for the library service and new ventures for all stakeholders. Sometimes LIM staff are not the most confident with blatant self and service promotion but we should all be on a mission to turn this around! We are central and integral to the success of many large organisations and should be increasingly vocal about this. | There are so many misconceptions about LIM roles and librarians themselves and sadly some of these are negative (e.g. all we do is stamp books, we insist on libraries are quiet all the time, we are stuck in some kind of library land from the past). These misconceptions need to be broken down with each "library" based interaction no matter how small that interaction may appear (the ripple effect), we need to highlight how our services are as diverse and dynamic as our users and stakeholders needs are! One of the major challenges of our role is that due to the huge range of work we engage with, we are expected to know a lot about areas that might not be specifically our areas of expertise e.g. I am not an IT Technician, but over the decades I have often found myself front and centre (or dealing with cables under a work desk) attempting to resolve a users confusing IT problems either physically or remotely (often in terms of accessing library resources remotely). Libraries are regularly the "go to" safe space for any problem, query or crisis both in a physical sense but also with remote working. As such the staff that work in libraries need to try and develop the widest possible professional skill base in order to successfully support our range of users and their variety of needs. | I don't think I can call out any specifics in terms of modules because skills develop through experience, experiential learning and development and opportunities. I would say unless you have a certain sector in mind that you want to work within, and you are focused on only that area (e.g. health libraries) then keep an open mind and don't prepare for any specific role. Try to make the most of every module, every guest speaker and every library visit so you have a broader idea of what is possible post graduation. If you naturally lean towards certain modules and specific learning experiences rather than others, then potentially research LIM roles within that sector and what specific transferable, hard and soft skills would be pertinent to those roles (e.g. health libraries = systematic searching). | Taking formal and informal learning opportunties as they presented themselves, specifically a range of post graduate formal learning and courses. Taking the advice of colleagues and mentors throughout my career, every professional can benefit from the guidance of a more experienced mentor especially when you are both new to the role and or new to the sector. Get comfortable in answering questions, constantly if necessary, you don't know what you don't know and if you are afraid to ask, you won't ever learn. | An enthusiastic and adaptable approach, we might not have the exact experience and skills for a job at the interview stage but if we can show we are willing to learn with flexibility and tenacity, this shines through in an interview. Transferable skills fit into this mantra, highlighting that you might not have undertaken the identical work asked about within an application or interview, but you have the skills required from previous experiences. | There will always be knock on impacts for our role due to societal, governmental and digital/IT developments. It is up to our profession to take up the challenge of meeting our user requirements wherever they are, irrespective of the sector we work in. The impact of AI will result in changes in the way we work day to day as well as our own professional digital skills and the digital skills of our users. Additionally, as a profession we need to continue to educate both policy makers/organisational leadership and our users that information, digital literacy and critical thinking skills are even more vital when there is an abundance of mis/disinformation and AI generated hallucinations! Our public libraries are increasingly at risk due to local government funding cuts, these are institutions of literacy and lifelong learning across all generations and as a profession we need to continue to support our public library colleagues while promoting the evidence that proves individuals and families within communities who have an active public library service, have more positive life chances overall. | Don't be afraid to take opportunities as they arise or volunteer yourself for extra opportunities or learning, whether this be informal or formal. If you are offered the chance to work with new departments/colleagues/stakeholders or groups (especially user groups) then go for it! All of these experiences will develop invaluable transferrable skills and competencies, you will broaden your professional network and possbly make friends along the way! Library and KM services will always need to share resources (including financial) so the swifter you become adept at seeing opportunities for collaboration, sharing resources or services in order to become stronger and more robust as a service, the easier this will be in the longer term. | No | ||||||||||||||
18 | 18 | Research Culture and Open Monographs Lead, Academic Library, focus on Open Research | No week looks the same! My role focuses on advocating for open research, encouraging academics to engage with Open Research practices, and also developing infrastructure and workflows to allow researchers to engage with open research. This week I have been processing and publishing Open Research case studies submitted by our researchers as part of an open research award we are running. I am also helping to plan a library conference this summer so I have spent a lot of time developing the programme for this and meeting with the wider planning team. My other area of focus has been discussing with library colleagues how we use our library budget to support open research infrastructure. | I worked in several student roles at my university, after graduating I did a graduate role which saw me do internships in 3 different university professional service departments. One of my roles was in the university research office, which had some collaboration with the library team. A role in the library came up eventually and I managed to get it, it opened a new world for me and I now consider librarianship to be my professional identity. | Interpersonal skills are very important, I have to communicate with a lot of people, often telling them how to comply with some quite complicated policies set by research funders when they publish their research. Attention to detail is also important for my role, I have to understand policies and also analyse lots of data to inform decision making. | Roles in Open Research allow you to be quite creative. A big part of my ole is engaging with academic staff and I am able to use a range of methods to do this, such as creating podcasts, producing videos and training material, and designing workshops. | I would say they should focus on recording their experiences and keeping track of their skills, transferable skills are really important and many open research roles won't ask for prior experience in open research. Skills like customer service, interpersonal communication and team working are all common skills these roles ask for. | Networking is very useful, open research librarians are very collaborative and very generous with their time, I would recommend just approaching people working in this field if you are interested and asking to meet them to find out more about their role. | Transferable skills are very important, skills like communication, attention to detail and time management are all very useful to have. | I think a big focus in the next 5 years will be on supporting open infrastructure, by this I mean libraries using their budgets to support open source software, and grassroots/scholar led publishing initiatives that use non-traditional publishing and funding models. | Librarians are very collaborative and generous with their time, I would recommend approaching people working in fields you are interested in and asking them if you can meet up to find out more about their roles. | Yes | t.morley@lancaster.ac.uk | |||||||||||||
19 | 19 | Clinical Librarian / Library Lead | As the only professional in a team of 2, my role is split into 'Site Librarian', Clinical Librarian and Library Manager-like tasks. My main work is my Clinical Librarian tasks so most of my time is taken up doing literature searches occasional one-to-one user education sessions supporting library users to use databases to search for health information and creating current awareness bulletins. 'Site Librarian' tasks mainly centre around promoting the service, book selection, supervising the Library Assistant, desk cover for the Library Assistant and troubleshooting any operational issues. Library Manager-like tasks involve stock requisition, recording activity for the quality assurance process (currently ever 3 years) and reporting to my line manager (the Head of Education). Any significant downtime from Clinical Librarian work is spent on planning promotional work and keeping activity records up to date. This means I can do promotion quickly in busier times and not have to spend too much time digging up evidence It also means I have readily available information for reporting (such as annual reports). In addition, I am signed up to a few communities of practice and networks and attend their online meetings as well as attending online national Library managers meetings and any webinars or sessions that keep us up-to-date. This is a really useful way to interact with other librarians, keep abreast of new developments and get advice / new and different ideas for good practice and service improvement. | Various careers aptitude tests I did a few over the years suggested librarianship which I initially ignored. My first degree was in Business Studies and after university, I did a stop-gap job (for 4 years) in my local NHS Trust Medical Records department. This wasn’t where I wanted to be and yet another aptitude test suggested accountancy or librarianship. When I told the Medical Records manager, she said “There’s a library here, you know”. This was news to me. I met the Trust Librarian and she encouraged me to do the postgraduate Library course. So in 1998, I quit my Medical Records job and got some summer Library Assistant work in the local public library service which extended into part-time during the postgraduate course and post-qualification. I was lucky enough to get some temporary professional work due to a restructure which lasted 2 years. I eventually landed in a 'Library Supervisor' role in a branch library but I couldn't get enthusiastic about it. Eventually, in 2003, I saw a job at the library in the local NHS Trust I had visited 5 years earlier. I got the job and had landed in NHS Libraries where I have been ever since, moving to my current role in 2019. | Most people think a library or being a librarian is just about books. They may know of university libraries or even specialist libraries but don't really think of hospitals having libraries (or even an entire education facility) for staff. It can be quickly explained by talking about clinical staff needing to stay informed and up-to-date which is a simple concept for people to understand. However, that doesn't really do it justice because in fact the job has the potential to have a significant impact on cost-saving, patient care and staff health and well-being by saving time. In my experience, the main challenge is that education may not be seen as an priority either from the financial perspective of the organisation or from any number of individual perspective (such as lack of time or motivation or need). | Having some knowledge of the NHS is useful - such as job roles and career structures. Ensuring you can use Word, Excel, Powerpoint. Building search strategies and learning to search databases and use their functionality is essential. Good customer service skills, learn to dig a bit when someone has an enquiry. Marketing and promotion is important whether its a social media campaign or just remembering to tell a new library member about the services and resources. Presentation skills are also important (its difficult if they don't come naturally so you have to work out what your strengths are and deploy them) | Having a job in NHS admin to start with helped the most. It taught about how the NHS works . How it helps to be positive about changes even when you don't feel it. It taught me about job roles and how the hierarchical structures work. It also gave me good experience in supervision and teamwork and how to interact with people in work. | Not much experience of this, mainly interviews. Giving good and constructive answers in an interview. Letting the interviewer know you are not afraid to ask for help, take contact details and get back to people and admitting your weaknesses and explaining how you intend to overcome them. | It depends on the organisation. Some are already encouraging librarians to teach AI skills, raise health literacy awareness, essentially becoming more attached to the education offer. | Be pushy and get yourself known in an organisation as useful. | No | |||||||||||||||
20 | 20 | Cataloguing Librarian Academic Cataloguing and metadata | All behind-the-scenes (with the ability since 2020 of being able to work from home for a substantial part of my role) Part of a team of 5 cataloguers (2 of whom are part time), within a larger Collection Management team (that includes acquisitions, e-resources, interlibrary loans) Tasks include (but are not limited to): Activating (singularly purchased) ebooks Importing vendor supplied MARC records Checking and upgrading any substandard MARC records When on campus - cataloguing physical books - this includes checking/upgrading the MARC record used to place the order, or cataloguing from scratch when needed, adding subject headings, and classifying the item using either Library of Congress Classification (LCC), Dewey Decimal Classification (DDC) or Moys (our university uses all three schemes, due to a variety of institutional mergers over the years). Cataloguing rare books in our Special Collections department (about once a fortnight, to aid the Rare Books Librarian) Reclassification project - reclassifying items from a local scheme to LCC (a large long term project, currently mainly done via spreadsheets) Remote cataloguing via spreadsheet for TNE campus Attending meetings - these include, monthly Cataloguing Team, Physical Collection Working Group, Alma Updates, Library Search Updates, Equality, Diversity & Inclusion, plus external meetings such as with our local consortia metadata group, and CILIP Metadata & Discover Group Compiling agendas and writing minutes Writing/updating cataloguing guidance notes Providing cataloguing training/refresher sessions for partnership libraries Cataloguing maintenance work - which can include updating subject headings, amending classmarks, correcting any errors noticed by library staff | Whilst studying for a PhD in Classics I took an evening/weekend library job. Although enjoying research I didn't want to become a teaching academic and after completing the PhD ended up applying for a full time library job - this was as an Acquisitions Assistant in an academic medical library. The acquisitions work ended up encompassing cataloguing duties too which I discovered I really enjoyed. I did a distance learning MSc in Librarianship to become professionally qualified, and was able to get a Cataloguing Librarian job within the same institution. | Attention to detail and focus - cataloguing work is all about the details, punctuation, rules, being able to accurately describe an item Being open to technical changes, and prepared to learn about them | People often don't really understand what we do - sometimes they think we catalogue everything from scratch (and so think the library would benefit from outsourcing/shelf-ready) when in reality we mostly import records from external sources and amend where necessary They also often don't understand how classification schemes work. I sometimes feel if we do our job well, (and users can therefore locate what they need on the catalogue/in the library) then we are invisible - it is only when there is a problem and something goes wrong (which may not be our fault) that we are noticed. | If they want to become a cataloguer - find a course that runs specific modules in cataloguing/metadata/classification. The MSc I took didn't focus on these areas, but at the time I didn't realise what I really wanted/needed. Although I did most of my specific learning on the job (with some external courses), I regret not having a thorough grounding in these skills. However, a strong background in wider librarianship is also beneficial, in helping you know where you fit in to the wider landscape. | Volunteering - as a committee member on CILIP Metadata & Discovery Group - being involved in the group's activities, meeting metadata people from across sectors, taking on an editorship role for their professional journal, helping to organise conferences - lots of opportunities have come from this, and it has really helped with my CPD. I also joined a city wide staff development group (for library staff) and ended up chairing the group for 10 years - this led me to meet people from different roles and sectors, and helped me keep up to date with wider librarianship outside of my own role. | Understanding what is going on in the current metadata landscape. Demonstrating attention to detail and the ability to adapt skills (if they haven't much practical experience in cataloguing) | Impact of AI - personally I am not in favour of AI, and think it is being brought in to many areas indiscriminately (you need to argue your case why your job can't be done by AI!) - on the other hand, I have also heard about interesting projects that have utilised AI successfully. Be aware of its limitations and its uses. Linked data and the possible move away from MARC | Say yes to new opportunities and challenges (as long as you don't overwhelm yourself). Volunteer for groups/committees. Keep your skill sets up to date. Where possible attend conferences (or even unconferences/library camps) - there are often bursaries available for new professionals, so look out for those. | No | ||||||||||||||
21 | 21 | I am one of the two Subscriptions and Licencing Librarians at Manchester Metropolitan University Library. A key part of our job is managing our journal and standing order book stock and regularly reviewing our portfolio of subscriptions and standing orders. The role also includes working with our Library Management System (OCLC WMS) to make sure that material we have paid to access to is discoverable via our catalogue and that our catalogue holdings are kept up-to-date. This involves working collaboratively with colleagues in the digital team and external suppliers (for example, publishers). | A typical week would include supervising assistants in processing new deliveries of stock, processing invoices and recording expenditure, reviewing any changes to title lists in either our electronic packages or read and publish agreements and making sure these changes are reflected on our discovery tools, keeping a record of the licences governing who can access our content, identifying areas where stock could be withdrawn or weeded (in consultation with Academic Liaison Librarians) and working with our colleagues in the digital team to report any issues with online access. Our work is largely behind the scenes. When time allows I also work on some strategic projects where we identify emerging trends in the sector and consider how we might adapt our purchasing decisions and working practices to meet changes in information and publishing environments. | I entered the profession following a career change, having previously worked as a bookseller and academic. My first library job was a content and collections assistant at MMU library. Working as an assistant I gained an invaluable insight into how the library worked, and learned a lot from more experienced colleagues. I later successfully applied for a maternity cover position as a Subscriptions and Licensing Librarian. After a while a permanent position became available, and here I am. | Attention to detail, the ability to focus, communication skills, and an enthusiasm for constantly re-learning your role, especially in the face of a rapidly changing technological landscape. Microsoft Excel is used a lot in collections work and have had to develop a fairly high level of proficiency in this software. | People sometimes just equate your job with the physical stock they can see in the library and don't consider the time spent purchasing, managing metadata, ensuring discoverability, handling licences and other behind-the-scenes jobs. | Any library experience you can gain will be a huge advantage. The most valuable preparation I had for my current role was working as a library assistant, and gaining and understanding of the core- day-to-day processes that keep any library running. However, librarianship is a hugely diversified profession and there are tons of transferable skills you may have from other jobs outside libraries that will be relevant to the plethora of library roles available. | It's hard to isolate one experience or skill. Bookselling gave me communication skills. My previous career in academia was really helpful in giving insight into what students and researchers need from an academic library. I also worked on a research project on digital preservation, which taught me a lot about metadata and the need for accuracy. But most valuable of all was working as a library assistant. | I would say the transferable skills and the ability to directly relate those to the role they are applying for. | For better or worse AI is rapidly changing the way information is created and consumed, especially in higher education, so a high level of AI literacy would be advantageous, alongside an awareness of its current limitations. | Identifying someone who can mentor you is a big help. I would also recommend volunteering to getting involved in as many areas of work as you can. | No | ||||||||||||||
22 | 22 | Information Officer at corporate law firm | I am part of a 7 person team, but I am working for my own department of the law firm. My main task is responding to queries from the lawyers, in addition I do the subscriptions, training, collection management and current awareness for the department as well as some firm/team wide projects. | I did the MSc with no prior work experience, got a trainee role in a large organisation where they were recruiting graduates to multiple different roles including their information team. | very sector specific such as commercial and legal research skills as well as very general people and communication skills. | that it is extremely stressful and lawyers are demanding, I have never had a bad experience. I don't know the law, but I still know how and where to find information about it better than the lawyers. | anything they find interesting, you will learn on the job and they are so varied you never know which skills you will actually use. most things will be very different in real life settings. any work within or related to corporate or legal, LIM related or not or any customer facing role, people management role will be good experiences. | getting corporate experience in my first role | honestly, what makes you most employable for a law firm is having worked in a law firm previously. a degree in law or LIM and the hiring manager liking you are the other ways in. | I can see it being populated by more law graduates than LIM professionals, I would encourage more LIM graduates to try to give law firms a go as the information specialist skills are still very much needed. | it will be a massive bonus if you enjoy talking to people, and putting books in the bin. the principles and values you learn from your studies will be relevant for your whole career, but the practical day to day tasks will be entirely learnt on the job. | No | ||||||||||||||
23 | 23 | Academic Support Librarian (School of Arts, Media & Creative Technology) at University of Salford | Delivering information literacy training: workshops and one-to-one appointments from foundation to PGR level. Best part of the job! Projects: developing eLearning on various info lit subjects, engaging with university strategy topics (for us that’s “global citizenship” and preparing team for new customer relationship management platform), engagement (large challenge for our team is making all students and academics aware of how to access our support) Collections work: Weeding analysis, new acquisitions analysis. I am the link between the academics in my school and the Library Collections team. So although I don’t work with collections budget, pull analytics, do cataloguing or work the lending library desk, I work with academics to develop acquisition proposals for resources important to them and communicate with them when resources aren’t being used Engagement with academics:. A lot of time is also spent communicating with academics to set up embedded information literacy workshops for their students; none of this happens automatically so we need to plan a lot of outreach and build strong relationships. Admin: Emails, registers, setting up sessions, meetings… | Achieved master’s in library and information studies at University of Strathclyde. Important for my knowledge of information literacy skills, understanding of library collections and experience of doing postgraduate academic quality work. Worked as a library assistant at University of Salford for two years. Got role as “academic skills advisor” which gave me essential experience delivering sessions (something my master’s was lacking). After a year, got role as academic librarian, combining information literacy and library knowledge with teaching skills. | Interpersonal skills are so important. Ability to proactively build relationships with academics at every opportunity is essential for connecting with students and making sure library collections align with teaching needs. Teaching skills. Knowledge and experience of active learning methods with awareness of how this intersects with accessibility and equity of learning. Grab any experience like this you can get. Openness to learning. I’ve learnt so much about unique teaching methods, ways of supporting collections by researching, connecting with communities of practice. | Lots of time writing e-mails! The best and most rewarding part of my job is supporting students and researchers with their information literacy and research skills through workshops or one-to-one’s. The challenge is everything inbetween which I have to do to create spaces for that to happen. Universities are complicated organisms, students have so much information thrown at them and so little time, so there’s a lot of work (involving communication, project-work, admin) required to let that happen. | Something I was missing after my master’s was the teaching experience, which is so important for my role. Do research, find alternative training if possible. | Experience delivering workshops as part of my “academic skills advisor” role. Comprehensive database search skills through library master’s. Understanding of high-quality university assessment writing requirements through dissertation (and further publication as peer reviewed journal article). | Communication skills; awareness of active, blended learning which promotes accessibility and equity; knowledge of where generative AI meets the sector. | Generative AI. I think librarians will always be needed to contextualise and steer use of generative AI in universities, but it is essential to understand how the technology works, how it affects universities and information literacy, and how you can support users to be aware of its drawbacks but also use it effectively if they wish. | Be brave! We’re often introverts in this profession, but jumping into potentially uncomfortable environments with new people can be so useful. I recently made a huge step forward in my engagement with some programme areas by attending an after-work student final project event on my own, surrounded by lots of people I didn’t know. But an informal conversation there was key to building a connection which has driven collection engagement, precise acquisition and embedded learning. One more thing: we are uniquely situated in this profession because our skillset is precisely the ability to find and manage information. So if you’re ever unsure of something or need to develop your skills/knowledge in a certain area, use those research skills! We can investigate any topic and use information to answer any question, and this is a huge boost for working in any role. | Yes | Colin Paton, c.paton@salford.ac.uk | |||||||||||||
24 | 24 | School Librarian. Secondary school. | Library open before school, break and lunch for pupils to use PCs, borrow books. | Worked from 2001-2013 in public library sector. | Interpersonal, organizational, digital, creativity and marketing skills. | A lot of my work involves initiatives to encourage reading for pleasure but I think some staff and pupils think I shelve and stamp books all day and that's it! | Read a lot of children's and YA fiction. Also research SEND (eg autism, dyslexia). | Networking with other school librarians. | Attitudes, enthusiasm for the role. | More emphasis on digital. | Network, do online webinars and as much CPD as you can handle. | No | ||||||||||||||
25 | 25 | Library Assistant, Specialist Academic library, Music | Issuing and returning books, music and AV resources to students and staff, helping find resources, answering music-based queries, advising on Copyright, preparing books, music and AV equipment for use (making it shelf ready), promoting the library resources through eye catching displays, liaising with other departments (academic, practical and admin), looking after print periodicals, teaching and troubleshooting photocopying and comb binding. | Primarily though studying as a musicologist, then qualifying and chartering as a librarian while working in public libraries for many years. The library qualifications are much less important than the experience and knowledge gained from musical study, both academic and practical. | Musical knowledge (history and theory as a bare minimum), being a practising musician - in a conservatoire library at the level of working directly with students it's music, music, music that counts! | Music is a discipline which changes relatively slowly, so 'state of the art' looks very different in a music library from other types of library. For example, self-service is less suitable when music sets consisting of multiple parts are being issued and returned than for single items - and the bulk of our loans are in multi-part form. | I recomnend focusing on individual specialisms that contribute to the type of library one wishes to work in - for music, the subject itself is obviously important, as is playing an instrument/singing in a choir, but copyright is another big area it would be good to look at. | Keeping my musical knowledge up to date and maintaining my own practice have been vital. Coming into the job with prior experience of photocopiers and binding machines has also served me well! | I would say transferable skills, flexibility and a personal understanding of the pressures under which musicians train and operate would make a candidate stand out. | I think AI poses a threat to both academic study and to librianship in the future. Geopolitics also have a huge impact on the student cohort each year, both in terms of numbers and calibre. | Follow your interests and passions - librarianship is a wide profession and it has many unexpected little niches! | No | ||||||||||||||
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