Thing 14 - Reference Management Systems

I was airily going to skip over Thing 14 with a smug “I don’t need a reference management system”, but then I read The Green Stone Librarian’s blog and had a lightbulb moment. Yes, I could use a reference management system to keep track of articles I want to read and those that I have read and want to re-read.

But, with Freshers only days away, I’m not going to spend a lot of time downloading and comparing products. 51^st Century Librarian has done a good job of that. I have downloaded Mendeley on to my computer, and for now will just keep in the back of my mind to put any articles/documents in here for safekeeping. I may even revisit this task in order to record if I’ve used Mendeley, and if so, how I’ve used it. But don’t hold your breath!

Thing 15, Attending, presenting at and organising seminars, conferences and other events

Much earlier in my career, I loved conferences. I just couldn't believe that I could go and stay in nice hotels (some had swimming pools!) and my employer would pay. I thought of it as a perk – a day or sometimes even more, off work and would happily go to everything possible. Later I worked for RSC Wales where attending conferences, seminars and other events happened all too frequently. I was also involved in organising lots of training and events for Welsh Video Network, so by the time I came to my present post, I was a bit burnt out from all the organising, travelling, presenting etc. I know that I tend to blame my children for all kinds of things, but they really do put a spoke in the wheels when I want to try and go away for a night or two. What I'm trying to building up to is the shameful admission that I have all but given up on conferences and events recently in the last few years.

However, I have made the effort recently to attend one event which was out of my usual comfort zone (all 3 hours out of it), because through this CPD23 lark, I realised that I needed to make more efforts to network with colleagues. And, of course, I really enjoyed it, and got a huge amount out of the day. So while I don't think I'll ever go back to those days when I was the first to volunteer to attend any kind of event, I am committed to attending at least one event a year. And now that I've stated that publicly here, I'm going to have to keep to it.

My main advice to anyone attending a conference is to talk to people. Don't stick to people from your own institution but mix it up with anyone and everyone. Think about issues at work you find difficult to solve, or would like to know more about in other institutions, and ask people about them.

Organising events can be great fun but also pretty stressful. Getting the technology right is one of the major stresses – make sure you have at least half an hour to test beforehand if you're in an unfamiliar place, and ensure that technical help to is at hand. Get presentations before the day and make sure they're on the computer ready to go. Try also to have someone to help you problem-solve. Often as an organiser, you're in demand to meet and greet, introduce people to each other, and make sure presenters have all they need. Having someone else available to find out why the tea and coffee haven't arrived, or to figure out how the fancy new light switches work, is a huge help.

There are so many events that look interesting that I can't pinpoint any that I think would be especially useful except maybe the UC&R conference. If I'm dealing with a specific issue at work, then anything that addresses, for example measuring impact, will be of interest at that particular time.

Are there any subjects on which I feel I could speak? I work in Customer Services, so anything on the student experience, managing a front-line service (combined IT and library), how to measure CS – though suspect anyone who's done Customer Service Excellence would have far more to say on this than I do; also jobsharing – how it works in real-life (keep meaning to write a blog post on this one). BUT, “could” speak is one thing, “would” speak is quite another.

If you have a burning idea for a great event, now would probably be a good time to talk about it!

One thing that has been churning at the back of my mind for a while now is holding a small, informal conference here in Aberystwyth for library staff in all sectors. While Aberystwyth may be small, you can't go anywhere without falling over librarians – the town is crawling with them. Not only do we have the university and the public libraries, but also the National Library of Wales, Bronglais Hospital Library and one of the university's departments is the Department of Information Studies. We also have CYMAL just down the hill. And of course, we never get together. So I've had it in mind to suggest a day where we invite staff from each institution to come together and present – probably on a common theme such as marketing and advocacy. Its on my "to do" list as something to explore when I have the time.

Back to school and CPD23 - Thing 13

I was doing so well, until school holidays interfered. It’s been hard to shake off that holiday feeling, but with Freshers just round the corner now, and work pressure piling up, I’m definitely getting back into the groove. However I’m so behind on 23 Things that I've been avoiding looking at the website and other people's blogs because it just makes me feel bad. Because of that, I’m going to ever so slightly skim quickly over the next few things to try and catch up just a bit.

So, Thing 13. Google Docs, Dropbox and Wikis.

Because we use sharepoint at work, I don’t have much experience of using the first 2 tools in any kind of professional capacity. Documents are kept on Sharepoint and we can control who has access to various areas. We can also give people either read only or editing rights. I now tend to keep most of my documents on sharepoint for the following reasons:

• ·         I can access them from anywhere – no more emailing documents to myself
• ·         Sharing with other people – I’ll email people the link to sharepoint, rather than emailing the document. It means that if it gets edited, everyone sees the changes.
• ·         Security – if my computer crashes, the document is safe. Our clever computer people can also retrieve old copies of the document so if someone accidentally deletes information, I can revert to the previous copy.
• ·         Collaborating – people can collaborate on a document and it’s much easier than sending the document around and then trying to incorporate everyone’s changes.

I have used Google Docs for keeping documents related to the local Cylch Meithrin (Welsh playgroup). As the committee running the local playgroup changed every couple of years (or sooner) this was an easy and convenient way to share documents between committee members. I found it easy enough to use – I wonder if they still use it or are back to 3 huge box files?

I have used Dropbox once to access a file. Someone sent me a link and I just followed it – didn’t need a password. I haven’t explored it further as I don’t see a need for it at present, and also I don’t want to download something I don’t need on to my computer.

Wikis

I don’t use, and don’t see the need for it. Only ever used Wikipedia (of course).  

Thing 12 - reflections on social media

Having been congratulating myself on being up-to-date with all things CPD23, I now find myself falling behind once more. I'm off on holiday next week so busy this week getting everything ready. That means no time to look at things 13, 14 or 15 - and by the time I come back from holiday I really should be on 16!

I did make a few notes on thing 12 - reflection on social media, and felt really smug about it, seeing as it was supposed to be a free week. Ah well, pride comes before a fall and all that ...

Well, having got this far, what’s changed for me?

If I’m really, really honest, then this blog is the only big change. I’m hoping to be able to keep it going after 23 Things, but having a topic set every week is giving me an impetus that will not be there once 23 Things has finished. A big dose of self-discipline will be required to continue regularly.

Social media can lead to better communication.

Yes, but only if people participate. The huge majority (including myself) seem to prefer lurking in the shadows – happy enough to read other people’s ideas and comments but unwilling to share themselves. Twitter seems to be dominated by a small number of librarians, and also librarians who already know each other and have created their own groups within Twitter. It’s difficult sometimes to know when is appropriate to comment, and when not, especially when the professional and the personal meet.

It creates a more collaborative working space where people are encouraged to share their ideas

Not yet for me, but I can see that for projects, groups, etc, it would be useful. I'm hoping to join a project with other institutions and it will be interesting to see how much use we make of collaborative working space.

It aids in building online communities

I’ve blogged about this before, but for me, the main online community is still lis-link (or other mailing lists). The response rate is far better than Twitter or comments on my blog. I’ve also found that one of the big pluses of following CPD23 is renewing contacts with people who I’ve either already met or know of, and I’ve really enjoyed following the blogs of Alyson Tyler and Sam Oakley. I haven’t really made contact with people I’ve never met before. This probably means that I’m not being proactive enough in commenting on other people’s blogs and responding to Tweets.

Social networking can also provide easy access to other areas of the profession.

Yes it can, but I think that to get a clearer idea of other areas of the profession, then visits to other sites is invaluable.

Since beginning 23 Things, I use Twitter a lot more, but am not sure of the benefits. I'm a lot more aware of how I need to improve my networking, and face-to-face works a lot better initially to build relationships - maybe I can then use Twitter etc to keep in touch with people.

Thing 11 - Mentoring

Hmm, not quite sure what’s required here, as I’ve never had a mentor or been a mentor to someone.

Do I think I’ve missed out by not having a mentor? Not really. I suppose it does depend a lot on the person who is the mentor, and the relationship you have with them, but I’ve always been very happy with discussing issues with colleagues. I was very fortunate in my first job to be working with people who supported me brilliantly. In my second job, I was a solo librarian in a city where I knew no-one. Yet the network of librarians there was great and before very long I was spending at least 2 lunch-hours a week with other librarians on campus to discuss issues. The University where I work now has a mentoring programme that I could access, but at present, I don’t feel the need for this. Since I job-share, I already have someone on hand to discuss problems, to reflect on issues, and to support (or sometimes to argue against) any decisions I might make.

I would be more than happy to be a mentor if I was asked. We do have a mentoring scheme at the university, and training is provided for mentors, which I expect would be useful not just for official mentors, but anyone who has a role in supporting and/or managing other members of staff.

Thing 10 - CPD and other things

I'm warning you now, this is a bit of a monster post

It's 17 years (gulp!) since I qualified as a librarian. I fell into it completely by accident. I'd just graduated in Welsh and had applied unsuccessfully for a number of jobs – one of which was in a library. In the interview I was told about the MLib (as it was then) course at DILS (now DIS) at Aberystwyth University, and since I seemed to be virtually unemployable as I was, I persuaded my poor parents to put me through yet another year in Higher Education.

I remember very little of the course by now. A quarter of it was dedicated to management, a quarter to reference tools, and I remember one session on teaching us to use card catalogues. How useful was it? Well, I've hardly used a card catalogue in my life, and for the first 5-6 years in my profession, the information on management was completely superfluous. My first job was on a reference desk, so that bit came in slightly useful, but I think I learnt more in a month on the job than I did in a year of studying it at masters level. I also managed to submit my dissertation within the year.

Of course, the course would have offered me so much more if I'd worked in a library for a period of six months to a year beforehand. I'm envious of our library graduate trainees as they get an unique opportunity to explore nearly all aspects of library work, and gain a far greater understanding of the workflows and the interactions between teams in the library. To be fair, the year I studied seemed to be a year of transition from paper-based materials to huge computerised databases, and the year I started working was when the institution I worked in suscribed to their first bibliographic database – remember BIDS? - but it did mean that lots of what I'd learnt about were out-of-date almost immediately.

I did finally get a job where I spent morning in a sectional library and afternoons on the reference desk in the main university library. This was great as I got the opportunity to learn to do a little of everything in the sectional library, while I really enjoyed (and still do) working on the reference desk.

Opportunities for promotion or advancement were few and far between where I was, so I moved to Leeds and ran the Education Library at the School of Education, University of Leeds. I've never wanted to be pigeonholed in library work – I never wanted to be just a cataloguer or reference librarian or desk manager, but rather have opportunities to do different things, and being a Solo Librarian at the School of Education Library provided me again with this. The library was part of the academic department, rather than the University Library, so this gave me an insight into how academic departments worked, especially as I was kindly invited onto all the Advisory Groups covering policy, research and teaching. I also got a gentle introduction into management, as I was mentored by one of the lecturers and also received a great deal of support and advice from other librarians on the campus.

After a few years I joined RSC Wales – no, not a Shakespearean acting troupe but the JISC Regional Support Centre for FE. My work here was to support library staff, and later teaching staff, in FE in using ILT. Again this was extremely varied, and challenging. However it was also a fabulous opportunity and all the RSC staff were expected to attend various national conferences and training events, as well as our own events.

Family life interrupted and after 4 years I gave up my job. That lasted 12 months, before I went back to work part-time for the Welsh Video Network as a Learning and Teaching Advisor. After the RSC, it was a relief to be only working with one technology, and by working alongside an ex-PGCE lecturer, I learnt a huge amount about creating effective lesson plans and reinforcing learning. We also had lots of fun arranging events – my favorite was probably a “Question Time” type event involving 4 AMs (Assembly Members in Welsh Senate) and a number of FE Colleges.

The travelling was getting too much with 3 small children (Oh, the irony, when I was promoting videoconferencing!) so when a full-time job came up as Customer Services Manager in the University Library I jumped at the opportunity, but only after persuading a colleague to apply with me as a job-share. We fortunately were offered the post and nearly 5 years later, we're still here.

During those years I'd done quite a bit of CPD, from a translating diploma, to a LeTTOL course, and attended a huge number (during my RSC time especially) of conferences. In my present role, I need to focus far more on generic management skills. The JISC infoNet resources and courses have been really useful, and if you haven't seen them, then they are worth a look. I would find the management aspect of my MLib course of far more interest and value now then I did at the time.

Apart from formal qualifications and courses, I should make far more of an effort to keep up with current literature, and attend more conferences – but again, it's hard to fit everything in.

I can see from looking back at the CPD23 post that my route has not been straightforward. I did start an attempt at Chartering but only half-heartedly as I was never convinced of the benefits, and I can honestly say that not Chartering has never hindered me.

I believe the benefits of a good Graduate Trainee programme are unsurpassed for a thorough grounding in all (or at least most) aspects of library work, and can see that it would have helped me enormously over the years.

As for formal masters or undergraduate degrees in librarianship – I'm not convinved that my degree gave me the best skills for the job, but I don't know how things have changed over the years. I do know that these academic departments don't seem to be concentrating their research on issues that I find all important in librarianship these days – impact being one of the main ones, and if anyone wants to prove me wrong and point me in the direction of research in impact or value of academic libraries, I'd be grateful.

It's been a bit of a ramble, so if you've got this far, thanks for reading. I'll try not to be so long-winded next time.

Thing 9 - Evernote

Thing 9
I like the idea of Evernote, and from looking at other people's posts, I can see that there's a lot of good reviews. I've downloaded it now onto my computer, and will do so on my phone as well. I can see where being able to save anything from my computer, phone or any other device will be useful for me, but I haven't used it yet, and feel that I need some time to play with it before I can use it effectively. In reality, this time will never happen, so either I won't use it, or I'll start using it haphazardly and take a very long time to get to grips with it. Maybe I'll try and find someone who works with me who uses it, and sit down with them to look at it in more detail.
Although, since I spend so much of my time trying to organise myself, maybe I should prioritise anything that might help

Christine Sexton has written on "Think before you post" on her blog "From a Distance..." which is, as usual, very interesting and informative.

Calendar - Thing 8

Google Calendars

We already use Outlook Exchange calendars at work, and all in the department can view each other's calendars. It's fantastic for arranging meetings as you can check the best times for each attendee. We use calendar invitations to schedule one-off meetings and also to enter regular meetings in staff calendars. We've got extra exchange calendars set up for leave and for various rotas such as desk rotas. All this is integrated with personal calendars so it's easy to see what's on. I can also view my calendar on my mobile phone which is a huge benefit, and access and use it over the web.

I love the reminders and also often put tasks in so I use it for time management as well. What isn't so great is the reminders that I constantly get telling me that a task is now a number of hours overdue - either I'm inefficient or hoplessly optimistic about what I can get done in a set amount of time.

We all have to be careful about the information on display in our calendars. Anything confidential or relating to a person needs to be made private or worded in a way that the person or subject is unindentifiable.

We also use sharepoint calendars to book rooms and cars – again everyone has access and can see at a glance when a meeting room is available. It's quick and easy to use - which is not something I often say about Sharepoint!

What this means is that as an individual I don't see a need for google calendars specifically, but am absolutely sold on the idea of shared calendars.

Self-service kiosks

A request for information rather than a post specifically to do with 23 Things this time.
We're look at implementing self-service kiosks in our libraries and possibly other heavily used university spaces. This would be a user-friendly, streamlined service to offer our customers and would extend the self service provision we can offer in different locations where we have not been able to directly offer services before. The kind of services that might be offered could be:

• ·        Check/Renew library loans

• ·        Pay fines online

• ·        Check Library PIN

• ·        Check library catalogue

• ·        Buy printing credit online

• ·        Check printing credit

• ·        See which computer rooms are free

• ·        Set up wireless

• ·        Set up printers

• ·        Check password

• ·        Register MAC address

• ·        Change password

• ·        Register firewall holes

• ·        Student record/timetable

Has anyone else implemented a similar service? I'd be very grateful if you could get in touch and let me know exactly what services you've been able to implement. Please either comment below or email me at nrj@aber.ac.uk . I'll post results up on this blog if I get enough responses.

Thanks

Professional organisations and real-life networks

I'm really getting behind now - blame school sports day, fun night and a sudden, compulsive need for clothes shopping.

This is going to be a short post, partly because of lack of time, but mostly because I'm not a member of any professional organisations for a number of reasons:

• cost – that's probably the main reason,
• limited benefits – for geographic reasons more than anything else. It takes about 2.5 hours to get from where I am to places where events, training and meetings usually happen. There were 7 events or groups listed on this blog and the nearest is Cardiff which is, yes 2.5hours away.
• Lack of time – I work part-time because I have other commitments. It makes it very difficult then to do additional activies
• Priorities - also, I'm not looking to advance in my career right now, so there isn't that additional motivation to make myself more visible, and collect things to put on a CV.

We did attempt to get an information group of librarians involved in managing Customer Services in HE libraries together, but it didn't happen for a number of reasons but that would be something I would find useful.

I've just looked over the above and realised that I sound like a miserable loner, burying myself in my little corner of the world – which I'm not, really! I'd love to be able to discuss some of the issues at work with people in other institutions, but opportunities to do that face-to-face are rare.

It also highlight just how important online networks are to those of us who are geographically isolated, or not able to participate in real-life networks for whatever reason.

Thing 6 - online networks

Thing 6 – Online networks

LinkedIn – I have a profile and a few connections so I've ticked the box, but it's not something that I feel comfortable with. Mostly I think that's because I'm not actively looking at getting another job at the moment so there isn't that extra incentive to market myself, but it's also because the interface is pretty awful and I can't see the point of it. Perhaps it's the same as updating your CV – despite all the best intentions, I never actually do it until I am applying for jobs and I also can't be bothered to be using LinkedIn right now. I also find it boring compared to other social media experiences, and I really, really hate the way that Aberystwyth University is automatically located in Shrewsbury! Do they not realise how unbelievably insulting that is - why oh why can't they sort that out? OK, rant over, but you can see I'm not the biggest fan of LinkedIn. It's definitely not the office, but more of one of those sad dives just off campus where a few lonely people congregate while everyone else is having far more fun somewhere else.

Facebook

I love Fb for staying in touch with friends and family. I'm also a member of a few closed groups (children's football teams) and that's a wonderful way of sharing information and photos. My biggest worry with Fb is the privacy agenda. Despite shutting down my profile to be viewable by only friends I still worry about this. When I got my latest smartphone I was horrified to see all my Fb friends (some of whom I haven't seen or spoken to for 20 years or so) added to my contacts with mobile phone numbers and email addresses for many of them added as well – very scary!

I'm a bit of a lurker of Fb. I use it mostly for reminders of friends birthdays and quick checks every now and again of what's happening. I hardly ever post anything there myself. Most of my “real” friends are on Fb so it feels much more like a community than LinkedIn, or Twitter (which is almost exclusively professional contacts).... and there's a half hour gap between this half of the sentence and the first half because I got sucked into the black hole of Fb and have only just reappeared.

Despite joining a few library groups, I don't think of Fb as a way of connecting with other librarians or information professionals and I'm happy with that.

LISPN and Librarians as Teachers – I'm no longer a new professional, unfortuantely and I don't teach at the moment either, so just to keep things managable, I'm not going to join any of those groups.

CILIP – I'm not a member, and that's partly because of geography. I now live in a remote part of Wales and travelling anywhere takes forever. This means that getting to CILIP meetings and training etc is very difficult (add 3 children to the mix and it gets even worse). When I worked in Leeds I found CILIP's predecessor (what was it called?) really useful. I regularly went to meetings of the Solo Librarians Group and UC&R. I also used to go to Chartership meetings in a pub after work – not surprisingly I never got around to chartering.

I do feel guilty about this as I know that CILIP is what it's members make it, so if it's not meeting my needs, I have the opportunity to do something about it if I want to get involved. Again, it's a matter of time and priorities.

I'm a bit worried looking back over this post that I'm stuck in a slight rut – using the same social networks that I've always used. Since starting 23 Things I am using Twitter a lot more, and also RSS feeds. I would like to get more involved with CILIP but have given myself too much to do in the past and regretted it, so CILIP will have to wait for now. Managing these online network and chosing the best one for me right now is more important than trying to keep up with all of them.

Mirror, mirror on the wall ...

Thing 5

It’s been a busy couple of weeks, and I’m starting to fall behind, so I’m hoping to catch up with things 5 and 6 this week.

Reflective practice is something I do quite a lot of anyway. I’m always reviewing what I’ve done and how I could have done it better. One of the advantages of job-sharing is that there is an opportunity to update and reflect with my colleague at least once a week, and this face-to-face discussion is often invaluable in helping me to understand why things have happened the way they have, and how to improve things the next time. Also, discussions on operational plans, or just working out our to-do-lists can leave me feeling more in control and with more understanding of how to fulfil tasks and manage my workload.

Looking more particularly on 23 Things …

Blogs. I really enjoy reading other people’s blogs and I’m trying to leave comments whenever I read something that resonates with me. It’s reassuring to know that other people are grappling with the same problems or facing the same issues as ourselves. It’s also extremely enlightening to have a snapshot of other people’s professional lives and see what they are doing day-to-day. If there is a risk to all of this, it’s the time spent browsing various blogs. As for blogging myself, I started out very enthusiastically but time (and half-term) have made it difficult for me to blog regularly. I find it valuable to record my activities and thoughts (reflective practice I guess?), but I’m not sure that others find it so useful., but the beauty about blogging is that it doesn’t necessarily have to be for other people. Having said that, the first things I do when I log into my blog is check my stats. I want to carry on blogging, but I need to be realistic about the time it takes. Once 23 Things is over, I may need to recognise that once a fortnight is as much as I can manage.

Twitter. I’m tweeting more but not sure if this of the benefit to myself or anyone else. It might be raising my profile, and it gives me a feeling of being part of a community when I join in a discussion. As for following other people, I’ve found some useful links now and again but I’m aware that I’m missing stuff so can’t rely on it as a failsafe tool for getting information – possibly this is my fault and I need to get to grips with tools to manage tweets. Again it helps to feel part of a community, and it helps to have a finger on the pulse when it comes to current issues. However a lot of the information is superficial and I have concerns as using it as a representation of the entire library community. It seems to be dominated by a few very frequent tweeters, so not sure if it representative of the community as a whole. Although it’s used, and often praised, as a way of following discussions and presentations at conferences, I haven’t found it at all helpful in that context. I’d much rather read a longer, more considered report on a blog.

However, it’s easy to use, and I love its immediacy. I can access it from my smartphone, otherwise use would be infrequent at best. It is definitely my tool of choice when looking for breaking news, such as information on the floods at the weekend, especially when I’m not at my desk.

Storify. I wasn’t too impressed with Storify at first, but I’ve now succeeded in identifying an use for it, and am looking forward to going back and playing with it again.

Personal Branding. I find it really interesting not just for me, but also for the institution that I work for, and my husband’s business. Personally I still need to get my blog and twitter account to match and update automatically. My blog is improving my online presence (I hope anyway), and there doesn’t seem to be anything bad out there. I could do more to promote myself, but again it’s lack of time and it’s not on the top of my priority list at present.

This blog post has become far too long and taken up too much time (yet again) so I’m leaving it at this for today. I just want to add that in all of this, the biggest benefit and motivator is engaging with other people, and that’s why I want to continue tweeting and blogging after 23 Things.

Making sense of user surveys

One thing that occupies an awful lot of time here is creating surveys, collating results, using those results to inform decision making and giving feedback to our customers on those results. A colleague of mine came up with a really great idea for providing a quick, visual feedback method. Customers were asked what they would like to see less of, and what they would like to see more of, and this is how she displayed the results:

Interesting to see the overlap between the two - zoning is the issue that really divides people!

We're also able to combine the Welsh and English feedback in one document, and hopefully portray some of the complexities of trying to provide a service to people with very diverse needs and expectations.

Twittering away

I have had a Twitter account since 3rd Feb 2009 but never used it much. However, 19 out of my 122 tweets have been sent since I signed up for 23 things on 10th May, so already having a positive effect on my tweeting. I can see this becoming addictive. I’ve looked over all my old tweets, and while at the time I agonised over sending them, I can see know that they're fine, so maybe I don't need to be so worried about it.

I've also been checking up on Twitter a lot more often which means that I can follow conversations rather than just dip into random tweets. I've also edited the people I'm following and need to remember to do this regularly. I've found some more people to follow, and have come across some interesting tweets and links to blogs and other websites.

My main issue with Twitter is information overload and  the more you follow the worse it gets. It's a bit like walking past the tv and hearing a random quote (this morning it was "Charlene - the last surviving woman ...."), only with Twitter, you have around 30 channels going at once and it can be very difficult at times to make sense of it.

When I tweeted a request for information, I got no replies at all. I suspect that this is the problem with Twitter – people don't, in fact can't, follow all the tweets, so much of what is on there goes unnoticed. When I put a request for information on the lis-link mailing list, I got around 6 responses so if I compare the 2, the mailing list wins hands-down for gathering information. However Twitter is better for following trends and keeping up-to-date with conversations.

One thing I want to do is find out how to manage Twitter better. I have used TweetDeck in the past but need to go back and explore this and other tools.

I've been using RSS feeds in Google Reader for some time, and am pretty happy with how this works. I've updated the feeds and like another participant, would like to explore other RSS feed handlers apart from Google Reader. This is probably the most valuable way, for me, of keeping up-to-date. I keep intending to set up feeds from various journals, but haven't been able to do thiss yet.

Storify – this wascompletely new to me. I didn't get on at all well with it to begin with, and at the moment can't see when I would use it.

So, a big thumbs up to Twitter and RSS feeds, and I'll keep subscribing to mailing lists as well.

Day-to-day stuff

I’ve always intended that this blog would reflect my working life as well as my progress in 23 Things, so while I’m sorting out my week to come, I thought I’d share my plans for the week.

We’re holding a Customer Services Team meeting Wednesday morning so I need to prepare for that. The content of the session is already decided – feedback on survey data; sharing on upcoming projects including proximity cards (replacing all staff and student cards this year), possible refurbishment and upgrading of library on another campus, ILL changes, printer changes; and latest on project to investigate procurement or development of new service desk software across support departments. We’ll also be looking at developments in creating a new Strategic Plan for Information Services and how this will affect the development of our operational plans.

The problem will be fitting everything in, and getting survey data in a meaningful state before the meeting.

I’m working on the new service desk software project across support departments in the whole university so I need to put in some work on this including going over information sent to me by colleagues in other universities, and sending information to one of the vendors. Also need to decide how much resources we’re going to be deploying on this project in the next few weeks as it’s a busy period for all staff with lots going on.

I also have various catch-up meetings with individual staff and a Customer Services Manager meeting which is held fortnightly and is extremely useful to keep everyone informed of what’s happening.

Hopefully by the end of the week, we’ll be further forward with operational and strategic plans, and everyone in the team will have a clear idea of what our priorities are going to be over the next few months.

Now just need to go through emails and notes of meetings last week to list other things that have cropped up and need to be done and I can get going.

Branding myself

Been musing over this personal brand issue for days now. At first I did think it was a bit self-indulgent, and a bit too managed. I was under the illusion that surely I didn’t need to plan my web presence, it would just evolves naturally. However then a colleague remarked that my description on Twitter is “pretty sad” and I had to agree, though I still haven’t got round to changing it. I also read some blogs about how I already have an online brand whether I like it or not, and therefore ensuring that I’m aware of this and managing it for my own purposes is pretty important.

I’ve no intention at all of blathering on about my home life – even I don’t find it interesting – and all though some unimportant details may slip by my internal censor, I’m positive that my online presence, on this blog at least, will be purely professional. I want to be able to engage with other people who deal with the same issues as myself (and can I just thank all those who’ve left comments on this blog – it’s so encouraging), and for this to happen I need to be able to project who I am and what I do in order for others to be able to find me. That also is why I use my own name and own photo on all my social networking sites. I WANT people to be able to recognise me and know who I am. Using my own name and the same picture keeps consistency across different social networks as well so people will know that I am the same person as Nia08 on Twitter. I’m also thinking about changing my photo as the one currently on my blog was taken at a Christmas party and I’m not sure whether that’s the impression that I want to give although I do look very happy!

I also want this blog to reflect my views, and not those of the organisation for which I work, so I had better make that clear as well right at the start.  I’ve also taken to heart the comments on http://davefleet.com/2010/05/ruin-build-personal-brand/ on the importance of not being negative, so no posts on how unbelievably busy I am, or how colleagues are annoying, or why I’m not being paid enough, for example. I’m hoping to write more about my day-to-day job so I’ve kept the title as general as possible and not restrict it to just 23 Things.

And that’s it really. If I have time enough, I’d like to put an unique background on this blog and on my Twitter page. Also I really need to change my descriptions to something a bit more meaningful, but that will have to wait.

A grand tour of blogs

I've been reading more blogs this week than I've ever done before. I'm so impressed with the titles that some people have given their blog. I’ve been wracking my brain for something witty and descriptive but to no avail. However since Phil Bradley calls his blog “Phil Bradley’s weblog”, and that doesn’t do too badly for followers, then “Nia’s blog” will have to do for now. If inspiration strikes, I’ll change it.

Just had a quick skim through and so far lots of people have got about as far as I have, which is putting up their first post. I suspect that a lot of us share the same fear about putting our thoughts up in public. It’s reassuring to read a post by A Delve in the Shelves about the fears about blogging publicly and how it gets easier after time. I’ve even left a comment on the blog which is a first for me, as I’m more of a lurker usually.

I follow Christine Sexton’s blog, From a Distance, regularly as I worked in a converged service and she always has interesting and timely entries that help me keep up with issues and developments on the IT side of things.

I also dip into Meredith Farkas’ blog when I have time as she’s such an interesting writer, and writes about a range of things.

I’ve been looking for a blog written by senior managers in academic libraries in order to find out what activities they’re involved in, and what issues are concerning them both short and long term. I can’t find anything that meets my needs, so if anyone can recommend something, please let me know ….

Just realised that in Delicious, I'm listed as being in UK: England! For a proud Welsh woman based in Abersytwyth, this is disastrous. I can't find a way to change it in Blogger can anyone help?

I've created this post for the "23 Things for Professional Development" programme which I'm hoping to follow over the next few months. I'm also hoping I'll use to describe some of my activity as a Customer Services manager, and to reflect on any issues that I'll be working on.

At the end of this, I'm hoping not only to have updated my knowledge about web2.0 technologies, but also to have had the opportunity to think about and engage more in discussion about what's happening in libraries and HE.