TLA Launch: Week 5

 

This was the last week of TLA Launch. We discussed Change Management. We focused on the REDUCE acronym based on the book, The Catalyst: How to Change Anyone's Mind by Jonah Berger. It stands for Reactance, Endowment, Distance, Uncertainty, Corroborating Evidence. Examples were given of how to lessen the fear of change and get more people on board with them. For example, providing a menu of change options so that staff feels they have agency over the change. One option I never thought of was to "harness freemium" which is like a free trial to get others on board. If you are confident and have done the work necessary, the change should bring about a positive effect. Once people give that free trial a test run, they can see for themselves that the change is warranted. 

Overall, I think the program was useful. We were the first cohort to do the program virtually, so some of the lessons had to be converted appropriately. It was nice that for a lot of the breakout sessions we were divided into similar libraries, though I always got lumped into the academic library group. Which wasn't a problem, per se, but I couldn't relate to everything discussed. I feel like five weeks was such a short time to adequately cover all topics. The topics they chose to cover (Emotional Intelligence, and Influence; Communication & Crucial Conversations; Team Work & Collaboration; Equity, Diversity, & Inclusion; and Change Management) are very substantial and a five-week course over any one of them probably wouldn't cover everything necessary. So in that sense, it was nice to get an overview of these important workplace topics. The teachers did provide further reading and did emphasize that they were always open to more questions. They also stated that they might have a reunion meetup since it's a lot harder to network virtually and it would be nice for us to meet each other in real life. 

TLA Launch: Week 4

This week during TLA Launch, we discussed equity, diversity, and inclusion. First, the teachers went over the definitions of each, which is great because I always get equity and equality mixed up. They had a cartoon to help visually explain the differences, which did help. 

In a breakout room with other academic/special librarians, we made a TRIZ list so that we could hypothetically achieve the worst result imaginable when it comes to an EDI workplace. The list was segmented into Direct Report, Peers, and People You Report To. It was eye-opening to see just how many of the things listed were happening at a previous place of employment. Seeing the columns of segments made it abundantly clear that there is never just one negative issue in a toxic workplace. The negative traits trickle down and out. 

On our collaborative slide, we listed a bunch of different ways workplaces are not EDI, from the obvious, showing favoritism, to less obvious ones like hiring homogenously. As we looked over our list, we were asked to highlight on the slide and reflect on those in which we may be complicit. Many people highlighted working in silos, not being a team player, and being disconnected from employees. I've done some of these myself and it just drove the point home further that even if you're trying to mind your own business and ignore the issues, your reactions to them just add to the overall culture. The lesson provided some great food for thought. 

"Certainly I can!"

“Whenever you are asked if you can do a job, tell 'em, 'Certainly I can!' 

Then get busy and find out how to do it.”

Theodore Roosevelt

Primo Issues Well, some of the records I edited ended up getting harvested and popping up in Primo search this week. That's a good thing. I'm like 80% sure the problem is something in the 500 field. So I did a batch record modification and deleted the 500 field from all but three records (so that we have a control group). The harvesting happens later in the week so it won't be until next Monday that we know for sure if it is the 500 field.  

Our Library During the Pandemic: The View from the UX Office I watched this session of the SLA Texas Annual Meeting this week. It was presented by Rice University's Public Services/Psychology Librarian, Amanda Thomas. They discussed their various library advisory groups which were interesting. Not that they have one, but that they have many! One of the biggest takeaways on the pandemic was the fact that they found it easier and more beneficial to conduct UX testing virtually than in-person. With screen-sharing abilities, real-time observations, and the ability to record, they found that virtual testing was more conducive. This same sentiment was also expressed at work when we had our Quarterly meeting via Webex. Someone mentioned how being able to see the results and the documents were more engaging than previous in-person presentations. watched this session of the SLA Texas Annual Meeting this week. It was presented by Rice University's Public Services/Psychology Librarian, Amanda Thomas. They discussed their various library advisory groups which were really interesting. Not that they have one, but that they have many! One of the biggest takeaways on the pandemic was the fact that they found it easier and more beneficial to conduct UX testing virtually than in-person. With screen-sharing abilities, real-time observations, and the ability to record, they found that virtual testing was more conducive. This same sentiment was also expressed at work when we had our Quarterly meeting via Webex. Someone mentioned how being able to see the results and the documents was more engaging than previous in-person presentations. 

OpenAthens Administration Webinar This week I watched a pre-recorded webinar on the OpenAthens Administration side. We are in the process of getting OpenAthens but have not gone live yet. The webinar was an overview of all the backend administration. Because we don't have access to it yet, I wasn't able to follow along with the demo in my browser but it seems pretty easy. There were some instances where I made a mental note to remember that some issues might stem from settings in another section but other than that the layout seems pretty intuitive. I like to be hands-on with my learning so when we get access I'll be looking at this webinar again to familiarize myself with the platform. 

TLA Launch: Week 3

This week during TLA Launch, we discussed teamwork and collaboration. Again, because I started at SwRI during the work-from-home orders, I have not had many "traditional" teamwork interactions. However, as far as "team" projects go, I think my co-worker and I did great work on the Famous Mathematicians virtual exhibit. Because we each had our own bullet points to work on, it was easy to work separately, then come together to put our two halves to make a whole. 

However, as far as the TLA discussion goes, I had to resort to past work experiences to find common ground. The TLA team put us into breakout rooms by library type. I ended up with the Academic & Special librarians. The first quality on our list of what makes a high-functioning team was open communication. Someone in the group also came up with the term "compassionate professionalism" which was described as having empathy for co-workers but maintaining professional boundaries. A lot of librarians in the group-at-large liked the term. 

You can't talk about what makes a high-functioning team without talking about dysfunctional teams. We spent some time in breakout groups to discuss the different aspects of dysfunction we've experienced at work. Though everyone has experienced the negative team qualities before, because of the current situation the listed traits are now presenting themselves differently. Some felt that COVID has created more meetings just to meet. These meetings are labeled as check-ins to ensure that people are on-track, doing their jobs, and being held accountable but usually, nothing productive comes out of the meeting. Again, I too have lived through many of the negative team traits listed but I haven't encountered them at SwRI. 

"People Rarely Succeed Unless..."

Your Audio Tour website

“People rarely succeed unless they have fun in what they are doing."

Dale Carnegie

Rare Book Virtual Exhibit Because we decided to have the books on display in the library in addition to the virtual exhibit, I created a slideshow that would be displayed on a monitor for staff. The slideshow focused on the author biographies and the display placard focused on the book. I figured it would be like two parts to a whole exhibit. When my boss and I went out to the lobby to discuss where we could set up the monitor, it was suggested that it would be cool to have an audio tour. 

I performed a quick Google on audio tours and found the website Your Audio Tour. I decided to go with this website because it doesn't require an app download, it's free, and your tour doesn't have to be public. 

Taking a lot of what was on the Famous Mathematicians webpage, I recorded a couple of authors as a demo. However, as I was recording myself I was reminded that many of these books are not in English. I don't like listening to my voice in the best of times, but hearing myself try to pronounce things in French and Latin was just pure torture. Luckily, Your Audio Tour has the capability to auto-generate voiceovers. They even have a handful of voices to choose from. 

We decided to go with the UK Male voice. I love British accents no matter what, but he almost doesn't seem fake at all. I was very impressed. I did have to go through and add random commas and rearrange sentences so that it would sound better. 

Primo Issues Back in September, I mentioned that one of the projects I had done was to catalog our IHS Engineering Workbench standards so that staff would be able to search them in Primo. We'd been having some issues with them not showing up in Primo. There were errors when harvesting. Last week my boss duplicated one but input the information based on another electronic resource template that we know show up in Primo. Well, hers ended up working so I took a look at what showed up and what didn't and made some changes to a few records inputting the changes I made into the 500 field. On Monday, we'll be able to see which, if any, ended up getting harvested correctly.