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Material that supports the study of how libraries and knowledge professionals are trained, how they share their skills, and how their peers view them.

When People Ask for Career Advice, This Is What I Tell Them

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Great mentors–and personal experience–have taught me some valuable lessons.

BY JUSTIN BARISO
CREDIT: Getty Images

He who dares to teach must never cease to learn.
–Richard Henry Dana

Throughout the past 20 years, I’ve been privileged to experience some very different types of work. Sure, I’ve felt the joy (and struggle) of pursuing my passion–but I’ve also had jobs that others would consider very…”unglamorous”.

Since beginning this column over a year ago, a number of readers have reached out to me for advice on their own work life. The individual situations differ slightly, but most questions are variations of the following:

I try my best to respond to these requests, since I love connecting with readers. I always emphasize that I’ll never tell someone what to do, because they’re the ones responsible for the decisions they make and their consequences.

But I’m always happy to relay principles that I feel have proven successful in my experience.

Looking back, here are a few of the lessons I’ve passed on:

Happiness is an attitude, not a set of circumstances.

Read more…

The Five Big Mistakes That Will Sink Your Internship This Summer

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J. Maureen Henderson

I have no qualms about saying that, for a host of reasons, I’m not a fan of internships and the emphasis we place on them as the best (and increasingly only) path to that elusive post-college entry-level white collar job. But, as a career advice Cassandra, I realize I’m in the minority. Interns are gonna intern. If your summer plans involve getting on-the-job experience (and a decent paycheck – please hold out for that) in the hope of increasing your future employability in a world in which the value of a college degree seems to erode by the year, you can at least go about it in the smartest manner possible. In other words, don’t make these mistakes.

Assuming Your Boss Knows What He/She Is Doing

It’s possible your manager hires interns because he or she deeply believes in nurturing the next generation of entrepreneurial or creative talent. It’s also possible that he or she has never managed anyone before, just needed an extra set of (cheap) hands around the office or was told from on high that the department would be getting an intern, end of story. The point being that it’s very unlikely that your growth and development will be this person’s top priority. Between putting out various fires, dealing with inter-office politics and daydreaming about an upcoming two weeks at a cabin in Maine, your boss likely won’t be devoting significant time to planning out your workload. Thinking your manager has your best interests at heart and relying on him or her to craft a winning internship experience on your behalf is a mistake. Read more…

On the heartbreaking difficulty of getting rid of books

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Astack_of_booksApril 26, 2016  By Summer Brennan

Like a lot of avid readers, I enjoyed Marie Kondo’s The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up but bristled when it came to the section about books. The gist of her now-famous method is this: go through all your possessions by category, touch everything, keep only that which “sparks joy,” and watch as your world is transformed. It seems simple enough, but Kondo gives minimalism the hard sell when it comes to books, urging readers to ditch as many of them as they can. You may think that a book sparks joy, she argues, but you’re probably wrong and should get rid of it, especially if you haven’t read it yet.

Paring down one’s wardrobe is one thing, but what kind of degenerate only wants to own 30 books (or fewer) at a time on purpose? What sort of psychopath rips out pages from their favorite books and throws away the rest so they can, as Kondo puts it, “keep only the words they like?” For those of us for whom even the word “book” sparks joy, this constitutes a serious disconnect. Still, as the weather gets warmer, many readers will tackle their spring cleaning with The Life-Changing Magic in hand.

I wondered, can Kondo’s Spartan methods be adapted for someone who feels about books the way the National Rifle Association feels about guns, invoking the phrase “cold dead hands”? I decided to give it a try. Read more…

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Personal Brand

14 Things That Impact The Quality Of Your Personal Brand

Andy Robinson
April 13, 2016

Quality and personal excellence are two key elements of your personal brand. The degree to which you fully embrace the importance of these elements is communicated to others on a continuous basis and is incorporated into others’ vision of who you are (i.e. the personal brand that you broadcast).

RELATED: The Perfect Recipe For A Great Personal Brand

Those who are fully aware of this fact can definitely undertake action to broadcast a personal brand that elevates their professionalism through conscious focus on quality and personal excellence.

Here are 14 things that impact the quality of your personal brand:

  • Every e-mail message you send to someone else.
  • Every voicemail message you leave for someone.
  • The voicemail message others hear when they try to reach you.
  • Your e-mail “signature.”
  • Read more…

6 Steps To Maximize Your School’s Career Center As The Path To Job Success by Nicolette Weinbaum

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by Nicolette Weinbaum

April 13, 2016

As many seniors in universities across the country will tell you, there’s no shortage of bright and accomplished graduates from top schools, all competing for a shrinking number of opportunities.

In fact, the competition for an entry-level position has never been fiercer. Newsweek recently noted that 2.8 million graduates will enter the workforce in 2016.  The scary part is that 40 percent of the total number of unemployed in the U.S. will be made up of 18-to-29-year olds, an unemployment rate of almost 14 percent among that age bracket (almost three times the national figure). Read more…shutterstock_284570267