June 28, 2008

ALA Conference update

Posted in conferences tagged , , , at 12:21 am by Andrea Kappler

On Friday I survived an early morning wake-up, 2 flights through three timezones, and a day that ended at 1am in my home timezone. That makes it nearly 22 hours of being awake! I slept like a rock last night, despite fireworks going off at the nearby Disneyland park. I’m tired tonight, but more than happy to be at ALA, learning new things and meeting old friends.

Today I attended a CONTENTdm session that was both an overview of OCLC’s CONTENTdm software and their Digital Archive services and an in-depth demonstration of how to use their Acquisitions Station software to catalog compound objects. Cataloging compound objects like yearbooks, books, and postcards made me rethink my priorities when I return to work after the conference. They can be very complex and require specialized knowledge of PDFs, full-resolution images, and filenaming conventions. I’m definitely going to delegate more everyday stuff so I can spend time on CONTENTdm and other projects.

The OCLC Symposium was thought-provoking. Although the theme was mash-ups, the keynote speaker, Michael Schrage, didn’t spend much time talking about mash-ups in the sense that we’re used to hearing about them. He talked about innovation and said it’s the conversion of novelty into value, although the definition of novelty depends on the perceptions of individuals. He said libraries should find out what our customers think is the most innovative thing we do. Four actions libraries should take are:
1. Learn from our lead users- find out who they are.
2. Think about who we want to collaborate with to create value for both parties.
3. Market our best internal arguments & disagreements.
4. Establish “Liberatories” that attract talent and inspire hypotheses.

He finished with a quote that I really liked: “Success comes from not taking the path of least resistance, but the path of maximum advantage.”

A panel discussion followed with David Lee King, Mary Beth Sancomb-Moran, and Susan Gibbons discussing their mashups and answering questions from the audience. David discussed mashups like RSS feeds linked to resources in their catalog, a Meebo IM widget for reference and dead links in the catalog, bookmobile stops on a Google map, patron comments that can be added anywhere on their website, and how they used outside software like MySpace, Facebook, YouTube, Flickr, and Twitter for user-contributed content. Mary Beth showed a map mash-up of the Minnesota Sesquicenntial banner’s travels through 11 counties and 35 public libraries. She also used a map mashup to show legislators and constituents which libraries they represented. Susan discussed how they asked students and faculty to give input as to what they liked, disliked, or thought was missing from the library’s web page. Students wanted things the library never thought of, like dining room schedules, IM, Facebook, and course-specific information. The libarary worked with the registrar to create a mash-up of subject guides with course names, meeting times, professor names and a dynamic link to a librarian, whose title was different depending on the course associated with the subject guide.

June 17, 2008

ALA Annual Conference

Posted in Organization tagged , , , , , , , at 10:39 pm by Andrea Kappler

I’m just now putting together my schedule for the ALA Annual Conference in Anaheim, CA, next week. I’ve been meaning to sign up for sessions and receptions for a few weeks now, but haven’t been able to find the time to sit down and do it. So I’ve been working on my schedule for the last few days, squeezing it in here and there between projects, problems, and routine tasks.

As always, there are lots of great programs in the same time slot, in hotels spread across a huge city. Years ago, ALA conference planners were supposed to organize programs into tracks so that we could see what was being offered in our area of interest. They were also supposed to put programs in the same hotel so that when we were attending programs of interest, they were together in the same location.

HA!–I’m here to tell you it didn’t work out according to the theory. There are lots of competing programs in the same time slot in different hotels on the same day and within the same track. Gaaahhh! So much for following a program track and attending programs in the same hotel. They’re still scattered around the city, sometimes a mile or two apart. One thing’s for sure– I always get a good workout when I go to an ALA conference.

Better get back to planning my itinerary. It looks like I have some time slots double-booked (some could be triple-booked if I’m not careful). Better find a quarter so I can flip it and decide when I get there. Sometimes the location rather than the topic of the program helps me decide which one to attend– after I consult with my feet, of course. Ya just can’t be in two places at once.

Email in-box overload

Posted in Time management tagged , , , , , , , , , at 12:23 am by Andrea Kappler

I heard an oh-so timely story on NPR‘s Morning Edition while driving to work on Monday. They were talking about the volume of email most of us receive, which for some folks (like me) is in the thousands– new or unread emails in the in-box– every day. I can sympathize with that!

They said email is still overwhelming for most people, despite the fact that phone or instant messaging has cut down on some of the email traffic. To make matters worse, some people are their own worst enemies because they use the “reply all” feature, which generates even more email. Steve Innskeep discusses this with Will Schwabe, co-author of a book about email overload, Send: The Essential Guide to E-mail for Office and Home. I know I send myself lots of “bcc” emails, mostly to create a digital paper trail so I have proof I sent something of importance to a vendor or an employee. I also sign up for discussion lists and newsletters with the best of intentions to stay informed, but then struggle to find time to read them. Guess I’m guilty as charged. When I’m done clearing out my overflowing in-box after just one day out of the office, I’ll have to see if this book has any useful tips I might share here.

They also said companies like Yahoo are thinking of email as a social network, since we tend to regularly email the same family members and co-workers. I’d have to agree with that, too. Years ago, we had a nasty email virus at work that replicated itself through people’s address books. What tipped me off that something weird was happening were the empty ‘messages’ from library staff I didn’t usually correspond with. I cautiously opened their messages but not their attachments (since I wasn’t expecting any from them) and was lucky enough not to catch or spread the virus.

June 11, 2008

A juggling act

Posted in Time management tagged , , , , , , at 12:17 am by Andrea Kappler

Some days when I arrive at my office, my mind is abuzz with everything I need to do. Some tasks I do daily, like sending files of bibliographic records to Marcive for authority control or checking catalogers’ work as they cross-train into other areas. Other tasks are part of bigger projects, like updating documentation, filling out vendor profiles, or reviewing vendor work to assess the quality of shelf-ready books. Some days all tasks get pushed to the side as meetings, webinars, and employee counseling sessions eat into my time. Some tasks like the six-month overdue employee performance appraisals never get started, much less finished, because something else of burning importance invariably comes up.

It’s a never-ending juggling act that sometimes leaves me literally short of breath– I mean shallow breathing, hyperventilating, short of breath. It comes from the feeling that everything, from small task to big project, is due right now— a feeling that all are of equal importance and high priority. In my mind, I know this isn’t possible or even realistic. But in my panicked heart of hearts, I sometimes wonder if it will all crush me some day, like a tiny bug under a size 11 shoe.

Thanks to the stress, my hair is graying at a faster rate than some of my staff are working in a day’s time. My facial skin is breaking out and the skin on my forearms is getting blotchy (probably just age spots). I’m skipping lunch, working late, and I never exercise any more (bad, bad, I know). I think I look perennially tired, but thankfully, nobody has pointed it out to me (yet). I have more to read, to do, and to think about than ever before.

Despite all the stress, I’m enjoying the challengesof my job more than ever before. We’re starting a digitization project with OCLC’s CONTENTdm software, we’re getting shelf-ready books from two (and possibly three) vendors, we’re looking at ways to streamline our cataloging and processing procedures, we’re going to install Innovative Interfaces’ Floating Collections product, and I’m still trying to re-organize my department’s workflow and cross train staff in response to a consultant’s recommendations last fall. All of this is in addition to serving on numerous committees within and outside of my library. Every so often I drop a ball or two, but not for long. There’s always someone to remind me to pick it back up again.

June 3, 2008

Calm vs. crazy

Posted in Time management tagged , , , , , , , , , , at 10:38 pm by Andrea Kappler

Monday was such a calm day at work that I was beginning to think I showed up on Saturday by mistake. After a small flurry of emails between me and a vendor and a phone call to another vendor, the rest of the day was relatively quiet. Few people came into my office, the phone didn’t ring much and even email activity quieted down. It was kind of serene– and downright eerie.

Tuesday more than made up for it. I had to come in late, handle multiple problems, phone calls, and visitors, attend a meeting, work with a colleague to try to figure out how to set up new digitization software, and return calls to the director and HR director (which I ran out of time to do). I ended up working until 7:50 pm, because it was finally quiet in my office and in my mind. I was able to really dig into finding solutions to the problems we encountered while setting up the digitization software. I just wish I had time for that kind of stuff during my regular workday, rather than after everyone was gone.

Wednesday promises to be a hectic repeat of Tuesday, with another late arrival, three scheduled meetings, returning phone calls to the director and HR director, and handling whatever crises arises (I’m sure there will be at least one or two). I hope I have time for lunch. That sounds silly, but it’s true. Some days it’s easier to just skip lunch and use that hour to get more work done, rather than take it and have to work an hour over to make up for lost time.

Sometimes I wish everyone else would take a vacation– all in the same week– so I can get some work done without staying so late.