Solo Librarianship: You are not alone!

I recently had the privilege of attending Library Camp East (see here for main post). I made notes on two of the discussions which were particularly useful to me, and hopefully by condensing my thoughts and forming them into some coherent whole, they might prove useful to others. So here’s my take on the first of those talks, which was about solo librarianship.

As I mentioned in my more general post, the solo librarians came from all areas – public libraries, academic libraries, specialist and special collections libraries. Some came from areas where although they weren’t lone workers per se, they were the only librarian within their organisation. And one person wasn’t even a librarian at all, but a very considerate IT-based line manager who wanted some understanding of what his potential employee was going to have to cope with. (Seriously, kudos to that man!)

After the mandatory introductions around the circle, we discussed the issues that we face as solo librarians, which I’ve grouped under four headings.

1. No Other Librarians Around

2. The Demands of the Job

3. The Lone-Working Environment

4. Justifying Libraries and Librarians

No Other Librarians Around

• Lack of peer support – when you work in an organisation where no one else is a librarian, they simply don’t understand what you do. It can be hard for them to relate to the issues you have to deal with.
• No informed sounding board – a second opinion is often helpful to ensure that you don’t overlook obvious pitfalls when making changes or introducing new initiatives to the service.
• Communications and the broader picture – being away from other librarians can make you feel as though you’re missing out, and it can be much harder to keep aware of recent developments.

The Demands of the Job

• Job too big? – certainly in my case, I’m a solo librarian because two of my colleagues retired and were never replaced, while the workload itself has not diminished.
• Time management – it can be very hard to prioritise the workload when everything is “essential”. Keeping on top of things – and deciding what to ignore – can be overwhelming.
• Handovers/continuity of service – how can the service run if you’re not there? What will happen when you leave? Will anyone there know how to do your job? Will anyone know what to look for when they interview for your replacement? Often, to cut costs, organisations have to wait before advertising for a currently vacant post, meaning there’s no chance for a handover either.

The Lone-Working Environment

• Violence/incidents – dealing with an aggressive patron can be much harder when you’re alone. And how do you cope when two incidents are happening at the same time?
• Safety – you might be in a situation where you won’t actually see people for long periods of time. If you have an accident at work, how long will it be before someone realises?
• Isolation – it can be pretty darn lonely. That’s alright for some people, but certainly not everyone, and can make for a miserable existence.

Justifying Libraries and Librarians

• Divide between specialists and librarians – some librarians perceived a lack of respect within their organisations for what they do and the service they provide.
• Classroom management – a couple of librarians had to cope with “you’re not a teacher, I don’t need to do what you say” from their classes. Teachers would have training in classroom management that might not be offered to school librarians.
• Justification of resources – particularly an issue with older or ephemeral resources. It can be difficult to explain to a non-information professional why certain things need to be kept.
• Advocacy within the organisation – it is exhausting and not a little soul-destroying to constantly have to justify the existence of libraries and information professionals generally, and to have to do it within the organisation is doubly so.

Depressing reading? We also took the time to discuss solutions to some of these issues, and to highlight the positive aspects of being solo librarians:

No Other Librarians Around

In this magnificently technological age, this is a problem where there are considerably more solutions open to us. As a distance learner, I’ve built up a fantastic support network of friend librarians on Facebook. As part of the local university and its hundreds of libraries, I’m on so many email lists I can’t even to begin to shake a stick at even a small fraction of them. Twitter seems to be incredibly popular with librarians. There are forums, like the ones for LISNPN.

The library world has never felt smaller and so accessible. So I can say “thinking of introducing x at my library” on my status, and someone, somewhere, will have tried it, or dismissed it before, and will race to comment. Building up these contacts in the first place is where the time and effort is taken, but I found attending conferences (and unconferences!) that there were people there who’d immediately follow you, even though you might have written a grand total of two tweets since you’d signed up four years ago…

The other point to make here is that just because your co-workers may not be librarians, doesn’t make them ignorant or worthless! They may not have the librarian’s understanding, but that can often turn out to be a big plus and you can gain new insight into how non-librarians perceive you and your work, or you can find out new solutions to problems you’ve both had to face.

The Demands of the Job

I think it’s probably a fair assumption to make that in most cases, the workload is not going to diminish for most library staff, and in some areas, as more cuts are made, it’s only going to increase. It’s important to accept that you can’t do everything. Here, it can be an advantage to be a solo librarian, as most people in the group indicated that they have a high degree of autonomy and control over their work. With great responsibility comes the need to prioritise much more effectively.

Several of the group emphasised the need to document everything you do at work, and there were several levels of this. The first is producing cribsheets for smaller processes, so that if someone else is taking over for the day, they know what to do. The next is the full-on “here is how to do my whole job” manual for longer-term (or permanent!) handovers. Finally, there’s the CPD/appraisal level – what you’ve achieved or implemented over the year, how you’re coping with the situation and what you need to be a happy and productive worker over the coming year. To my shame, these are all things I haven’t done at all with my current job, although when I left my previous junior library assistant post I produced 17 pages of instructions for my successor!

The Lone-Working Environment

Firstly, it’s important to be aware of the legislation and guidelines around lone working (I’ll be honest; it hadn’t even occurred to me to check this until the group leader mentioned it!). Workplaces can carry out risk assessments and changes can be made to ensure that you will be safe. In every job I’ve had, on my induction I was shown the panic button which would alert security. I’m pleased to say I’ve never had to use it, but it is vital to know that there is that lifeline.

The next thing is to attend as much relevant training as you are able: negotiation skills, classroom management, learning how to deal with difficult patrons – being able to defuse the situation before it escalates into something much more serious. BIALL offers one-to-one training sessions over the phone if you can’t get away from work to attend things, which I didn’t know, and sounds absolutely brilliant. Also, many workplaces offer counselling, or at the very least a professional friendly ear.

One interesting point raised by several people was that self-defence classes were not so useful, and in some cases self-defeating. They suggested that people who’d attended these sorts of classes could unintentionally heighten the tension in a difficult situation, or go to these skills immediately, rather than draw on the people skills and attempt to talk things down first.

Finally, and possibly most practically, know where your resources are. When something happens, know who you can call to come in and help. Know who or what you can rely on in an emergency. In one situation, the group leader said she relied on the assistance of an ex-staff member and one of her regular readers. At one of my previous jobs, the receptionist kept a list of emergency contacts; when security said they couldn’t come out until four hours later, I went through the list – the first was in Basingstoke, the next was on a conference, the next on holiday and unreachable by phone, but eventually I found someone to come in and help!

Justifying Libraries and Librarians

Embedded librarians came to the fore at this point. One commented that due to having chartership, she felt she was much more respected by other professions where she worked. One thing several of the group agreed on was that we should consider ourselves as professionals, and therefore equally worthy of respect in the organisation as say, the teachers, or the lawyers. After all, we probably have as many university degrees!

The other advantage was the fact that by not huddling with a group of library staff, and having to forge relationships with non-library colleagues, some librarians felt they were able to develop much better personal relationships with their users, and again benefited from the non-librarian perspective on their work.

Ultimately, I think the majority of us found this a helpful group discussion. It was a positive experience just to air and share, and realise that you’re not alone, and there was lots of helpful advice for the variety of situational challenges. There may even be a regional solo librarians group in the offing!

I realise this was a long post – kudos and internet cookies to you if you made it to the end!