Nice People Thread No. 15, a Cyber Summer

GDB2222

PasturesNew wrote: »

What else is there to do? Bit of dusting?

You've been studying my style in tact and diplomacy.

vivatifosi

It's pretty unlikely that the person you are describing is a librarian Pastures, more likely a library assistant. You'd be great at that, it is definitely worth applying for if you see a job come up. There's still a lot to learn, I'd estimate it would take a year to learn those skills.

A library assistant will answer general enquiries, help people using computers, join new members, shelve books, do basic stock management, read stories to children, run rhyme sessions, strict ordering (making sure things are in the right place) and so on. It also helps to have a good knowledge of the town to answer questions about schools, doctors, shops, local visitor attractions and so forth. Some library assistants also undertake functions on behalf of their or other local councils, such as processing Blue Badge paperwork, selling theatre tickets or parking vouchers, etc.

A senior librarian will generally specialise in one area and manage that for the whole authority. So if you were a librarian responsible for online services, you'd be responsible for knowing the marketplace and everything available, negotiating those services, understanding how they meet the needs of the community they serve, both now and in the future. A children's stock librarian would need to know about upcoming changes in the national curriculum, and to ensure that the stock profile met that. There's much more to it than that, but that's a quick overview. Its very specialised.

zagubov

I've always been impressed by the way that Northern Ireland has combined Libraries and Education Boards. We need both facilities and services as we need access to information in all ways possible, both as knowledge bases and as means of transmission to our children, and let's be honest, our successors.

I'm worried by the accusations that we're the first generation to pass on less knowledge to our offspring. We'd be such philistines if that were true.

LydiaJ

ivyleaf wrote: »

ETA Lydia We were hopeful DGS would get a place there as it's his nearest one, but they use a "fair banding" test, and of course "his" band might have been filled by boys who lived even nearer. It's near enough for him to cycle or even walk to. His second choice is a 45 minute bus ride away, so this will be better for him and the school gets very good results for a non-selective.

Sounds like an excellent choice for him. One of the schools around here does fair banding, but the rest don't. It's a bit of an odd system IMO. I have an instinctive dislike of systems that make it more difficult to guess how likely you are to get a place.

Pyxis wrote: »

Except that I told him it was my house, my mortgage and my money buying the windows!
I wouldn't have signed anything on the spot, because I was asking for information....specs and a quote, which I would then compare with others. If the way they operate doesn't allow for that, then they don't get my custom. End of.

Seems reasonable to me.

PasturesNew wrote: »

Ah, well they're not really interested in information gatherers because the sales person isn't paid for their time...

That's just the way the industry was built.

But information gatherers often do eventually buy. When I wanted to get PV, I had 4 sales people round to quote. The firm I went with seemed to me to be offering decent quality panels at a reasonable price. Also, the salesman was knowledgeable, and both able and willing to answer my questions at a level suitable for me as a professional physicist with no specific prior knowledge of PV systems. He didn't offer me any deals for signing immediately (I automatically ruled out the sales person who did) but his firm ran a scheme where previous customers got cashback for recommending people they knew if the people ended up buying from that company. He also offered me and my neighbour a discount if we both got them on consecutive days, which we accepted. It turned out to be just as well we did. They did my panels first, and one of them got broken by being blown over in high winds. They were able to fit all the rest of them, and then bring a replacement and quickly add it to my roof when they were back the next day to do next door's.

I also got an excellent deal on the panels themselves - I had been offered a choice of brands of panel with a range of specs and prices. I had chosen some from the cheaper end of the range, but the installation company's supplier let them down and they called not long before they were due to install them to apologise and offer me a choice - wait several weeks for the ones I'd chosen to arrive, or have higher spec more expensive ones fitted on the day I'd booked for the price I'd agreed for the cheap ones. Guess which option I picked?

IME, "there's a special offer but it runs out today" usually means "I really want you to sign up before you have a chance to realise this is a terrible deal".

Pyxis

zagubov wrote: »

I've always been impressed by the way that Northern Ireland has combined Libraries and Education Boards. We need both facilities and services as we need access to information in all ways possible, both as knowledge bases and as means of transmission to our children, and let's be honest, our successors.

I'm worried by the accusations that we're the first generation to pass on less knowledge to our offspring. We'd be such philistines if that were true.

What's that accusation based on, Zag?
I've not heard that before, and am intrigued.

LydiaJ wrote: »

.

But information gatherers often do eventually buy.

IME, "there's a special offer but it runs out today" usually means "I really want you to sign up before you have a chance to realise this is a terrible deal".

Exactly. :T

Plus, I'm not going to waste my time researching for goods and services I've no real interest in buying, am I?
(If some people do, that's just a hazard that's built into any commercial undertaking. To start a business on the premise that no-one will want to buy your goods, so you will proceed using methods to force them to, smacks of coercion, not salesmanship of quality products!)

If I want a washing machine, I will google as much info as possible first, including prices, and then go to the store and ask more questions about any shortlisted ones.
In the days before the Internet, the only way to get that info was to go to stores and 'waste' the salesperson's time by asking questions.

Similarly, with something structural like windows etc., before the Internet, the only way to get any information at all was to make an appointment with a salesman. "That's the way the industry was built", you say? Well, whose fault was that? Not the customers'!

If you don't gather the information, how on earth are you going to know which windows you want, or can afford?

I would by far have preferred to have had info given to me without having to endure home visits and endless spiel!

And as for the "I shan't come and give you any info unless I know you are going to sign up on the spot" approach, well, would you tolerate going to Curry's to enquire about washing machines and have the assistant say that as he has spent time answering your questions, he's not going to let you leave the store until you've bought one? :eek:

Jazee

With the role of librarian being so specialised it worries me that most of the libraries round here are now run by volunteers. Not in their abilities as such but just that the council can brush off such an important role. But I suppose their other approach would be to close the libraries.

PasturesNew

GDB2222 wrote: »

You've been studying my style in tact and diplomacy.

If you look closely you might spot that the post was edited - I added that piece in later, in honour of you.

PasturesNew

Jazee wrote: »

With the role of librarian being so specialised it worries me that most of the libraries round here are now run by volunteers. Not in their abilities as such but just that the council can brush off such an important role. But I suppose their other approach would be to close the libraries.

From what was said above - it appears that most of us have never, ever actually met a librarian .... people who work in our little libraries are just "library assistants" a job "anybody can do" pretty much.

So, we spent our lives thinking librarians were the ladies who worked behind the counter in the library, when, in fact, they don't do that at all. They do "stuff you will never see, in faraway buildings, that you didn't even know went on". Subject specialists.

vivatifosi

In years gone by, you would have met many librarians. These days though, they will be in bigger libraries, or especially places like academic libraries where there is a high need for specialist knowledge around non-fiction areas. Schools often have librarians too, as they are mirroring their collection to the needs of their audience and curating that accordingly.

There are a few reasons for the demise of librarians. One is that big data allows for the taxonomic side of the role to be shared more readily, so people working with that data such as library assistants, can operate within that framework.

Another is that, for fiction at least, it is possible to use predictive data to identify which books are likely to be best sellers; whereas in the past you would have had librarians buying your whole collection. Now it is possible to buy those authors who slip through the cracks. Similarly many library authorities work together on buying, both to get better deals from having a bigger budget and to share the knowledge load.

In spite of all of that, librarians still play a vital, pivotal role. Similarly, think of all the on the job training that those library assistants have, they know loads and working a large number of hours, will know more than most volunteers.

But volunteers are vital too. Even in a staffed library we have volunteers coming in to help with tasks that help us focus our resources cost-effectively. Furthermore, the type of people who volunteer are often highly educated, with transferable skills (there are a lot of ex teachers helping out for example), we also benefit hugely from retired librarians, who are keen to help out still.

Pyxis

PasturesNew wrote: »

From what was said above - it appears that most of us have never, ever actually met a librarian .... people who work in our little libraries are just "library assistants" a job "anybody can do" pretty much.

So, we spent our lives thinking librarians were the ladies who worked behind the counter in the library, when, in fact, they don't do that at all. They do "stuff you will never see, in faraway buildings, that you didn't even know went on". Subject specialists.

Yes, interesting.

On a similar note, for years I thought that a curator was a sort of caretaker, but of a museum or suchlike, as opposed to a school or office building, etc., unlocking the doors, tinkering with the boiler, cleaning up the odd spill, and moving stuff around as required.

It gradually dawned on me over a long period of time that a curator was, in fact, a highly qualified person, usually in the fields of history, art, archaeology etc, and very often was responsible for the collections being there in the first place.

Curator can mean both those things, but I hadn't realised!