What's In a Name?

Librarians' stock in trade is the naming and classification of things.  Perhaps that is why something I read today made me sit up and take notice.

I spotted a tweet today by Alison North, linking to an article in Healthcare Today which is reporting on a suggestion by Dame Fiona Caldicott that the term "Information Governance" should be replaced by "Clinical Governance" in an effort to "encourage a cultural shift in the NHS towards more information sharing". 

While I am all in favour of this aim, I cannot see how this suggested change in terms is likely to help meet that goal.  

Firstly, I think such a change in terminology is likely to lead to increased confusion over meaning. As things stand, the term 'information governance' is widely understood (in the Records Management and Information Security professions anyway, if not by clinical practitioners in the NHS).  Why take a well known term for an activity and change it?  (for example,  Gartner Inc., an information technology research and advisory firm, defines information governance as 'the specification of decision rights and an accountability framework to encourage desirable behavior in the valuation, creation, storage, use, archival and deletion of information.').

It is especially puzzling to me to suggest changing it to something that could be easily confused with a different activity altogether.  'Clinical governance' has connotations of how clinical procedures and decisions are made - nothing to do with the management of information.  It seems that the issue (if one exists) is whether there is effective promotion of this concept within the NHS and training of staff in its meaning and in how to accomplish it.  

Secondly, I'm not at all sure of any causal linkage between having sound information governance (whatever it's called) and encouraging the sharing of information.  In order to safely and effectively share (often sensitive) information within the NHS, good information governance in a prerequisite.  However, of itself, having good information governance neither encourages or discourages the sharing of information.

This example goes to show the key importance of what's in a name.  Giving something a label means attaching to it all sorts of assumptions and implications - which may or may not be those that the person making the original suggestion contemplated. This is especially important where you are trying to promote something or advocate for something.  It might be obvious to the speaker or writer what they had in mind - but the audience might get a completely different picture.

Marketing - who's your audience?

Marketing can be a contentious word for librarians.  For public librarians it smacks of commercialism and selling out to a capitalist ideology.  For corporate librarians, business researchers or web content managers, it's something their firm does to attract external customers.  In either case, it's apparently nothing to do with them.

However, without marketing librarians would have no users.  Marketing simply means communicating with people who might find your services useful, so that when they need those services they think of you and may choose to use your services (rather than some other means) to meet that need.  To communicate in an effective way, first you need to understand people's needs (market research), know where and how they communicate (marketing channels), and understand what's important to them (value proposition). 

Activities like having a library web site, user education, putting up a poster about a reading group - they are all marketing activities.  It is easy to fall into the trap of thinking 'what services do we have; we need to promote those services', and to design communications around that 'push' mentality.  However, marketing works a lot more effectively if you start by considering your audience - and work from a 'pull' perspective.

Who could you be marketing to?  The obvious answer is 'our users'.  While it is important to maintain a relationship with existing users, for example sending out surveys to check on their customer satisfaction, or telling them about new content or services, if that is all the marketing that's being done then the best outcome you can hope for is to maintain the status quo, in terms of numbers of users.

The real aim of marketing is to increase things.  Increase the numbers of users, increase the number of visits, number of loans or number of enquiries, or increase the amount of renewals or interlibrary loan requests made online.   Carefully targeted marketing, for example about business directories and start up guides demonstrated at a fair for entrepreneurs, or about art and design books at a craft fair, can draw new patrons into the library or onto the library's website.

Thinking about who you audience are (or could be), and where they are (in physical spaces or in virtual ones), and crafting your message to meet their needs and be seen where they hang out, can get you a long way.

Marketing can also be done to an audience of stakeholders, senior managers and budget holders.  This sort of marketing communicates to these groups how the library services help them meet their needs - that is, the goals and targets of the organisation as a whole.  

If you work in a public library service, this is a part of a larger city or county wide public sector body, with funds from taxpayers and goals to meet.  It probably has a whole series of goals.  In Glendale, CA where I live, for example, some of the city's goals include:

• Encourage neighborhoods to take ownership for improvements 
• Increase neighborhood involvement by educating residents to take active responsibility for their neighborhoods 
• Retain and expand local small business as a foundation for community economic development.
• Communicate successes to illustrate that Glendale neighborhoods are safe.  
• Seek opportunities to inform the public regarding the role played by Glendale in support of Luke Air Force Base

I wonder whether the city council members are aware of how the public library service could help them meet these goals?  A strategic and business plan prepared by the library, demonstrating this, could be an important factor in raising their awareness of the value of the library to the city, and help in future budget discussions.

Whether your audience is a group of potential new users, or the media who influence city councillors, consideration of their needs and communicating how you can help them meet those needs, is marketing at its best and most effective.



 

MOOCs - My Experience So Far

MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses) are becoming more common, and from the numbers signing up certainly seem very popular.  For example, the course that I am currently doing (World History since 1300 from Princeton on Coursera) has over 80,000 signed up and 1,700 submitted the first assignment.

There are several university partnerships that have sprung up to offer MOOCs for free, the best known being Coursera (originally Stanford, Princeton, University of Michigan, University of Pennsylvania and now many more), and EdX (MIT, Harvard, Berkeley).  There are also a number of other providers, such as Udacity, Academic Room and others, which either focus on one subject area (Udacity is IT focused, for example) or offer one-off video lectures and articles rather than fully formed courses.

So what is it like as a student on one of these courses?  My experience so far has been largely very positive, with only one or two very small niggles.

Main Screen of the History of the World since 1300 course on Coursera

This is the main menu screen of the course, which is based around two weekly video lectures, plus recommended text and the forums.  These latter have been very active and have provided some valuable peer-to-peer learning, as people discuss issues and offer links to additional reading and video resources.

The video lectures menu

The video lectures are broken down into 10-15 minute segments, with embedded quizzes at the end of each one, but the main assessments comes from the weekly essay assignments.  We are given a choice of 3 topics and need to pick one on which to write our essay.  These are then assessed by five peers, using a rubric covering argument, evidence and eloquence, and a score given which is the average of the peer scoring.  As an incentive, if you don't evaluate your peers' essays, you can't get to see you own score!

The quality of the lectures has been very good, and the Professor and one of his graduate students have taken an active part in the forum discussions, making it possible to pose questions and get informed responses (as well as well aimed questions to seed the discussions).  Technically the VLE system has been working well, with the only problem being having to scroll through lots of material to get to the most recent posts (at the bottom) - which was raised early on and that they have tried to fix by adding a 'newest first' button in each forum thread.

One minor niggle, which several people have reported on the forums, has been lack of feedback to the essays.  In addition to giving a numeric score, peers are supposed to write comments under each section.  However, many people seem to be just receiving one or two lines (or one or two words!) as feedback, or are only getting written feedback from 1 or 2 of the 5 people who reviewed their essay.    

Many people have also been discussing the issues that arise from so many of the enrolled students having English as a second language, as those studying the course come from all around the world.  There have been lively discussions of how to score someone who is clearly trying hard but having trouble expressing themselves, versus someone who just can't be bothered to write clearly or doesn't have the understanding of the course material.

This particular course doesn't offer a certificate, although many other Coursera courses do.  This doesn't matter to me personally, as I'm doing the course out of personal interest, but it has been mentioned as being of concern by some students.  Overall it has been a great experience so far, and I have just submitted my second essay assignment and have my fingers crossed I get a good grade!

Library Outreach, Advocacy & Marketing - close cousins or poles apart?

Last night I took part in a very interesting #UKlibchat discussion on the topic of Outreach and Inclusion on Twitter.  Many of the comment revolved around whether, and how, librarians should use marketing knowledge and techniques to better achieve outreach goals.  Even on the topic of social inclusion, marketing was being cited as a useful means to an end.

There were several comments indicating that some librarians either didn't have the knowledge about marketing (or business concepts in general) or were reluctant to consider using marketing techniques.  Reasons for this were given variously as fear of incurring costs, lack of time/staff resource or a feeling that marketing, in a commercial way, went against the ethos of a 'purely cultural' institution or meant that libraries would be competing against each other, which was inherently wrong and would lead to 'chaos'.

So is marketing the close cousin of outreach and advocacy of library services, or are they poles apart?

I believe that it is possible, and indeed essential, for librarians to learn about marketing concepts and techniques, and then to apply them sensibly to the situation in which libraries find themselves.  In an age of scarce funding resources and rapid technological change, when politicians, budget holders and society at large are questioning the role and place of libraries (and indeed education as a whole), I think it is imperative that librarians 'shout out' for libraries, for their value, and for the benefits they can bring to their communities.

Whatever name or label you give it, this activity is marketing.  You can try reinventing the wheel and creating campaigns called 'outreach' from first principals - or you can learn about marketing theory and learn from past examples of marketing campaigns, and then apply those principles to the matching of library services to the needs of different groups in the community and to the promotion of those services.

Surely it is better to learn the best of what's available, and adapt and grow from there, rather than to dismiss all that knowledge as 'too commercial' and try and recreate a way of communicating with users from scratch?

Update 8 September 2012:

The discussion continues on Twitter (most recent tweets at the top):

What do you think?  I'd love to hear your thoughts so please do leave a comment if you have a view on the whole 'marketing, good or bad?' debate.

Social media; time waster?

Social media seems to be here to stay, irrespective of which platforms or systems are in vogue, and is becoming the primary way many people find the information they need. Information professionals therefore need to get to grips with it, according to no lesser a personage than Phil Bradley, CILIP President; whether to be able to give advice on which systems and how to use them to patrons or to use them to find or track information for your users. 


Out of the many systems currently in use, the two that I most commonly hear the cry ‘I can’t see the point of using them’ about are LinkedIn and Twitter. The former generally because ‘it’s just an online CV’ and the latter because ‘it’s just silly gossip’. I feel that this is a bit like a librarian of 20 years ago dismissing Dialog ‘because it’s too hard to remember all the different stuff it’s got in it’ and trying to use hard copy reference books instead. 


While anything new can seem daunting, social media is easy to access, user friendly and intuitive to use and above all forgiving, so any initial uncertainty in what you’re ‘supposed’ to be doing won’t cause any comment and in fact will probably go unnoticed. So what can these two social networks offer? Are they a waste of time or a useful resource? 


Twitter 


I use Twitter as a newsfeed, to keep track of interesting articles, seminars & conferences. I also use it to keep up to date with issues in the industry, and what people are talking about, as well as to have discussions with people (eg recently there have been chats going on about whether / what hobbies and interests to put on your CV, whether ‘personal branding’ is a good thing or not, and about CILIP’s policy on volunteers replacing paid staff). 


It’s also great to be able to ‘meet’, read the ideas of, and talk to, people I would probably never get to meet ‘in real life’. It’s a good way to test out your own ideas, too, and see if people agree or have a different view, as well as to ask for help! 


Of course Twitter can be ‘full of silly gossip’ – but only if you just follow the sorts of people that only have inane chatter about celebs, etc, to offer! To realise all the benefits I’ve listed, simply follow some of the very many engaged and interesting library, information and records management people already using Twitter to share information. No one minds if you ‘lurk’ for a bit (I hate that word, so many negative connotations, but it seems to be the one that’s come to mean hang about and read what’s going on), but my guess is that pretty soon someone will say something that you really agree with (or vehemently disagree with) and you’ll just have to reply to their comment! 


LinkedIn 


LinkedIn I am more ambivalent about. It has very high Google rankings, so if you are ever likely to be changing job or hoping for promotion it’s good to have a decent profile on there, so someone doing a search will see at least one positive online mention about you. It’s also very useful when you’re going for interviews to find out more about the person/people you’ll be meeting. LinkedIn also has an active discussion community for the library sector that revolves around the Groups. CILIP, SLA, BIALL and many other associations have Group pages on LinkedIn – and the incredibly successful LIKE started life as one. 


On the other hand, as soon as you join a group, you find your email inbox rather deluged with update emails. It’s possible to set these to periodic digests, but if you belong to several groups even these can get irritating. There is also the need to keep your profile updated, and the fact that you may get connection requests from people you don’t really know or want to know. 


Of course these are only two of the many social networking tools out there, and I’m often asked how I keep track of everything and avoid getting overloaded. 


Here’s how I organise my work – this may help some people or not be a good fit for others, feel free to pick and chose whichever bits work for you! I generally have several browser tabs open at once (two email accounts, Twitter, Google Docs, Blogger, etc) and switch between them all the time. In fact most of my work is browser-based now, rather than in ‘offline’ packages like Word. For Twitter I tend to let a bunch of tweets build up and then skim read through all of them, clicking on links to interesting looking articles and responding to any that catch my eye or where I feel I can add something useful to the discussion. For LinkedIn I tend to only log in every now and then, either to post something to share or to look at others’ updates for links to discussions that look interesting. 


It does take a bit of self discipline not to keep peeking *every* time that little (1) pops up next to Twitter in the tab header! It’s the same as email though – I think it’s good to switch off the ‘new mail’ ping and only look at your emails once every half hour or hour or whatever, and deal with those in batches too. That gives me a chance to focus on whatever I’m doing in sensible blocks of time. 


This blog is my contribution to the LIKE Ideas Conference Blog Carnival.


Here are details of the LIKE Ideas Conference event. 

Some thoughts on leadership and management

There has been something of a focus on leadership and management (or should that be leadership vs management?) over the last couple of weeks. Jo Alcock posted Seven Lessons About Effective Leadership on her blog, where she listed some lessons she’s learnt about leadership as part of the CILIP Chartership process.

This was followed by #uklibchat on Tuesday 29^th May, which was on the topic of leadership (thank you to @Annie_Bob for the storify of the conversation) and Emma Cragg posted Leadership and Management on her blog in the middle of last week.

This got me thinking about my experience of leadership over the years, both practical examples I have witnessed or experienced and also the learnings about leadership from my MBA studies.  The first thing that struck me was the lack of any really positive examples I could give; perhaps this is because leadership is very hard or maybe I have been very unlucky in the leaders I have seen?

Some examples:  

1. A company whose leader had the vision that it should be the largest and best in its field – probably a common and possibly a laudable goal in business.  However, this was translated into annual regional goals which were somewhat unrealistic.  It was clear that when managers were asked for growth projections anything not in double figures was simply unacceptable – did this mean that the leader had little understanding of conditions ‘on the ground’, or really thought that anyone suggesting less than 10% growth year-on-year just didn’t have what it takes to ‘make it happen’? Perhaps the leader had a great vision but lacked the communication skills to carry the staff with them?
2. A company whose leader was charismatic, had a loyal team of staff, led the firm to growth over several years, and had a clear vision of where they wanted the company to be and which new areas to go into.  Unfortunately the key one of those ventures turned out not to be the massive growth area the leader had expected, and it never made sufficient revenues to break even.  This shows that even with a ‘good’ leader the clear and compelling vision they create, which people are prepared to follow, isn’t always the ‘right’ vision.  A leader can draw the wrong conclusions from the information they have or can filter the information they receive to fit their dream, and so make the wrong decisions.
3. A company with a well loved leader who looked after their staff, led the firm to growth over several years and managed the working process and company finances really well.  However the leader didn’t tell anyone in the company what the strategy was, what their vision for the firm was, or where the company was heading.  Despite having a strong brand and great reputation, the firm just jogged along making small profits.  Perhaps this leader was more of a manager at heart?

There seems to be general agreement on the attributes of a leader – vision, charisma, provide inspiration, confidence, communication skills - I think that some of these can be learned but others you either have or not.  One example could be confidence and self-belief – you may be able to adopt a veneer of confidence sometimes, in some situations, but to put yourself forward as a leader, with a view of ‘how things could/should be’, and to take difficult decisions which may not always be popular, I think takes real self confidence.

 

While self confidence may be innate, having it means there are other skills (which perhaps don’t come so naturally) that a wise leader would make sure they learned – enabling opposing voices and setting up mechanisms to ensure information contrary to what the leader wants to hear gets heard for example.  In one case I can remember, a leader was so fixed on their vision of growing the firm that they refused to listen to their managers who were telling them about a forthcoming downturn in the market, to the extent they borrowed heavily to fund the expected growth and nearly bankrupted the company when the downturn they refused to believe in duly came to pass.

One of the points raised in the #uklibchat that caught my eye was that communication skills, universally agreed to be a vital skill for a leader, were very hard to teach / learn.  Leaders need to communicate to inspire people with their vision, to motivate and encourage their followers, to negotiate with partners and to promote their vision to external parties.  They need to make everyone believe in their dream; believe that the different state of affairs that they envisage is not only desirable but achievable. 

The vast majority of CVs I’ve seen over the years include the phrase ‘good communication skills’.  Beyond the obvious (written or verbal), what does it mean?  For a leader it means being able to inspire by talking about their vision (whether in a speech to hundreds, or one to one in a conversation), to persuade and negotiate, to give and accept criticism, to use effective body language and tone of voice, to give a great presentation, to gather information by asking questions, to give instructions and to praise and encourage followers….phew, no wonder ‘communication skills’ are hard to learn!

Although it helps to have read about the basics of what makes up good communication (University of Kent has a good summary on their careers site, it is only by putting these ideas into practice (probably repeatedly) that effective communication becomes second nature.  Outside of work, where trying to act like a leader in non-leadership positions might cause unwanted waves, I believe that probably the best environment to get this practice is within one of the various information groups, especially through volunteering to be on a managing committees.  Although this may sound daunting, many of the groups are crying out for people with the interest and energy to step forward and give some time and effort to help organise things, so it's well worth asking informally if there are any ways you can get involved.

Some other ideas on ‘what makes a leader’ can be found in the literature.   Psychology Today has an article that claims there is little difference between leadership and management, beyond semantics, but several sites have lists of differences between the two – including those of Practical Management and Performance Coaching International.

ChangingMinds argues that the main difference is that leaders have followers, while managers have subordinates. Finally, Harvard Business Review has a whole series of classicarticles on the subject, 10 of which have been collected together into one piece (subscription required).

Another librarian-written piece, by Andrew Burlington, Emerging Technologies Librarian in Burlington, USA, has some tips to get started on leadership straight away.

  

Media savvy?

On the programme for the upcoming Library Camp Leeds I noticed that a session has been proposed on how to advocate for libraries on camera and / or off the cuff (presumably to politicians or other influential people one might meet on the train, etc).  
This got me wondering about whether librarians in general, or at least those working at industry bodies or in campaigning or leadership positions, feel they are in need of media / PR training?  Do courses exist already to help people learn how to present effectively to camera, talk in memorable soundbites, and get key messages across quickly?  Is this something CILIP should be offering?  Does anyone at CILIP have the skills themselves?


Checking the CILIP website under 'training' I found a section of onsite courses offered, including a sub section on Marketing Skills, which included using multimedia to promote your service, and one on branding your library service (which includes creating brand messages) but nothing apparently for appearing on camera or advocating generally 'for libraries'.


Hunting around Google for any other organisations that might offer media training for librarians, I came across VolResource, a site offering support for voluntary and community organisations.  They have a page dedicated to media support - perhaps a resource page similar to this would be useful for librarians?

Future Role for Libraries?

Earlier this week I read a blog post which argued that, despite years of projects (eg, to ‘catalogue the web’ by OCLC and others, to set up ‘virtual reference’ services, to provide ebooks, etc) libraries have been largely unsuccessful at becoming the leaders in the new digital information world.  Others, such as Google, Amazon, Library Thing, etc, have had no such difficulties engaging with the public.  If libraries’ forays into the web2.0 world have largely failed, and book borrowing and library visits are declining, then what are libraries for, now?

Another blog post, which I saw yesterday, suggested that “libraries are a technology for free, large scaleinter-generational transfer of knowledge and culture,”.  However, one could easily substitute “the internet is” for “libraries are” in this sentence and it would be equally, or perhaps even more, true. 

Given this background, what is the remaining USP of libraries?  What feature do they have, that the internet cannot offer?  What benefits does this bring?  One obvious one that springs to mind is - a physical space.  A place to congregate.  A place for direct person to person knowledge transfer, collaboration and sharing. 

I think libraries need to consider what activities, related to information and knowledge transfer, can only take place in a physical space.  Those are the activities, and those are the benefits, of libraries that we should be promoting, advocating for and marketing – to users and to potential new users.

Communication vs Collaboration - what's the difference?

Today I was reading a post by Sam Marshall of Clearbox Consulting about Sharepoint based intranets, and the sentence What defines collaboration is that multiple people work towards an end goal. caught my eye.

As a member of the group promoting the Defragmentation discussions, about encouraging information sector groups to collaborate more effectively, this definition struck a chord.  We have been trying to persuade the various groups to collaborate (for example to jointly produce concrete products such as an Information Manifesto that all groups could use to promote the value of information professionals).  However, I've started to wonder whether effective collaboration can take place before regular communication is established? 

It seems to me that (despite some great personal links between a few of the members of some of the groups) there is little or no regular, effective, senior level communication between the boards, management committees, trustees, etc, etc, of the various groups.  I am aware that some of the groups have tried to establish this, with varying degrees of success, while other groups seem to see it as less of a priority.

Without this communication, which could build familiarity and trust, perhaps asking for collaboration on joint projects is just too much to expect. 

Career goals - a good time for change?

It's the start of a brand spanking New Year (and it's my guess that you've already broken any new year resolutions you half-seriously made the week before!).  

Earlier today I was reading James Mullan's excellent blog post about setting New Year goals and finding your focus, and I was struck by the difference between a resolution (generally along the lines of 'I won't do so much of xxx this year' - eating, smoking, etc)  and a goal (much more centred around a positive, can-do idea, something you want to strive for and achieve this year).

A resolution is hard to keep.  We are generally good at convincing ourselves that 'just one' (sweet, cake, gin!) isn't really breaking the rules, after all, it's only one... isn't it? On the other hand, it's harder to 'fall off the wagon' with a goal.

A goal is something you have to actively do things in order to achieve, rather than avoid doing (generally pleasurable) things.  Indeed, the steps along the way to achieving your target can in themselves be pleasurable.  If your goal is career related, then some of these steps might be about learning new skills or gaining new experiences, to enable you to apply for that promotion or that new job, for example.  

Learning new things, that feeling of having mastered a new skill, gives a great feeling of satisfaction and achievement.  Add together a range of these, plus the increasing realisation that you're now equipped to get that new job or move to that new sector you've had your eye on, and the journey can be as pleasurable as the destination.

Maybe 2012 is your year for looking around at the library & information profession, deciding whereabouts in it you'd like to be working, what kind of role and what sort of organisation, and setting about to collect the skills and experiences that will get you there?  Now that's a goal to get your teeth into for the New Year!  Good luck!

Data Protection Act - Barrier to Good Customer Service?

The Data Protection Act is designed to protect individuals’ personal data from mis-use by organisations.  There are eight Data Protection Principles, covering such issues as fair and lawful processing of data, collection of data for specified purpose(s), keeping data held accurate and up to date, and not keeping data for longer than needed under its defined purpose.

Problems can arise, however, when organisations misunderstand their duties under the act or, in some cases, wilfully ‘hide behind’ the DP Act to excuse their actions, or justify their lack of action.

There are many examples of this in the press, some of which have gone to court.  For example:

A franchise operation, where the franchisee’s contract said they had to send customer details to the franchise owner, and they said they couldn’t under the DP Act - Court of Appeal ruled this was wrong as they would have had ample time & opportunity to seek the customer’s consent to do so.   Grow With Us Ltd v Green Thumb (UK) Ltd,  2006 (1)

A Panorama programme in Februrary 2011 showed the British Legion complaining that MoD were using DP Act as ‘an excuse’ to not give departing soldiers contact details to them, so they could offer them support.  Surely it would be easy for them to get soldiers to sign a consent form allowing this? (2)

Some equality researchers from the Open University were given DP Act as an excuse for not sharing information about women engineers by Microsoft.  The software giant claimed privacy laws prevented it from saying how many Microsoft-certified engineers were women. The OU got a note from the Information Commissioner to show the defence was nonsense - the researchers were asking for statistics, not names and addresses. (3)

Because of this uncertainty on the behalf of organisations about what the DP Act does, and doesn’t, say they can’t do, the Information Commissioner has issued various guidelines and examples to clarify the situation:

“You should explain why you want to use an individual’s personal data at the outset, based on your intentions at the time you collect it. If over time you devise new ways of using that information, perhaps because of changes in technology, you will be able to use their personal data for the new purpose if it is fair to do so.”

“The Data Protection Act does not impose a blanket ban on the release of personal information. It requires a common sense approach, and should not be used as an excuse by those reluctant to take a balanced decision.” (4)

Another recent example has arisen recently rather closer to home, with CILIP.  A newly joined member of CILIP posted a link to her blog on Twitter.

@bumsonseats Carolin Schneider

What is a new CILIP member to do? wp.me/p1IjjA-en

19 Nov via WordPress.com Favorite Retweet Reply

In her blog post Carolin made a point about new members experiences with Branches & Groups:

“I think for a new joiner going to a branch meeting is daunting. It would be nice to have a buddy, someone to help you take those first baby steps. This could be something you can opt in once your membership pack arrives in the post. With social media it should be easy enough to coordinate, no?”

In a comment responding to this, Jo Alcock said:

“My problem (as a branch committee member) is that I don’t know who our members are or when new members join. I appreciate that there are data protection legalities but I’m sure there must be a way to opt-in so that your branch and groups know that you have joined and can contact you to see if there’s anything you’d like to know or what you would like them to do for you.”

This generated some discussion on Twitter about why CILIP might feel that it shouldn’t share members details internally to allow branch or group committee members to contact new members.

Charles Oppenheim (retired Professor at Loughborough University and now independent copyright and DP consultant) was one of those contributing to the conversation:

@CharlesOppenh Charles Oppenheim

@joeyanne @NicolaFranklin I am aware of CILIP's approach to DP. There is absolutely no reason for it. No idea what its problem is.

21 Nov via web Favorite Retweet Reply

Charles later expanded on his Tweet by saying:

“There is an obligation under the DPA that a data controller shall ensure that all necessary technical and administrative measures are taken to ensure unauthorised disclosure, etc.  does not occur.  So yes indeed, [their Data Controller] would be liable if something went wrong, but the law requires them to take such steps as are necessary to ensure no problem arises. Stopping people with a bona fide need from accessing the data is a quite inappropriate response to the problem.  Ensuring B & G officials are properly trained is the correct response.

Equally, the centre is obliged to keep info accurate and up to date.  Again, the onus is on CILIP to put into place procedures to ensure this is the case.”

Carolin has also sent in an expanded statement explaining the service she would hope to receive, as a newly joining member of CILIP:

“I recently re-joined CILIP as an associate member. Having shared on twitter and my blog that I am once again a CILIP member I received a warm welcome from several people on twitter, which was good and showed that these individuals care about new members and how to get them involved. So whilst waiting for my membership pack to arrive in the post, I hoped that my regional branch and my chosen interest groups would get in touch to share what they do and how I can get involved.

After blogging about these expectations I was informed by a colleague on twitter that my regional CILIP branch and special interest groups would not be able to send me a welcome letter as they are not notified when a new member joins their group. She was under the impression that it was due to data protection.

From looking at my online profile I know what my entry in the CILIP Yearbook says. I am able to edit the entry, and therefore have control over the details CILIP stores in their database. This would make it possible for me to not share my home address, for example, or opt out of sharing my phone number. Every member of CILIP is listed in the CILIP Yearbook, with their name, job title and workplace. Through this entry (and with the help of the internet and other resources) it would probably be quite easy to find more details about me, e.g. the address my workplace. Any details I don't want to be shared I could delete from my profile, so why can't my details be shared with a different part of the organisation that I signed up with?

Whatever you do these days, from shopping online to signing up to a newsletter, organisations ask you to opt in or out of sharing your details. If CILIP is worried about sharing something they shouldn't: I suggest that CILIP enables their members to opt-in to sharing personal data with their regional branches/special interest groups/third parties when they first sign up. It just takes a few tick boxes on the membership application form.”

When asked to comment on this situation and CILIP’s approach to sharing member’s data, CILIP’s Head of Customer Services, Francis Muzzu, made the following statement:

“Members’ information and the database are extremely important to us, and we are committed to reviewing how we can share data more effectively with Branches and Groups.”

Perhaps including a simple tick box on the application form along the lines of ‘tick here if you agree to your contact details being shared with the branch and group(s) you have elected to join’, as Carolin suggests, would help enable this process.  Also, if members data were being provided from the centre, then branches and groups would not need to collect their members’ details separately.  This would make keeping the data accurate and up to date easier and more effective and reduce the risks of holding two or more separate data sets.

I understand that CILIP is planning to review its policy over sharing members details internally next year, and sincerely hope that they can adjust their policy, processes and procedures, and have the IT infrastructure, to enable them to manage member’s data more effectively in the future.

As the membership body for librarians and information managers, members and prospective members expect the organisation to embody best practice in its own information management practices.  In this case, where doing so would help new members feel more welcome and possibly also attract more members to join, at a time where CILIP needs to not only reverse its declining membership numbers but also widen its membership base, demonstrating good internal information management practices should surely be a key tactic to achieving its goals.

Footnotes
(1)  http://update.legal500.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1247 viewed November 2011
(2)  http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-12386376   Feb 2011, viewed November 2011
(3)  http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/01/18/medical_academy_privacy_complaint/  viewed November 2011
(4) http://www.ico.gov.uk/for_organisations/data_protection/the_guide/principle_1.aspx viewed November 2011

**Wednesday 30th November - Charles Oppenheim has since submitted an additional statement, outlining which data protection principles are involved and his opinion of CILIP's argument:

CILIP’s Head of Customer services had written to say that, if they distributed members’ data, they couldn’t guarantee that it would be treated confidentially.  Charles’ reply to this contention is “The seventh data protection principle (schedule 1 of the data protection act 1998) requires that appropriate organisational measures shall be taken against unauthorised processing of personal data and against accidental loss or destruction to personal data.  In other words, CILIP already has legal obligations to ensure everyone who handles personal data does so properly.  This principle requires CILIP to educate and train anyone handling personal data.  It is not an excuse to refuse to pass such data to people when they have a bona fide need to use it.”

CILIP’s Head of Customer services had written to say that a second consideration was that, if the Branches & Groups had member’s data they might overload them with information, which could be counterproductive.  Charles’ response to this argument is “This is again a matter of education and training.  CILIP should be training all who handle personal data in good information management practice, including avoiding information overload on members.  This is not a good reason for refusing to pass to branches and groups information they are entitled to.”

CILIP’s Head of Customer services had written to say that, if Branches & Groups had copies of the data as well as the central office, it would be harder to ensure it was kept accurate and up to date.  Charles’ reply to this is “The fourth data protection principle requires CILIP and its branches and groups to keep accurate and up to date personal information.  Francis notes that some branches and groups fail to pass on revised details to cilip centrally.  By definition, CILIP and the branch/group is then in breach of the fourth principle and could be sued/prosecuted as a result. What the data protection act requires is that cilip educates and trains. The act is no reason to refuse to pass information to branches and groups, and vice versa.”

Charles concluded by saying “In short, the legal obligation is on CILIP to ensure that its branches and groups both receive, and handle personal data appropriately.  Branches and groups cannot function properly without master lists of members. At the moment, in my view CILIP is in breach of the DPA.  Best to sort the matter out by releasing the data, and ensuring good information management practices, rather than burying its head in the sand hoping the problem will go away - because it won't!”

CILIP Councillor Election Hustings - a virtual experience

As I was unable to get into London yesterday evening, I decided to follow the CILIP 2012 hustings online.  This was possible since CILIP was helpfully livestreaming the event (which has been recorded and can be viewed here) and there was also a twitter hashtag allocated (#CILIP2012).

John Kirriemuir has already posted an excellent review of the evening, from an attendees point of view, so I will try and avoid duplicating any of the points he's already made.

So what was the experience like as a virtual participant?  The video worked really well (although from the twitter stream I believe there were one or two people who had difficulty getting it to run).  The only real problem I experienced was with the sound quality.  There were two table-microphones in view, but Sue Cook on the end of the row (and to a lesser extent Maria Cotera next to her) were virtually inaudible at times. 

The twitter stream displayed alongside the video on the CILIP page didn't seem to be updating without refreshing the screen, so rather than risk disrupting the video stram, I ran my own HootSuite stream in the background and checked it regularly as a substitute, which worked out fine.

Some of the key quotes that I picked up on, and tweeted about last night, included:

Q. How should CILIP increase membership?

Liz Mcgettigan we tell each other how wonderful we are - we should have a conference & invite people from other disciplines

Maria Cotera Start by bringing back those that have left - show them a reason to rejoin

Liz Mcgettigan Create a website or tools for people to use to sell the benefits of having librarians to employers

Mike Hosking Make CILIP seem less 'top down' and more belonging to, and owned by, members

Mike Hosking (Provide) better information career development guidance, less focused on traditional (physical?) library based careers

Sue Westcott Widen Chartership so it's more available (perceived as more available) to non-traditional LIS workers, take more care about the language used so it's more inclusive

Sue Westcott Talking publically about issues of wider public interest (Wikileaks for eg), would make more people want to join CILIP

Sue Westcott It's up to us to go out and find other communities who could be part of our profession and take a positive messasge to them

Maria Cotera The key thing is to listen, to what people's requirements are, not just partner for the sake of it, not just listen to friends but to 'enemies' too so we expand our circle

Q. Should CILIP increase its partnerships?

Sue Westcott We should think of partnerships in two ways; to partner with other information groups & to partner with commercial or other organisations to deliver services

Liz Mcgettigan CILIP needs to be selective about who they partner with

Sue Cook We need to be aware partnerships don't last forever, be flexible, and go for strategic partnerships

Mike Hosking CILIP needs to be in a partnership with organisations in the education sector

Q. How would you make members not in London feel more a part of CILIP?

Sue Westcott CILIP needs to think about having an internal dialogue about how people in the regions want to be included and catered for

Mike Hosking Branches & groups are key but we need to look at them with fresh eye, use new tech to bridge distances & get people to band together

Maria Cotera In other organisation I've been involved with, we used to hold a conference & other meetings at different locations around the country; CILIP needs to establish new models of working

Q. Where are borders of LIS profession, which skill sets are in or out?

Sue Cook There is a core set (of skills), but each job I've had has needed new things as well - so it's varied

Maria Cotera The most important skills are the softer ones like communication or advocacy

Sue Westcott Anyone who puts the right people together with the right information = an LIS professional, wherever they work

Liz Mcgettigan The basic skills (I believe she meant the core technical LIS skills) are important, plus the ability to engage, network and advocate are key

*sorry to any of the candidates if your comments are underrepresented, but as I mentioned above I had difficulty hearing some of the replies, some of the time.

Overall it was great to be able to participate remotely, and to see the candidates reactions in real time, which of course isn't possible with the ehustings. In fact, I believe there were more virtual participants (someone tweeted there were 28 viewing the live stream at one point) than physical attendees. 

Even so, that only makes a total of 38 people taking part, which seems a woefully low proportion of CILIP's 16,000 or so members.  Being somewhat controversial here, is it fair to say that, if people don't take part in the democratic process, then they have less right to complain about how things are run?  Of course some of those members had other engagements last night, or no access to an internet computer, but even so surely a couple of hundred could have shown an interest, at this critical juncture in the organisations life?