I have already discussed at some length my experience of volunteering in a primary school library & my mixed feelings about whether it devalues the profession in Thing 16. Volunteering has given me library & information experience which I would otherwise not have gained over the past year of trying to change career. In addition to my volunteering in the school library, I also volunteer as a cataloguer for a local natural science society which is aiming to catalogue its entire museum collection. I have designed a basic database to catalogue their shell collection (dating from the early 20th century) - the area which has been designated to me - &, one afternoon each week, work my way steadily through drawer after drawer of beautiful shells. I'm not a natural scientist, but as a member of the society, my contribution is welcomed, & I am learning new skills of archive & collection management.
The one downside to my volunteering is that I am not, in the strictest sense, line-managed. Both the school & the society are very grateful for my contribution, & it is lovely, on the one hand, to be given a certain amount of freedom, but I think that I crave direction & mentoring. My efforts to gain library experience in order to change career have been largely self-guided, &, as we cpd23-ers know, there's nothing wrong with that, but some structured guidance would be great!
Showing posts with label mentoring. Show all posts
Showing posts with label mentoring. Show all posts
Saturday, 12 November 2011
Tuesday, 9 August 2011
Thing 11 - Mentoring
Initially, I didn't think that mentoring had much relevance to my current situation as I associated it with chartering, but after reading some of the articles on the suggested resource list, I changed my mind.
I began to realise that a mentor can be for CPD not just for chartership, & started to feel a little bit excited that I could find someone to help guide me on the journey that I have just started. Although I agree with the idea that it can be fruitful to source a mentor from outside of the library & information sector, I believe that, as a career-changer, it would be most appropriate for me to find a mentor from within the sector. I suppose that I have had informal 'mentoring moments' - sage advice on reconstructing my CV from an experienced academic librarian, support by reference from past academic tutors, suggestions from friends for volunteering opportunities. A mentor would really help my momentum in the initial stages of my career journey. Having learnt how to blog through participating in cpd23, I would hope that my blog might be a useful example of my career development intent & reflective practice to show a potential mentor. To end with a quote from my favourite article on the resource list ('Be a proactive protege' by Priscilla Shontz): " Don't wait for others to teach you things. Ask questions. Ask supervisors, coworkers, employees, mentors, colleagues, friends, vendors, and others in your professional or personal circles". For someone like me who has been quite reticent in the past, this is a great mantra. It's also a good reminder that, in order to be successful, mentoring should be a two-way activity just as networking should.
Reference:
Be a Proactive Protege'
(an excerpt from Jump Start Your Career in Library & Information Science)
by Priscilla Shontz
LIScareer.com
Mentoring page: http://www.liscareer.com/mentoring.htm
I began to realise that a mentor can be for CPD not just for chartership, & started to feel a little bit excited that I could find someone to help guide me on the journey that I have just started. Although I agree with the idea that it can be fruitful to source a mentor from outside of the library & information sector, I believe that, as a career-changer, it would be most appropriate for me to find a mentor from within the sector. I suppose that I have had informal 'mentoring moments' - sage advice on reconstructing my CV from an experienced academic librarian, support by reference from past academic tutors, suggestions from friends for volunteering opportunities. A mentor would really help my momentum in the initial stages of my career journey. Having learnt how to blog through participating in cpd23, I would hope that my blog might be a useful example of my career development intent & reflective practice to show a potential mentor. To end with a quote from my favourite article on the resource list ('Be a proactive protege' by Priscilla Shontz): " Don't wait for others to teach you things. Ask questions. Ask supervisors, coworkers, employees, mentors, colleagues, friends, vendors, and others in your professional or personal circles". For someone like me who has been quite reticent in the past, this is a great mantra. It's also a good reminder that, in order to be successful, mentoring should be a two-way activity just as networking should.
Reference:
Be a Proactive Protege'
(an excerpt from Jump Start Your Career in Library & Information Science)
by Priscilla Shontz
LIScareer.com
Mentoring page: http://www.liscareer.com/mentoring.htm
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