Webcasting CILIP events and the CILIP CDG collaboration on webcasting CILIP Qualifications Event

This could equally have been titled ‘Watching London Evening Events from Glasgow Afternoons In The Office Is Lovely’!

Yesterday I FINALLY got the worktime peace to watch the recorded CILIP CDG event on Certification, Chartership, Revalidation and Beyond from last month. A wide-ranging event that concentrated on portfolio building techniques useful for all CILIP qualifications.

Background

In the last few months there’s been a few CILIP experiments at webcasting CILIP events live (the CILIP AGM in September) and last month at webcasting live while also recording events (e.g. this event and the eHustings for the CILIP Trustee Elections).

Now, I’ve attended a fair number of these qualifications and portfolio building events physically down the years in a whole variety of locations, initially as Candidate, and then subsequently as Speaker at various (being a long-time CILIP quals specialist even if I don’t have the time I used to have to give to it anymore).  So I was really curious about how it would come across taking a physical event replicated in main components around the country regularly and broadcasting it as a live webcast.

So what’s different about watching it as a live webcast?

I had tried to watch the qualifications event live over the websteam, but I got interrupted so much work-wise (joys of open plan offices) that I called a halt to that plan as I was missing a lot more than I was catching which was a bit frustrating.  Watching the recorded version at a very quiet date seemed a lot more conducive to concentration!

So watching it live was quite difficult for me, but it did allow the real-time interaction of the ‘viewing’ community and being able to see what they were commenting as we watched. The questions of the ‘viewing’ community were also picked up very well in the room real time and fed into the discussion and asked, so there was interaction between real and virtual world, there were answers.  Which was all really good.

How does that compare in experience to watching the recording later instead?

Viewing it over a month after it actually took place was actually excellent.

I love the fact that –

• It’s there for anyone who can’t make a physical event for whatever reason.
• It can be accessed anytime from any location as long as the IT set-up to view it is there.  

This is really important as there are Candidates all over the country and abroad for whom this is valuable useful content. New Candidates start the process all the time, it may be some time before there’s a course physically close to them that runs, and that might not be practical to attend for various reasons.

Specific Benefits of  Recorded Webcast Over Physical Attendance

Having watched it I also think it gives some different benefits to what you get out of the actual event compared to attending in real time. I definitely interacted slightly differently with it.

• It can be viewed whole, or done in bits if you’re flagging.
• You can pause proceedings at any time to catch up in your scribbled note-taking.
• You can pause while you go have a quick look at that web resource or document that’s just been mentioned while you’re actually thinking about it.
• You can pause for reflection on something interesting that was said that has a specific resonance for you before you lose the thought.
• You can easily go back a few minutes if you didn’t quite catch the end of a segment.
• You can go back and re-view particularly relevant parts of it another time to remind yourself of key aspects you’re currently working on.

Does it replicate entirely the experience of physically attending an event? 

Well no, it doesn’t. The physical event has benefits that the webcast view cannot replicate.

• Ability to meet fellow Candidates in person and chat to them and set up informal networks.
• Ability to look at physical Portfolios that have been successful (there are various ones on the CILIP website, but it’s not the same as leafing through something).
• Actually physically meeting key people involved in delivering the qualification (e.g. Qualifications Adviser).
• Can see the actual powerpoint slides and the presenter (though the powerpoint is on the CILIP website so can fairly easily access both at same time if watching online but more fiddly).
• Can participate in the groupwork and individual work exercises. This section of the overall event wasn’t broadcast as webinar because it wouldn’t have worked as a straight webcast, or not so easily.  It’s probably do’able, but it would require a bit of thought on how easiest to do it and integrate.
• Coffee breaks in the programme seem a lot less long when you’re actually there. With the webinar view the coffee break was three quarters of the way through the parts of the event being broadcast over the web, but half-way through for physical delegates doing the workshop elements. So on the webinar view there’s kind of a lot of twiddling thumbs as you can’t just go for coffee and gab with fellow attendees the same way, and then there was a very short session for the second part.

Conclusion

While the physical event and the webcast cover much of the same material the experience is different and not all aspects of the course are catered for by the webcast. However the webcast has advantages over the physical experience too as discussed above. 

So I think it comes down to try and attend a course that is running locally (because they all have variations, for all they seek to reinforce the same key things) if possible, but the webcast is a really good reminder that can be gone back to at any point to be used in addition.

If a physical course just isn’t very feasible it’s also the next best thing to view this, it replicates a lot of the experience content-wise.

This event has had over 400 views so far. That has to be worthwhile.

By the by....

If after this discussion of Physical v Virtual attendance you're now wondering what the actual content of the events is...

The courses essentially talk Candidates through the key qualifications, what’s involved in them, highlight key things you need to know and be aware of, discuss where the sources of help and support and additional guidance are, what the process is, how to put together portfolios that meet the requirements and the award criteria, why it all matters. The courses  highlight common elements across qualifications in terms of what is required to be submitted and concentrate on demystifying those. They often have workshop elements to them. Courses may be on one specific qualification or they may discuss a whole range as this one did.  There are always local variations in content and amount of detail depending who's speaking on what for what intended audience.  But core aspects are covered by them all.

The IDOX Open Day, December 2011

IDOX Information Services is a division of IDOX, a company that provides  Information Solutions, Information Services, technical support and evidential basis for policy formulation primarily for the public sector, but is also used by private companies.

IDOX usually has an Open Day around December each year in the Glasgow office, a chance for subscribers to their various services to go in, meet people, hear about the latest developments.  This year there were more presentation-type aspects to the afternoon so the below is a quick gab through these.

IDOX Overview

We started with an overview of IDOX and Information Services and the impact of the economic environment upon their clients and their own business and the changing information landscape necessitating a need to review their offer and services.  Therefore there is work underway to evolve the existing service e.g. taking account of social media through tweeting and a new blog coming, adding on related produces and  services e.g. becoming an accredited training provider.

First Presentation – value of information services and the evolving IDOX Information Service

The first presentation was on the value of information services generally and how the IDOX Information Service can help their clients deliver their own agendas. It talked through the changes in the information landscape with an emphasis on the use of good information and research to underpin policy formulation which was given funding to make possible.  It was noted that link had disappeared under recent and continuing funding pressures, much less new information and research was being produced and there was a need for intelligent use of what already existed so information was best fit – correct, up-to-date, clear, understandable, accessible, concise.  Information specialists save time and money to organisations by giving quality assessment and assurance to information and using their skills to save staff time elsewhere in the organisation.  Downsizing in organisations has meant a lot of staff have been lost along with their knowledge, skills and expertise, corporate memory is lost, people start to repeat themselves and spending money on it without realising.

In response to all these pressures IDOX would still give a full library service, but it was also branching out increasingly to give information on funding and grants, produce CPD accredited training, produce products that could be sold independently to the market e.g. GRANTfinder.

Second Presentation – Use of Communities of Practice in local government

The second presentation was by Mike McLean, Head of Knowledge Management at The Improvement Service.  He was talking about the use of knowledge management, what it brought to his organisation, and how they were utilising Communities of Practice on an IT platform to bring people and expertise together at a time of severe pressure on local government and finance.

The Improvement Service assists local government in Scotland. The local government sector generally is huge in the UK (employing 2.1 million people, 370 councils, providing 700 services in the UK) to improve their practices and services in a collaborative manner.  The speaker talked through why knowledge management is important and how it can be used generally before concentrating on the use of Communities of Practice (CoPs).  He talked us through the use of the CoP platform they had built and noted it had a very slow take-up initially in December 2007 but now had 110,000 people registered on it (of which 10,500 were in Scotland), 2,200 Committees were present on it, it had members from every Council in the UK.

He noted that the actual platform is locked down in design and layout, it cannot be changed by individuals, , no training is given to use it though support is given to people acting as facilitators, anyone with a local authority connection can register to use it, it has a single sign-in, up-dates are linked to email.  It consists of core area’s – forum, events (used for event planning, circulating agendas, documents etc.), new members, library, wikis (for document collaboration etc), blogs (limited to specific people or open to whole platform).

He talked about the key uses of the CoP (and the accompanying benefits too), from team workspaces, to responses to government consultations, to space to host online conferences. 

The online conferences struck me as particularly good, he noted that there was nothing stopping willing international speakers giving talks online, never mind local ones, with bookings and agenda circulated first, materials posted up, and comments taken which the speaker responded to in a timescale afterwards.  Everything available afterwards through the CoP. No direct expenses for the much distributed delegate list geographically, no travel time or expense for anyone, least break in own work achievable, no inconvenience. As he noted it’s even good for carbon footprints and many Councils are no longer authorising travel expenses outside their own boundaries as part of cost control so there needs to be other ways of bringing people together.

His list for a good Community of Practice was:-

Clear purpose on what it is to be used to do.

Creating a safe and trusted environment.

Commited core group of active participants.

Being motivated.

Knowing the needs of participants.

Having a clear action plan with activity to meet needs.

Blending face-to-face and online activity.

Good active facilitation.

He ended with discussing the new Knowledge Hub they had under development.

Pondering issues in copyright and CLA Licences

In true end of year fashion I’m thinking I should ponder forth on some of the things I’ve attended in the last month or so. Somehow I like to tidy off outstanding strands of one year before really contemplating the next one.

Copyright Webinar

I attended the Copyright Webinar for Scotland’s Colleges last month. This was given by Alan Rae, Copyright Consultant to Scotland’s Colleges who has a new blog here.

Mostly what attracted me to this was the fact it was a free webinar I could access from my desk, on an ever-relevant subject, but one which would come at it from an angle I was unfamiliar with (that of Further Education) which might give an interesting different perspective on some perennial issues.  I’ve also been trying to do more webinar type things recently, so it also fitted in with that initiative too!  All in all it was very enjoyable and really useful to hear another perspective, a lot of the issues are fairly common to all sectors.

The session was split into three main parts. 

CLA Licences and the rights they can (and can't) grant and potential changes

The first part dealt with the CLA and the on-going re-negotiation of their CLA licence Scotland’s Colleges are currently going through.  This is where I felt myself on thinnest ground listening to it all as it’s not my sectoral background (it’s a long way from the type of CLA licences I deal in in a law firm).  As the CLA Law Licence is in the middle of being re-negotiated it’s interesting to hear what’s happening with licences being re-negotiated in other sectors and how it is being approached there.  In this case it seemed to be more about aligning the new licence more to the existing Schools one rather than to HE.

The discussion gave me an appreciation of how entirely different the component parts that make up calculating a licence in education are from the commercial world and the sheer volume and size of the CLA licence in that context.  Scotland’s Colleges spend over one million a year on copyright currently, 600k of that being on the CLA Licence.

Other aspects of the discussion were a lot more familiar such as the extent to which (or not) a CLA licence is appropriate or necessary and in what circumstances and the cost issues. How do we deal with ‘born digital’ resources (through contractual terms and conditions mainly, do we want a CLA solution for as well, what if it’s more stringent?).  Do we need a CLA solution for free to view websites or in some contexts such as education can alternative resources be utilised or fair dealing exceptions or whether websites own terms and conditions will cover.

There was discussion of the potential usefulness of a web logging tool to solve perennial disputes about whether organisations pay more than they use or whether there is under-reporting during official CLA audits.

Social networks and copyright

This was mainly going over established ground that can’t re-use third party material unless have some form of licence, permission or legal defence no matter where it is posted.

There was interesting discussion of different approaches between different social sites however from YouTube increasingly using cease and desist through to Flickr setting up a channel for Creative Commons use material.  The Flickr discussion was interesting as I’ve been meaning to have a proper look at Creative Commons.  Usually Creative Commons licences exclude use for commercial purposes so as a law firm librarian that’s pretty much it. Unless it can be argued the precise use is non-commercial, but that’s difficult.  However I’ve been meaning to have a bit of a looksee at Creative Commons just from a ‘useful to know about’ generally viewpoint.  One for the New Year I think!

Digitising for VLEs

This part was back to can’t reformat unless you have some form of explicit agreed licence, permission or legal defence. Need to take care when sharing resources.

Joyous BL…

I am racing around like a mad thing between too much schedule and things needing done - as ever...

In the vague seconds between all of which there is this little thing called Christmas on top (gulp), which also has a deadline helpfully enough (sighs), traditionally 25 December each year.

Being both running about like the proverbial xmas turkey, and behind still as ever despite it, I am most grateful for the BL Xmas e-cards this year as I Christmas at horrendous speed. Especially for people I can’t quite find physical addresses for to hand and don’t have time to go hunting as they’ll be late if I do(!).

So seasonal felicitations to the British Library!

Much appreciated!

The Cylons had A Plan, and so did CPD23….

Background

The 23 Things for Professional Development course ran during Summer 2011. It was split into weeks with one or more Things allocated per week. Participants wrote a discursive blog post for each ‘Thing’ or part Thing to evidence completion of each item. Where a Thing or week comprised of multiple aspects I have occasionally split a Thing over multiple posts.

As I did the programme somewhat out-of-order and in time what my CPD23 posts relate to will not be obvious(!) the below is an index post essentially of what each Thing was linked to my entry for it on this blog.

Yes, I’m in Xmas blog  tidy-up mode!

The Plan

Week 1 (20th June) - Blogging

Thing 1: Create your own blog, write about what you hope to get out of the programme.

Thing 2: Explore other blogs and get to know some of the other cpd23-ers.

Thing 3: Consider your personal brand

Thing 4: RSS feeds, Twitter, Pushnote

Thing 5: Reflective practice

Thing 6: Online networks (LinkedIn, Facebook, LISNPN, LATNetwork, CILIP Communities)

Thing 7: National/Regional groups, Special interest groups and looking outside the library sphere

Thing 8: Google Calendar

Thing 9: Evernote

Thing 10: Graduate traineeships, Masters degrees, Chartership, Accreditation

Thing 11: Mentoring

Thing 12: Putting the social into social media 

Thing 13: Google Docs, Wikis & Dropbox

Thing 14: Zotero / Mendeley / citeulike

Thing 15: Attending, presenting at and organising seminars, conferences and other events

Thing 16: Advocacy, speaking up for the profession and getting published.

Thing 17: Prezi / data visualisation / slideshare 

Thing 18: Jing / screen capture / podcasts (making and following them)

Thing 19: Some time to think about how you might integrate the Things so far into your workflow and routines.

Thing 20: Library Day in the Life and Library Routes/Roots 

Thing 21: How to identify your strengths, how to capitalise on your interests, how to write something eyecatching that meets job specs. 

Thing 22: Volunteering to get experience 

Thing 23: What have you learnt and where do you want to go from here?

Once you've finished

Feedback and certificates (certificate sign up ends on 30 November 2011!)

CPD23 - I do believe I'm finished

A fair shock as it is I've done a last Thing-related post, filled in the evaluation, registered for a Certificate (despite the fact I utterly don't believe in the value of such things, may well do a post on that anon in itself, but I can accompany it with more useful things related to), and even looked at the presentation on the Programme.

Ergo - train arriving into Glasgow, and I'm finished - and time to go find that lunch!

PHEW

Late December Addendum

My CPD23 Completion Certificate has arrived! Hurrah!

CPD23 Thing 18 Part 2 - The finish line was not recorded in a photo finish

Well to an extent I'm admitting defeat. It is late afternoon of the Last Day of the Extended Deadline and the Virgin train I'm on from London town to Glasgow is frankly not playing fair. And I want to finish today.

By  Preston I'd achieved a seat with a plug and a working internet connection (hurrah she notes weakly).

Having half a Thing left to do (screencasting part of Thing 18) I therefore had renewed hopes of the journey. I reminded myself of the text of what we were supposed to be doing, had a look at some other CPD23 blogs on it, decided against Jing (something I can't use in work has very few uses) and for Screencast-o-matic (winning by a fair country mile out of the blogs I looked at and doesn't even need to be downloaded) and went for a play about with it (intended).

However the internet connection is a bit slow and dodgy to say the least and just does not want to play nice with Screencast-o-matic despite a few attempts at getting to the point I can try to record something.

So in the light of this and my very very weary body from a more than normally mad November schedule and week I'm calling a halt on today's attempt.  I shall go have a proper look at leisure from a fixed point internet connection and perhaps up-date this entry or post a new one in result, but it won't be tonight when I intend to find lunch (as it's gone 5pm) and then sleep.

So on a slightly fatalistic note I declare CPD23 finished. Phew.

CPD23 Thing 18 Part 1 or How I Failed to Emulate Tom Roper (grins)

Life (There's a Lot Of It)

It is an even more horrendously busy life than normal as you can see from the complete emptiness of this blog regards that month called November.  So there was the usual flurry of catching up on lots of CPD23 Things trying to get finished right at the end of October at the proper time, and then November hit… 

So before I am cast off from the extended finishing line entirely there will be very hurried Thing 18 posts not really as I intended (I’m a Virgo, it’s an issue). This was always going to be a blog  / activity in the tiny gaps between my schedule, and this it has been indeed…

Thing 18 has been the one Thing outstanding all month. Basically because the technology-based ones are usually a problem doing in work (I can’t mostly because of our IT set-up) and I’m just never home or charging around doing something else.

Podcasts in a Minor Key

I like podcasts, but I rarely have ever found the time to seek them out and listen to them. So as a life-long Doctor Who fan they’ve basically been the very odd snatched listen to a Big Finish one(who do superb audio’s) over theirwebsite.   Various other podcasts I’ve become aware of I was interested in, bookmarked, never got  to (usually from something Tom Roper tweeted – cheers – as I’m a Classics person too).

Podcasts and CPD23

There was an intention (no laughing at the back) to be organised. I looked through various other posts on the subject from CPD23ers who got to it earlier me. I came back to Tom Roper who had the inspired notion to post a podcast of his musings on podcasts for the Thing and really enjoyed listening to his.  It seemed the way to go… 

There was busy downloading of iTunes and Audacity, a bit of a play about with, an intention to finally come to grips with my MP3 player, and a first trial podcast attempt was made… and that’s as far as it got this week and I know I’ve no chance whatsoever of getting further by Wednesday and getting it audible enough to actually post anywhere as I’m away most of the week while sky-deep in meetings that have to take priority.  Which is why this is back to being a written blog post on it after all.

I also admit to having no obvious notion of how I could use self-created ones usefully in a work context, though other contexts have occurred and might be pursued…

Podcast investigation more generally

I’ve also had a play about with various podcasts series dipping in and out of ones that have been on the ‘meaning to get around to looking at’ list and having a search around for others. So been having a look at Classics, Egyptology, Doctor Who, Law Librarianship.  From which I conclude that I prefer shorter very focused podcasts which have limited numbers of participants. They’re just easier to fit in time-wise and simpler to follow the thread of. Geography and date is also important and knowing who’s involved, because it affects relevancy for some things, though by no means all. Also I like ones where it’s obvious what the duration is before you start. 

Enclose links to a few I’ve been listening to this week

Marathon 2500 Herodotus lecture (Classics, international lectures on Battle of Marathon)

Every Day Life in Kahun (Egyptology)

Big Finish podcasts (Doctor Who audio dramas and various other series)

iTunes Law Librarians Conversations on Digital Books

Thinking it through…

I like podcasts, I do really (she says ending this post as she started it!). As a listener it means I can in theory listen any time I have access, I don’t have to travel, it’s generally not going to cost me anything, they’re global. So it’s a lovely format if there are things available I want to listen to and I have the time to hunt them out and listen (yep, I’m seeing the usual two re-occuring problems there already).

Something quiltinlibrarylady said about Thing 18 comes to mind…

"It's too bad that CPD23 can give us all this wonderful inspiration but can't give us more hours in the day to make use of it all."

On the other hand, to be realistic, I can always come back to this, my schedule and its issues is down to me and not to anyone else (see Thing 21), and I’ve certainly explored a lot further than I had before. Which is progress.

Half a Thing to go!

CPD23 Thing 4 – Tidy Up Underway On Things I Appear Not To Have Posted On

Because I decided to do CPD23 a few weeks after the Programme had started there are Things from the beginning of the Programme that in the sheer attempt to keep up with In-Coming In-Coming new Things I never posted on.

Like the White Rabbit I’m Late, I’m Late finishing CPD23 anyway (mainly still got Thing 18 to do) so also going back and making sure I’ve covered the early stuff blog-wise. I suppose I want to know when I’m finished that I’m REALLY finished (otherwise it’ll niggle).

Thing 4 is, thankfully, easy to fill and short and sweet and about using Twitter, RSS feeder, and Pushnote.

Twitter

I think I’ve covered my Twitter use more that sufficiently in at least two of my posts relating to later CPD23 Things (Thing 3 on personal online brands and Thing 12 on role of social media) so (hurray) – not going to go back over old ground here.

RSS

Well here I should admit that my last RSS Reader is long abandoned, I used it for a good while (honest guv!), but I just found that the sheer time it took to go to it and read through things wasn’t available to me and it floundered at some forgotten point… So under the aegis of giving it another go have set up a Very Focused Small set of feeds on Google Reader (might as well, seem to have so many Google things going now mostly due to CPD23 it makes sense to move it).  I’ve put in a small amount of stuff – a) because I see it’s changing next week anyway(!) so no point spending time on aspects that will vanish and change; and b) it’s the time thing.

How does it compare to my former RSS Reader?  Well initially I wasn’t exactly impressed. However, it’s a new Reader to me, and it’s about to change anyway. Proper look next week at the changes.

Do I feel it enhances life to be back on stream with a Reader?  I would have said no, that anything really important I’ll pick up through Twitter or be emailed about anyway.  But actually its done me a good turn already I have to admit, something I wouldn’t otherwise have noticed, which in under a day is not doing badly.

Pushnote

I have never used this but I well recall from reading lots of posts on it at the time that not a lot of people found it exactly useful. As it isn’t available for the browser I use I have cheerfully decided I know it exists, what it’s supposed to do, have read a range of opinions on it. And that will suffice.

CPD23 Thing 21 – Two short sentences and lots of self-control

We’re asked about what we like and dislike to do and what skills are evident in the things we like and what we get satisfaction from. To think about recording our skills, what this means in terms of c.v.’s, interviews….

Things I’m Not Going To Concentrate On!

I’m not about to list my skills and activities because I have mostly done Portfolio that needs submitted next year for my next FCLIP Revalidation already sitting here which includes up-dated c.v. etc etc so I don’t see the need for a replication exercise. Not going to focus on the interviews aspect either, I’ve done a few down the years from both ends of the table. Mostly it’s about getting comfortable with it, more you’ve done, more different types and contexts, it helps relaxation a lot and focus. Both those things help immensely….

Likes and Dislikes

I like – achievement, focus, completion, perfection, commitment, learning, impetus, a sense of caring about things.

The subjects I apply this to differ – anything to do with the profession, anything to do with ancient history, and there really isn’t time for much else.

I dislike – feeling I don’t manage the attributes in the above ‘like’ list(!), being too tired to care or process while surveying the long queue of things I haven’t managed to do yet I feel guilty about, feeling I’m not getting enough done.

When did I last feel deep satisfaction?

I do quite a lot actually, in an odd way perhaps, e.g.

1) Presentation researching for something I gave earlier this month, a mad frantic rush admittedly, but it felt really good at points in it too where I was deeply immersed in the material. (ancient history life)

2) A few weeks ago I was Chair’ing something particularly large and complicated and I enjoyed it. Exhausted but good afterwards. (professional life)

3) Some urgent research I did today with a very good result. (work life)

4) I have a really horrendous schedule, I actually feel deep satisfaction through the entire heroic accomplishment of just getting through each day with it reasonably intact and building on it without something slipping massively. It is actually its own accomplishment. (many lives)

Changing the Pattern

Everything done or progressed is a victory, and above all I believe in progressing things I care about. I’ve always over-done things, never been exactly tidy in my use of energy, the tendency is all-out effort or post-completion puddle and frenetic activity at all hours.  I’d really like to have a higher percentage of commitments that I can turn around in reasonable timescale and just be finished than now. That would be wonderful. I’d also like to have more free time, and to feel less tired. The scary answer to be brutally honest is less commitments to juggle in the first place.

2012 – The Year Of Less Is More. 

Finish some things. Do not take more on in substitution.

Two such small and simple sentences in theory!

I have good friends who are every bit as bad as me (like must attract like!!), this is what I sternly say to them several times a year. They say ‘yes, I agree, but’. I know, I feel the ‘but’ about applying it to myself too. I want to do it, ‘but’ I also want to have my cake and eat it. Two short sentences will require a great deal of self-control (and sitting on my hands physically while humming desperately probably).

CPD23 Thing 19 - Integration is the nature of the problem

Well this Thing is about integration (identifying what has been useful thus far and how to integrate it into routines and life) and reflection upon.

Use….

Of the actual tools I didn’t already use covered by the Programme (up to Thing 17, cheerfully admit not done 18 yet!) I suppose the ones I’m using in an on-going manner thus far are  this blog (!), Evernote, and Google Calendar.  Everything else I’ve either used in a kind of one-off way to facilitate completion of the Thing and posting on it but not gone back to or it was something that was already integrated into my life (Twitter etc) before the Programme anyway.

With this blog, Evernote and Google Calendar I fully admit I’m not exactly consistently integrated.

And integration…

I have junked my personal printed diary in favour of Google Calendar on my phone. I forget to put things into it and find it more finicky to add things directly in through my phone than my paper diary was, I end up having to go back later and edit it at times from my pc which somehow has more options, but it also has functionality my diary didn’t possess I really like. So I’m persevering.  

Evernote I haven’t added to much at all since my initial afternoon activity at it – but the information I loaded in I use all the time through my phone, and there’s more things I need to add in before I forget how!  I really like it.

This Blog now has (good grief!) 30 entries on it. Somehow that makes me smile, this time I did not start a soon-abandoned blog (have before!). Most are related to CPD23 but not all and I’m pleased I initially named it nothing to do with CPD23 so it can go on in its own right very easily and will. It’s rather fun (for me anyway!).

Things I need to investigate more…

Some Things I haven’t used much at all compared to others. So I need to use DropBox a bit more, and have another go at Mendeley for instance, before I really know if I’ll use them on an on-going basis or not.  And there are Things I have still to do anything on at all.

Purpose…

But one of the main reasons I decided to do CPD23 was to do with getting to know a lot of programmes etc, have used them, have them in some form.  It’s achieved all of that.

End of the day the things I still use in six months will be the ones that are easy for me to access, fulfil a purpose, and be something I need to use regularly to achieve it.

CPD23 Thing 17 cont’d – Slideshare as the silent world

You know what they say about less haste… I forgot to put in anything about Slideshare in my original Thing 17 blog….

Would I put any of my presentations up on it?

Thinking about this my presentations fall into three categories

1. Oft-given and with a changing section that is up-dated each time.

2. Oft-given but not for a while so in need of up-dating.

3. One-off point in time presentations.

So yes, one-off point in time presentations no problem. But I wouldn’t go back and up-date something just for the sake of posting it somewhere. And with ones I give where the content changes a bit each time…. Well that disinclines me because the ‘current’ version changes sometimes twice a year.

Does the Slideshare environment change the context?

I’m also thinking that without the spoken word, audience, interactivity, it’s quite a different beast a presentation. Ideally I’d augment it before putting it on Slideshare (the silent world) for that reason.

What do I tend to use Slideshare for as a punter?

Mostly to try and track down Conferences and events I was interested in but couldn’t attend. I’ll end up following the hashtag, looking for blogs, looking for anything posted on Slideshare.  It depends on the event, but for some that combination of mediums does get you fairly close to what you missed and is a wonderful thing.  So I tend to be looking quite specifically…

What does a quick look at some presentations on Slideshare tell me?

Well I was highly amused to be reminded that something I jointly gave is already on it – I’d totally forgotten about this to be honest. So coming across that was amusing. Generally I conclude that the sheer volume of things on Slideshare allied to lack of obvious authority level or reliability information on some things is a bit of a problem. I want to know what date it was, who gave it, what’s their level of knowledge and expertise on the subject. Often that information is there, often it isn’t.  It’s also things like has the subject moved on, do I know enough about it to realise if this is the case?

I also noticed just how visual a lot of it was. I’m a words-based person (one overall look at this blog tells you that). I think presentations probably divide into those put together by visual people and those put together by text-based people. Which do you do first and augment with the second?  I know I tend to do images last, I ‘squeeze’ them in. Which you would think makes me a PowerPoint person. But I rather enjoyed Prezi, which I think is far more a visual medium.  I was also astounded to see some folk actually used the Script part of their Powerpoint – I’ve never done this in my life, I tend to talk to headings, it’s just my style.  However for Slideshare with a very visual presentation it would definitely help impart the subject matter.

In conclusion

For one-off presentations I think Slideshare would be sensible to upload to where I want to give audience easy access to the full thing without bits of paper and allow wider access. So, next time I’m doing a one-off I will… but it might be augmented slightly for the different environment from what I give on day.

CPD23 Thing 23 - All Aboard the Skylark, we (almost) have lift-off...

Of Theoretical and Real Lives

I’m cheating the formal Programme schedule more by the day.  If I had a theoretical instead of a real life I’d have done each Thing in sequential order and more or less to time. But my life is very real and full so instead you could call it an attempt in three parts at CPD23. Every few weeks it’s a massive head-down catch-up attempt but that’s okay, I knew that would be the case going in. It was always going to survive in the cracks between my various very busy worlds.

So as part of this merriment of bedlam I’m going to post my Thing 23 while still having various ones (but less and less) still to do.

It’s called get the finished ones done and dusted (i.e. Posted). The rest will follow on in now typical barmy convenience order…

The Experience

So here is the link to my CPD23 Experience Prezi

http://prezi.com/thsy-o_50biu/the-cpd23-experience/

Summing Up in Phrases...

And here is a related list, in story order, of various six word phrases that sum up CPD23 for me as I found it in Thing progression order…!

Oh why not, it looks fun

What a lovely group of people

The cpd23 webpage is so slow

Keep downloads to a minimum please

Taking me into some new territory

Too much content, not enough time

A lot of fun all round

Useful reflection space away from schedule

Bit behind, but will finish soon

CPD23 Thing 17 – Captain Pugwash Arises Early In The Morning

There are a lot of good things to be said for being a bit behind in CPD23, it does allow for some interesting approaches. Coming to Thing 17 somewhat late has been a good case in point.

Seeing It Before You Suss What It Actually Is

A couple of weeks ago I sat through my first Prezi presentation, I just didn’t know what it was I was watching. If I’d had time to get to Thing 17 the penny would have dropped instantly, but as it was I didn’t match the two together for days afterwards. 

So what did I think of Prezi as a presentation mode? Well, a bit nauseous actually, it was all that large screen swooping back and forth across the information landscape early on a Monday afternoon...  It made me feel like a very quick cut cinema presentation in the front row.  It was interesting, but it wasn’t giving me any inclination to try it out or give up PowerPoint in its favour. 

Devious Prezi’ing

What was really useful was having sat through a Prezi presentation very recently. I thought I would give it a go creating a very small one, and based on reflection of my overall CPD23 experience (this is called deciding how to get two Things out of 1 creation as I try to get myself finished and catch up on the Things I’m missing!).  So it’s a Prezi that will paste nicely as a link re the actual content for most of my Thing 23 post as well!

Sketching Presentations Rather Than Writing Them

And because I’d already sat through a Prezi and knew the kinds of things I did and did not like about it what I basically did was I drew it on a sheet of A4 paper as I wanted it to look and then figured out how to replicate that look and layout into Prezi.  Perfection it isn’t, but as a rough guide to my CPD23 experience and musings I think it works very well.

Prezi as an option…

It’s just possible that I might actually use Prezi again. There are types of presentations that I think it would actually work for very well, and others where I’d definitely stick to my Powerpoint. I think for short narrative stories that progress and can be shown visually Prezi is quite a good option though.  But it’d be important to view it on a large screen first before deciding it was finished. Just in case you’re swooping a lot more than you thought, we don’t want to induce sea sickness in the native audiences!

The CPD23 Experience

http://prezi.com/thsy-o_50biu/the-cpd23-experience/

CPD23 Thing 20 - Exploring Communal Career Routes and Motivations...

Library Routes

I’ve already done the roots / routes musing under Thing 10 I think, but I’ve gotten around to linking it into the Library Routes blog.

So I decided I’d have a bit of a dip into other entries  on the blog. I’ve looked at some people I already know, some in the same sector to me, and some who just had really fascinating looking job titles. 

What I get from this sample is that some people came into the profession by accident, some by intent, and some because it was natural, it was already in the family.   Some people on this last route had made a conscious decision early on, others had done a lot of other things first and then drifted back.

I really like that last natural / in the family one because that sums up me too. Although it wasn’t conscious for a long time that it was a career options precisely because I spent so much time there in my local libraries.  I had an uncle who was a Chief Librarian so why it took so long to twig it was a career option I have no idea, but it did. Anyway, I’m kind of amused and pleased that there’s more of us around through that route than I thought.

The other thing I take from the blog posts I’ve read on this is something Phil Bradley said “Being a librarian is not a job, it's a passion and a vocation”.  We really do encourage each other in what we do and cheer each other up. And that’s incredibly important.

Library Day In A Life Project

It is also suggested we have a bit of a scout through blog post’s on this so I’d better come clean and admit that after years of not remembering it in time this year I decided – ho hum – to do it for a week.  That was a bad idea.  Because I managed the first couple of days fine and then didn’t find time and then there seemed little point posting a random 2 days somehow.  So next time whether I do a day, two, or more then Most Important Thing to remember is to write and post it day at a time by editing the page as blog or just tweet as I go and not get disheartened and give up if it all goes pear-shaped under the schedule / to do list / asaps around it.  I prefer blog posts for this kind of thing admittedly.

Anyway, I’ve had a look at the blog and mostly what’s occurring to me is I really wish folk would just link to the actual blog post and not their blog home page for this.  I’ve gone straight to very few Librarydayinthelife posts. 

However one that I did was a gem, not because it’s my area or topic but it was just a really good sense of the slightly barmy frantic pace of life. I can entirely sympathise with waking up at 5am thinking about abstruse things to do with what you’re working on and wondering if someone else would think you were slightly deranged.  And then piling through a day of various other things and ending up back at what you were considering at 5am again  many hours later. It made me smile (in recognition)! And yes if I’d been paying sufficient attention I’d have linked to it but many other blog gazes later I can’t remember what it was called…

However. Coughs.  After reading a few still thinking come next round in January I shall have another attempt at this.

CPD23 Thing 22 – To Boldly Go….

I'm all behind again with CPD23 so I'm opting for the practical forget the precise order and just catch up whatever way is most convenient for me. As (almost) per Morecambe & Wise - all the right Things, just not necessarily blogged in the right order! Hence here goes Thing 22....

And no I have no idea why the idea of volunteering is triggering images of Star Trek and James T. Kirk in my brain this morning… Apart from the fact it can be a bit of a leap, for all kinds of reasons, a new environment.

Volunteering Has Made Me What I Am Today

The above seems a bit of a full-on statement - but actually on reflecting on this Thing and my experience re, it’s true. See my Thing 10 post on how I came into the world of law librarianship. Back in my student days I volunteered myself to The Royal Faculty of Procurators Library in which I assisted in a small one-off project for over the summer holidays after first year. As a result of that I worked there most of my university holidays as a paid library assistant thereafter (so I didn’t have to work during term), and I went back full-time for about a year after I graduated until I found a graduate professional post also in law a few blocks round the corner.  Fifteen years on I’m still a member, have lots of good friends there, and I haven’t emailed them today for oh…. At least 10 minutes for something….  Fifteen years ago I had no idea what I was getting myself into, no idea what was involved, and it was scary and a huge learning curve. But it set my career course, got a lot of good friends out of it.

Different types of volunteering

The volunteers I most come across these days are the Placement Students I take from the Local Library School annually for about a month.  It’s not a compulsory part of their course, it’s not marked or examined, so they do it because they feel it would be useful experience and help them get that first job in the sector or one at a higher level or in a different area of experience. My firm also takes a fair amount of school placement students doing very short placement periods working in a range of departments but for very short periods of time.  So I get Masters librarianship students for good periods of time, and I get 15yr olds for 3 hrs with little comparative knowledge of libraries. It varies considerably.

A long time ago during my various librarianship courses I was the volunteer on Placement. I had some very good experiences, I also had some bad ones.  I try to ensure that working here is thus a good one.  If nothing else it’s a very good way of keeping up with what’s happening in library education, course syllabuses, and the job market for new graduates.

The Big Question

There’s been a lot of debate in discussing this ‘Thing’ about recession impacts and whether people would be comfortable doing volunteering jobs to keep their hand in in the sector or not if their own job disappeared while they searched for paid work e.g. see #libcampuk11 musings post re. I think it gets back to the concept that volunteers are an additional short-term or short hours over a longer term resource. And they vary hugely in skills, ability, knowledge and confidence.  They need supervision and they need training and the experienced person to go to if things are going awry.  End of the day they’re not being paid for this, you (hopefully!) are, you’re responsible for them and their work.

If it’s going to ensure something gets done that’s nice but would never get up the priority list enough for the paid expert staff to do it then fine. Volunteers get experience and skills, get to try out different contexts and jobs, and hopefully get a lot of enjoyment (or why do it?), the workplace gets ‘x’ that has been bugging them for years actually done. Or if it’s an organisation (e.g. a small voluntary group) that was never going to be able to afford to pay someone anyway so it’s not a case of taking any potential job away.  If it’s job substitution without the pay (whether the volunteer concerned is qualified to do it or not) then it’s a much more difficult decision. And I think it probably comes down to an individual assessment of the exact context allied to the job requirements itself and the personal situation of the individual at that time. A sweeping ‘never’ is a bit grand gesture for a very real and practical conundrum that will face some people.