Episode 605: Starting a New Job/Keeping Your Job Fresh

Welcome back to Season Six of Linking Our Libraries!

We are the Central Minnesota Libraries Exchange. Our members are libraries of all sorts: public, schools, academics, special libraries, archives, and history centers. Join us in working thorough skills library staffers can use to be more successful in their work!

This week we look at a skill so many of us will use: starting a new job! When you are new in the library, it can be tough to figure out what you are supposed to be doing, who you are supposed to talk with, and what is going on around you. After you have been there for a while, it’s important to keep working on helping your job to stay fresh. You really don’t want to be one of those people who count down to retirement in the next ten years, while doing nothing more than sitting around complaining.

We have two Guest Hosts this week: Stephanie Schlangen and Glen Irvin, who are technology integration coaches from Sauk Rapids-Rice HS.  

If you want to earn a one hour certificate for CE/PD credit from CMLE, you can take our short class built from this podcast. You can find it here. And you can find all of our podcast-based class links right here.

The Basics:

We’ve all started new jobs. We all know it’s tough. Both of us at CMLE have been here for just over three years, which doesn’t seem like a very long time! Stephanie and Glen – how long have you been in your jobs? Even if you stay in the same school, or the same organization, you will probably move around to different jobs and have to start over again in learning new things and presenting new skills. 

Once you are there and settled into a job, there are always new things to learn, new ways to frame the work you do, and new skills you need to keep yourself fresh and to keep producing the same kinds of good results.

So we have a few basic strategies you can use to help you get through those first days on a new job. And for people in the same job for a long time, we will talk about some strategies you can use to keep up with the changes happening around you.

Here are a few suggestions that may help you to have a good start at a new job:

  • Make a plan before you get there. You want to be open to unexpected things that will happen on our first day, and your first week – but have a basic plan of things you want to  accomplish. It may not happen, but you have a plan of action to do good things.
  • Listen. It can seem useful, but avoid constantly saying “At my last job, we always [whatever].” Instead remember you are in a new environment. Listen to the procedures people are using, the history they are providing, the tips they want to share.
  • Be early. It’s probably always a good strategy to be a little early to work, but especially when you are new and things are still confusing, being early will give you time to either relax or to solve unexpected problems that will crop up.
  • Reach out. When everything is new, exciting, and scary, you want to reach out to other people in your school, in your library, and online. Nobody gets through a successful job alone – it always takes other people working in cooperation with you. So get off to a good start by making connections right away.

And what do you do when you’ve been in your job for a while? Nothing new ahead, and maybe you are dreading the next fifteen years of tedium. We don’t want that for you! So we have a few ideas about strategies you might use to twist the perspective on your job to ensure it stays up to date, that you keep moving forward to avoid being a stagnant and boring person. (We talked about Stress Management at work in our episode 611; moving forward and learning new things are great ways to keep workplace stress in check!) Here are a few other ideas:

  • Focus on the positive people around you. It’s easy to find the whiny complainers in any job, but if you stay closer to the people who are more positive and building toward the future, it will help you to be one of them.
  • Try a new routine. If you read your emails before starting the day, or grade papers at lunch – try shifting these to a different time. Can you do all your email just twice a day? Can you spend time on shelving and weeding once a week? Trying a few new things can make even boring stuff seem a little new and interesting.
  • It’s obvious, but: Keep learning new skills. You really want to  avoid becoming one of those people who say “well, we didn’t have that tech or tool or whatever back in my day; I’m too old to learn it now.” You don’t need to be an expert on things, but you want to keep moving forward with your skills. Standing in the same place means falling behind, and nobody wants to feel irrelevant.
  • Meet new people. It may be in person, it may be online – but if you can find a new person to have lunch with each week, or to start a discussion with, or to ask questions of each week, it will keep you mentaly moving around and thinking new thoughts. 

Resources for you to consult:

Okay, we’ve shared a few background ideas and strategies here. Let’s talk with Stephanie and Glen to get some ideas for making these theories a reality in their schools!

Books Read:

And now we have one of our favorite parts of each episode: sharing books! Each of us will share a book we are reading. Links to each book will be on our show notes page, with a link to Amazon.com. If you buy a nice book – or anything else – Amazon will give us a small percent of their profits. Thanks in advance!!

The Education of Margot Sanchez, by Lilliam Rivera

The Last Kingdom, by Bernard Cornwell

The New Childhood: Raising Kids to Thrive in a Connected World, by Jordan Shapiro

The First Tour de France: Sixty Cyclists and Nineteen Days of Daring on the Road to Paris, by Peter Cossins

Conclusion

Thanks to Stephanie and Glen for working through all these ideas with us!

Thanks to you at home for joining us this week! It’s always better when you are here to share ideas with us.

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Check back in with us next week for another library skill!