Tag Archives: professional development

General, Resources

Are you making Work-Related resolutions?

We’ve read one of Gretchen Rubin’s books for our book group:

To get started on the new year, she has nine suggestions for helping you to make some resolutions for work!

“The new year is here, and for many of us, that means new year’s resolutions. And many of us make resolutions related to our work lives. ..

For instance, some common work-related resolutions include “I want to broaden my horizons,” “I want to do a better job with record-keeping,” “I want to network,” “I want to find a mentor,” and “I want to expand my skills.”

One key to consistent progress is to make a behavior into a habit. Habits are freeing and energizing, because they save us from the difficult, draining business of making decisions and exercising our self-control.

Habits matter, because research shows that about 40% of everyday life is shaped by habits. If we have habits that work for us, we’re far more likely to be happier, healthier, and more productive.”

(check out her blog for the rest of her ideas!)

Academic, Check this out:, Research, Resources

CFP: The Future of Librarianship: Exploring what’s next for the Academic Librarian

Conference
they are ready to hang on your every idea!

Academic librarians – here is a chance for you to submit your work to the LACUNY Institute conference, happening May 12, 2017.

Do you have thoughts about the future? Do you want to share them with your colleagues? Consider submitting a proposal!

If you have not submitted a conference proposal before, or just want someone to discuss ideas or look at a draft – let us know! At CMLE Headquarters, we are here to help!

Continue reading CFP: The Future of Librarianship: Exploring what’s next for the Academic Librarian →

Academic, Check this out:, CMLE, Communication, Public, Resources, School Media Specialist, Special

CMLE Google Groups: A place to talk shop with your colleagues!

discussion
Let’s discuss library things!

One of the main things we hear from our members is that they work alone, and that they feel alone in a lot of the things they do in their libraries. As we found in the needs assessment, most of you are solos or working in a library with fewer than five people. And it can be tough to be alone!

At CMLE Headquarters, we want to help you connect to your colleagues. Having someone else to talk about ideas with you, to share in the issues you are all facing, and to ask questions from someone else who knows about the situations you are in can be really helpful!

So we have established a variety of online forums for you to talk, to share ideas, and to celebrate the assorted successes you have in your library! Need to ask for book recommendations? Do it here! Want an example of a useful lesson plan? Ask here! Have a charming story of an adorable patron? Share it here!

Groups available so far: (Feel free to join any group of interest to you)

  • Academic Libraries
  • Elementary School Libraries
  • High School Libraries
  • Public Libraries
  • Special Libraries (this is the group to join for discussions of all types of special libraries, museums, and/or archives)
  • Diversity in Libraries As information professionals in libraries, we are all charged with creating diversity in the staff, materials, programs, and services we provide to our communities. It can be a challenge to do this well, so we will gather here to share ideas, ask questions, and get support from our colleagues!
  • Library Leadership Leading is hard, so let’s get together here and talk about skills we need, and issues we all face. We can trade suggestions, share training opportunities, and ask questions of other people who are also working to lead well in their libraries!
  • Library Planning All libraries make different kinds of plans: strategic, tactical, project. Trying to guess the future can be a challenge, and it works better when we work together! Discuss ideas, solicit templates from others, and ask questions about planning here.
  • Reference work Working in Reference – online or in person – can be a challenge to anyone! Here is the place to discuss issues you encounter, challenges you face, or just to ask questions of your colleagues. We work better when we work together!
  •  General Library Discussion Do you have things you want to talk about from your library? Share them here! Ask oddball questions, share stories of triumphs and tragedies, and generally discuss all the things we see every day in the library!

We will periodically post messages to the groups with information we find that might be relevant only to a segment of our members, but for the most part these are just for you guys to discuss issues facing you and to network with colleagues!

Do you have other topics you would like to us to set up a discussion area?? Just let us know! We are here to help our libraries, and to provide some forums for communication and sharing across the system!

Academic, Check this out:, Communication, Public, Research, School Media Specialist, Special

Make a poster; go to ALA Annual in Chicago!

poster-session
poster presentations are a fun way to meet people who do what you do!

CMLE libraries have a lot of great things to offer their communities and the library profession. And we would like to see you showing it off!

Do you have an interesting program? An exciting event? A neat way to organize, arrange, display, or circulate your materials?? Make a poster, and share it!

Posters are very simple to make, and at Headquarters we can give you all the help you need. It is a great way to share information with colleagues, and you have the chance to learn all kinds of interesting ideas from your fellow presenters – who will all be sharing information on a topic similar to yours.

You do not need to have a completed poster when you submit the application, so you have plenty of time to think about graphic ways to show your neat stuff! (The design element is pretty low key; everyone there just wants to hear about your work!)

And if you want to go to the Annual Conference (you do not need to be an ALA member to attend!), exhibiting a poster is a good way to help convince your supervisor you should attend!

Click to get the information on what to do next: Continue reading Make a poster; go to ALA Annual in Chicago! →

Academic, Check this out:, CMLE, Public, Resources, School Media Specialist, Special

From Good to Great as a library leader

Pencil tips
Working on our professional development!

If you’ve been keeping up with CMLE’s book groups on Goodreads, the phrase “Good to Great” may ring a bell! That’s because the book “Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap and Other’s Don’t” by Jim Collins was our November read in the Librarian Professionals group! We hope that if you read the book, you were able to take away a sense of what helps great leaders and companies function at such a high level.

Library Journal recently posted this article written by librarian and Vice President of the ACRL Steven Bell on why the book can be especially helpful to those in the library world. He discusses how the book is still relevant in today’s library leadership world, but also names additional articles and resources that have continued to build upon Collins’ book.

Bell names a main component that is necessary for achieving greatness – passion! Leaders need to be able to channel their passion for their work in a way that inspires others to follow them and leads their company in the right direction. Bell also gives some suggestions of how to lead successfully in the library world.

If you are interested in developing your leadership skills, CMLE’s Librarian Professionals book group is an easy place to start! Our book for December is The Happiness Project, and we welcome you to join us!