Call for Information Professionals to Take Charge
June 26, 2009
I may be misinterpreting Stephen Arnold’s words with my headline, but if you read his post here and disagree with my interpretation, the comments field is open.
As a law librarian, I took on the training of summer associates, fall associates and partners. Their training needs were based upon the fact that they underutilized the power of the commercial databases at their disposal and didn’t use the free resources on the Internet to their greatest advantage.
Librarians are continuously learning and expanding their own knowledge base. Partnering with vendors to maximize the powerful information collected in commercial services is just one way to win friends and influence users.
Keyword search with Google is so easy because most people are looking for those top indexed terms. Applying the Google method of search to complex information collections does not assure accurate results. If you are searching within a specific industry’sdata and that industry serves multiple audiences that use similar terms that talk about vastly different topics, you will understand that search is more than keywords.
Taxonomies, language structure, database structure and more affect how information is retrieved. The average user doesn’t think beyond their own interpretation of a topic and may turn away frustrated or satisfied when they have no information or the wrong information. And therein lies the danger because the average user does not recognize that the correct information is there, just beyond their keywords.
Without the education provided by information professionals the inaccuracies caused by amateur searchers could have significant impacts on business and research. Our profession must iterate the importance of information literacy that reaches beyond keyword retrieval. Verification of sources, currency, accuracy and complex search techniques are critical skills. No one is better able or placed to teach those skills than librarians.
So my fellow professionals, take up the charge and continue the fight. We must demonstrate the need, the problems caused by not meeting that need and why we are in the best position to meet the need. Teach information literacy beyond keyword search. Teach to cause and effect and champion yourself as the key weapon in the battle for information retrieval.
Poking at the PACER Petition
June 25, 2009
Perhaps I’m a bit naive but aren’t courts one of the slowest institutions to invest in technology? That whole identity of being a government institution that provides justice to indigent criminals and employing lots of people to man that whole justice process seems to preclude such an investment. Not to mention the fact that the court exists in an industry that is slow to adopt new technology in the first place.
Thus when I read about the petition to enhance PACER here, I was a bit surprised by the third request (and part of the second)
2. Make it more accessible by lowering its cost and improving its Web interface
3. Provide free PACER access to depository libraries
In 2003 a cap of $2.40 was placed on “appellate, district, and bankruptcy courts, the United States Court of Federal Claims, and the Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation” documents including dockets and case-specific reports (that includes those complaints and Summary Judgment motions). How much more affordable does it get?
I understand that free is better. (I’d love to have free parking and free postage at all times.) However, I doubt that depository libraries will kill their budget for the number of users that come to them to access PACER records.
Seriously, if we don’t even pay the base $2.40 to have access to this information what’s the point? I know that technically these are government documents and thus should ultimately be free to one and all but the reality is that the users of these documents have a personal or business interest when accessing the information. Thus users should make an investment into accessing the data that serves their purpose.
I support the principles that Carl Malamud is so passionate about but at some point my practical nature takes over and asks: What is the reality of web enhancements (#2 in the petition wish list) if the there is no money invested? Does anyone really think that USGPO or the Federal Judiciary is going to invest in technology enhancements (no matter how affordable) for an archaic system that still functions when there is no profit motive? And don’t forget that each court’s PACER records are maintained separately, there is no unionization of this information. If you want that go talk to the big guns: Lexis & Westlaw and see how affordable that is for your budget.
So I won’t be signing the PACER petition my fellow law librarians. Despite my desire for an improved web interface because even in the hard times some data is affordable enough and useful enough to warrant a small investment by me. If the petition had focused on improved search functions, specific case alert features or other items to overhaul the overall usefulness of the system, you would have sold me. Price is not the issue with PACER, usability is.
Constance Ard June 24, 2009
Lines and Technology
June 24, 2009
SLA 2009 was engaging and full of educational and networking opportunities. I was scheduled to return home on Friday, unfortunately that did not happen.
I did receive the unexpected opportunity for education and networking while standing in various lines for 3 plus hours on Saturday. My original plans called for a flight home on Friday afternoon. And the delay of the 1st flight and the cancellation of the Chicago to Louisville connection began my long journey home.
I took that first day’s delay in stride and made the best of my layover in Crystal City. What did not work for me was the 2nd day. I did my duty as a traveler and arrived in plenty of time for the security screening and other formalities. Our flight boarded and all looked well until the mechanical problems were announced. An hour of sitting on the plane finally ended with a de-boarding and a need to stand in the first line and the re-ticketing process began.
We were handed a sheet of paper with an 800 number to call to get new reservations. With 100 plus people standing in line calling the same number the odds of a quickly answered call seemed slim. Fortunately the call went through and the reservations for another flight were made. Pretty good…twenty minutes in line.
Then off to the other carrier, to print boarding passes and get gate information. Quickly navigate through the line to self-check-in kiosk and bam! The first brick wall…Your record can not be located.
Three hours later I’ve learned that competing airlines can’t talk to one another and if you’ve had trouble in the first self-help line with the same information, stay in the line to talk to the humans.
Problems encountered:
- American Airlines can’t talk to others and send a simple E-Ticket to the airline they with which they have made reservations.
- Delta Airlines can archive traveler records within hours of creation.
- Self-help isn’t the best option when travel arrangements are complex.
Conclusions & Observations:
- Airlines should be pro-active, when travelers are delayed serve water or coffee on the plane and in long-lines. (This type of courtesy will keep the frustrations at bay)
- The baggage process at Reagan National is bizarre: one line to get tags and weight, another to drop off – use the curb-side check-in (Thank you Casey for the tip!)
- Airlines are not making a profit because they have refused to invest in technology regularly to maximize communications internally and with other airlines when necessary.
- Line policing is important to avoid possible crowd eruptions. Delta did this well, American did not.
The final conclusion is that information flow is critical to satisfied customers. If the reservation made on the phone twenty minutes into the first line had been accessible via the self-service kiosk at the carrier I would not have been at my wit’s end at the end of the next three hours.
I hope my fellow-line compatriots are home, at Fort Benning in time to report to duty, and enjoying their Hawaii vacation respectively.
Constance Ard June 24, 2009
Social Media: The Buzz in the Hive
June 8, 2009
Last week on the train from DC to BWI, I overheard a conversation about social media. It made me realize that the general public truly is adopting technology that techs and geeks and librarians have been using for years.
With this mass adoption there is potential for greatness: both good and bad. Guttenberg was the first self-publisher and today the trend continues. This blog is self-publishing. Further applications like Facebook and Twitter offer status updates… what a person is doing and/or feeling. The sharing of information through these sites can offer up to much minutia. Used strategically these tools can allow individuals and businesses to publish powerful data that attracts clients and solves problems.
Solving a business problem in 140 characters is really good bait. Fishing for the prize catch takes perseverance. The self-published data, the connections and the shared links that are posted offer a sea of rich data.
Self-published status updates mixed with connections and links that are shared and you start to get a full 180 profile of an individual. You know what causes they are interested in, what they like to do for fun and what networking groups they are using to benefit themselves and their business.
The investigative potential within these tools is tremendous. Learning about product recommendations and company complaints through Twitter can provide businesses with a method of pre-empting problems and gathering primary market research. Investigating the people connections provide through the networks can be used in litigation to unseat a key witness.
There are as many ways to use this information as there are to gather it. If you are not thinking about this in your due diligence and business practices, why not? Do you think this is a fad that will pass while you sleep? It may, but chances are that there’s something even more data rich pushing social networks out of the way. As fast as technology changes, information will fill the bits and bytes. Are you ready?
Business and IT: Collaboration Benefits Business
May 27, 2009
The inspiration from this post came from this quote:
While I couldn’t agree more that IT organizations need a track where technical excellence is rewarded with a solid career path, I still think those technical experts need to spend real time with business peers. ( Practical Analysis: Reaquaint Yourself With Your Changing Business by Art Wittman)
In recent years I have seen the blending of library and IT due to the fact that digital information is growing. This forced collaboration has not always been comfortable.
Librarians as a general rule enjoy working with others and try to make all relationships work. (Note: as a general rule…there are those of us who just want to get down to business and avoid the touchy feely stuff.) IT, as a general rule, has seemed more comfortable with the technology than the technology users. Taking the strengths of both and blending them to benefit business is the ideal situation.
Each service provider, and librarians and IT truly are service providers, must recognize the strengths and weaknesses of their colleagues and partner to maximize business investments.
Understanding how users seek and apply information is the librarian specialty, providing the technological infrastructure to deliver the information is the IT domain. Users don’t care who is making it happen behind the scenes as long as they get the data they expect and need when they hit enter to send their search to the data wasteland.
Collaboration between IT and Librarians is becoming smoother. IT is learning how informaiton users seek and apply content. Librarians are raising their awareness of the infrastructure and programming demands on making search work. Optimizing the skills of both groups to deliver content efficiently is good business.
If your organization is not combining business goals with content management practices, you are using resources inefficiently. In the current economic climate businesses should be assessing internal practices, evaluating current information resources and ensuring the collaboration of IT, librarians and business peers to maximize resources.
The collegial relationships that are growing between the tech and management side of information is a strong company asset. Are you using it for your benefit?
Constance Ard May 27, 2009
Finding Content
May 20, 2009
There is a lot of data out there that states that business suffers because information can not be located. Is this a problem? Yes!
If you are working and trying to use internally created content to advocate, sell, or succeed, it is critical that you are able to find organizational content. All of my regular readers know that I strongly support the telephone as the number one most powerful research tool. Unfortunately, information users get frustrated by the need to use the phone to find something they perceive to be a simple task.
If you work for an organization and want to find content created for and about you, can you do so without picking up the phone? Even if you use Google or Cluuz are you satisfied with the results?
If not, is lack of findability caused by the the “search engine” (internal or external) or is it because of content distribution? Are the two mutually exclusive?
In my opinion, digital content is so easy to create and upload that no one thinks beyond the upload. In today’s cloud computing environment, tags are easy to create and content abounds. The million dollar question is: is content findable? I don’t really care if it’s “searchable” because the search is just an action to get me to the data I’m seeking. I want to FIND information so that I can use it.
So do the tags I use make my content on this blog “findable”? I think so…I do pride myself on being a good taxonomist. (So if anyone needs a good custom taxonomy to make your content findable…give me a buzz.) I aim for descriptive tags that are consistent and fit into categories. Of course, the more content you have, the more complex your tags/taxonomy/categories become. Consistency in applying those tools is important.
If you are a digital content creator, you must be flexible and structured. Growth of categories and tags is inevitable but consistent application increases the findability. If you are an organization that has multiple content creators it is important to findability to establish procedures that ensure consistency in “tagging”. It’s hard for content creators to keep at the forefront of their minds as they work, that other people, complete strangers, need to be able to find their content. Thinking about how to bring people in and give them the content they need ensures success in advocacy, sales and success.
There is more to the digital revolution than uploading content. Metadata is important, no matter the process of adding to your information. Metadata helps make content easier to find so that decision makers can locate the information they need to support their work. So if you are publishing content, either internally or externally to/for your organization think strategically about the processes and procedures that will make your content findable and usable…having it just sitting there defeats the purpose of creating content.
Constance Ard May 20, 2009
Firm Libraries & Sea Change
May 7, 2009
Yesterday, I had the pleasure of spending some time with an old colleague. We discussed how the economic downturn was forcing transformations in law firms. Traditionally law firms are slow to change and usually do so only when circumstances force their hands.
Law firm libraries are a part of the trend of downsizing. This colleague stated that while the library budget had not been cut staff had been cut. The result was that the budget was cut because staff efficiencies were forcing the reduction of personal copies. I find it interesting that the current economic crunch is succeeding in implementing a sea change in collection development and library services within some firms.
Statutes and rule books are popular titles for “personal copies.” Firms that provide “personal copies” generally also have Westlaw and/or Lexis. The information contained within the personal copies is available through various electronic resources and is more current.
Firm librarians know that these “personal copies” are a significant line item in budgets. The material is duplicative and a convenience rather than a necessity. The personal copies require staff time to process.
Cutting “personal copies” reduces costs and forces attorneys to use the electronic resources that are a permanent part of firm services. These electronic resources are another part of the sea change.
Many firms bill back the costs on online research. As clients continue to look for ways to cut their owns costs the push back on billing electronic research costs will continue to grow.
Firms did not bill for print collections and clients know that fact. Some specialty technical reports may have occassionally been billed to clients but standard resources used to support the firm’s work were not. As firms de-duplicate their collections and improve efficiencies by maximizing use of available electronic resources they are, or at least should be, reconsidering the practice of online research bill backs.
Bill backs take staff time and like the personal copies, efficiencies can be improved by changing this tradition. Corporate clients are saavy and expect value added service not line item charges.
Smart firms will embrace this sea change and maximize the value of their professional library staff through project and/or hourly billing. Firms should consider the experience and educational level of their information professionals and set billing rates at a proper reflective rates. Does a one-year associate really research more efficiently than a five year or even first year librarian?
Marketing the value-added efficient service provided by your firm librarians is a must for firms who wish to transform client services. Firms who wish to survive should consider implementing the sea change of using the firm librarians as a major selling point for high quality and efficient service sooner rather than later.
Constance Ard May 7, 2009
Creativity in Crisis
May 4, 2009
Over the weekend I learned of another colleague who has been thrust into the throes of the unemployed. It prompted me to think about the fact that talented, experienced and engaged employees are suddenly finding themselves in a position that they probably had not expected at this stage in their career.
There is a lot of advise out there about how to do the job hunt and how to survive unemployment. When I found myself in the same situation last year one of the most useful resources I read was: Landing on the Right Side of Your Ass. This book provided me the practical advise I needed to move on and out. This, combined with my launch of Answer Maven kept me moving forward.
I recently had the honor of speaking at the SEALL 2009 Conference on the topic of Recruitment and Retention with a distinguished panel of law librarians from various organizations. I spoke from the context of the law firm perspective. While the economic realities are forcing changes that may not be desired, nothing is guaranteed.
So money is tight and the work is slow in some areas and hectic in others. Management issues are a primary concern and you are awake at night wondering how to survive or if you should move along before the axe falls.
Maybe you are already primed for a change and are just to hesitant to make the jump. No matter your situation a few things are important to relate to your management and/or potential new employer.
- Creative and effective budget control measures
- Can certain titles be eliminated for the duration of the crisis and shift in business and then reinstated?
- Can you work-share with other departments to retain staff and share costs?
- Ability to apply your skills beyond the library.
- Are you the CI expert? Bill out the services internally to the Business Development team.
- Quantify your value.
- Employ the Annual Report to quantify the value. Everyone loves you but management needs to justify the expense.
- Reconsider your billing status.
- If you do bill: can you change the scope beyond hourly to project?
- If you don’t bill explain to management how you can generate fees at a rate that is more effective and cheaper than associates for research. Convince clients and management that the associate value is in analysis not research and your value is in information gathering and dissemination.
Those are management tips that reference librarians and other library staff can employ as well. You have a different chain of command but you still must quantify your value and think creatively to retain or regain employment.
Move up and on by remembering your knowledge and skills. Be creative in applying those assets to your next venture whether it is a new title and company or an adjusted role within your current company.
Constance Ard May 4, 2009
God Made Dirt and We Start From There
April 28, 2009
Michael Grunberg is not the typical Somerset Kentucky businessman. His finesse and style peg him as an outsider, albeit, a welcome outsider to the region. A while back, I sat with Mr. Grunberg during one of his visits to his latest investment endeavor, Somerset Energy Refining. For those of you who don’t recognize the name, this is the restructured entity that once was Somerset Oil Refinery.
Mr. Grunberg read the writing on the wall and looked for opportunities to diversify his real estate investments. In the classic recipe for success of buying low and selling high, Grunberg seized the opportunity to resurrect a broken business.
Of course success was the end game and in order for this diversification venture to succeed Grunberg needed to identify why the business had failed in the first place. The advantage that Grunberg had was capital. This overcame the challenges of previous owners who were deep in debt with little or no capital.
As with any successful business, financials and review on paper is never enough to guarantee success. A visit to Somerset was in order to seal the deal. He was pleased with what he found with “the Lake,” the summer month car shows and the energy of the community. Nothing about this investment was easy except the decision to invest.
Thanks to Somerset Oil’s bankruptcy, Grunberg was able to take this teacup refinery and apply money, discipline and talent to maximize the investment. The bankruptcy trustee had done the fat trimming and thus it was Grunberg’s job to make good business decisions.
To begin the process Grunberg retained and is hiring the proper talent. The goal is to make a profit at all levels of the barrel. Using the cumulative experience of the people will accomplish that goal. Many of the long-time employees of Somerset Oil are proving critical to the success of Somerset Energy. Both office and refinery operations personnel are considered by Grunberg to be “key personnel.” Many of the operators and maintenance workers that kept the refinery properly mothballed to prevent corrosion and guarantee safety and environmental measures were maintained were critical to closing the deal. Grunberg closed on a working and permitted refinery, albeit down for much needed repairs, deferred maintenance and upgrades.
Reliance on intellectual capital is not an anomaly in Grunberg’s business practices. In every asset purchased brokers and key personnel are important. Grunberg has benefited from the “please take her” sentiment of closing deals that ensured that important people who know the ins and outs of the business continue. Grunberg trusts and admires the intellect of others. According to him, the trick is to identify the brighter folks surround yourself and learn from them or at least listen and emulate.
Somerset Energy Refining is an 80 plus year business. Grunberg sees his role as a sometimes taskmaster and arbitrator with no need to micromanage. Probably reassuring to some of the employees is Mr. Grunberg’s philosophy that old is not necessarily bad. This doesn’t mean that there isn’t room for new technology. As the refinery looks to maximize profits, high-tech investments and technology updates will be a priority. One future investment may be wireless data valves for flow rates maintenance and a vacuum tower.
It is interesting to note that Mr. Grunberg’s greatest challenge in this business venture has been the need to mend fences. When Somerset Oil failed, regional producers needed to go elsewhere, jobbers and independent truckers filled the vacuum. That caused an increase in cost to the producers because these jobbers are middlemen. The solution pondered by Grunberg: having the truckers come into the Somerset Energy fold. Resistance is anticipated. Other solutions for overcoming the sourcing issue: rail transport from other regions, allowing the purchase of crude at rates that compete with Marathon. The business decisions Grunberg faces are challenging. His commitment to intellectual capital and his broad-spectrum thinking are equal to those challenges.
It is critical for Somerset Energy’s success to get the regional crude in. An advantage that should not be underestimated is that GM, Mercedes, Chrysler and Ford approve the gas produced by Somerset Energy. The diesel’s viscosity is greater than that of other area producers, making their “off road” diesel second to none.
In short, Grunberg has committed to competitive advantages that maximize the benefits of the product and the people.
I must admit to being amused by Mr. Grunberg’s stated expectation that the area would be more rural. He seemed to enjoy the duality of the region’s suburban traits and rural access. Personally, Grunberg seems to be challenged by the slower pace of business. He says, “it’s tough to keep the ADD (attention deficit disorder) in-check here.”
The location is an advantage as Grunberg works to recruit and retain talent. Thanks to the proximity of Lexington and the fact that most people enjoy living in the Somerset region it’s easy to entice people.
What does he like the best about Somerset so far? “The weather.” I think he may have even embraced the old Kentucky adage: If you don’t like the weather wait 10 minutes.”
Author’s Note: This article is based on an interview with Michael Grunberg conducted in December 2008 and has just been released from consideration by another publishing venue. The title is a quote from an employee at Somerset Energy Refining that Mr. Grunberg has embraced.
