Do it in Geek Style: Geeky Easter Eggs (warning: Angry Birds included). 

And of course what GeekFest could be complete with Storm Troopers?

Most of you will know that the Ark one-day Best Practices Management Strategies for Law Firm Library, Research Information Services conference is on today. This is an annual event Ark holds, you can find the agenda and speakers list here.

Unfortunately I am not there to attend, but I have been following the tweets for most of the day. @johngillies has been keeping a good stream going, and here are some that I found particularly interesting.

From Bob Berrings' Transformation of Legal Research

When books first printed, would mimic manuscripts, but changed and books became sacred objects.

Tables of contents developed, indices, cataloging but law then developed that.

The point of search is gone; it's now all about the search engine. The trust that we reposed in systems was tied 2 books. That's ending.

Essence of research is to start with the treatises that allow you to know what questions to ask.

Challenge to know the legitimacy of the source: the fact that something is a result doesn't establish its legitimacy. Need discerning users.

Next, Jean O'Grady's Preparing for the virtual library:

Need to establish library functions as being core to the business. That then raises question: what business are we in?

Lawyers are adopting iPads ahead of law firm "blessing" and buying their own digital law texts (if available). Own research on iPad.

Keeping statistics is an absolute requirement: is the library responding to the right research requests? Need to do triage.

Need to develop own internal virtual library. This is the platform to establish legitimacy.

Followed by Scott Preston and Greg Lambert on Building a bridge between IT and library:

Library has tended to create new services, which then get passed on to IT when they are sufficiently developed

Technologists are very binary: everything is black or white. Librarians live in the grey world in between.

Possible offers to IT: pattern recognition. Also, what can IT provide back to library?

Librarians tend to think more like lawyers, whereas IT tends to focus more on making sure the technology works.

And finally, Cindy Adams and Marlene Gebauer on embedded librarians. 

Half of respondents either have embedded librarians or are moving there. Corp/commercial biggest single group, but Mktg significant.

How long embedded? 23% have been there more than ten years! (Is this really a new idea?)

Embedded librarians increases understanding of subject areas. Can cross-train those in other groups. Can manage matters better

Subject specialist librarians partnered with marketing personnel.

Develop proactive research. "I heard you talking about this issue. Here's some research material on that issue."

And that's it for today. Hope I got you thinking... 

Another day of sunshine and warmth, yesterday saw me arriving at my first local meeting/networking event. A joint SLA-GA/ALLA event, Bubbling Under: Hot New Sites for Librarians was a talk by John DiGilio about new websites of use and interest.

Most of you are probably familiar with John, also known as iBraryGuy (the site should be back to normal business starting next month).

John opened by telling his story to librarianship, and by extension a brief story of librarianship itself in the last couple of decades. He explained that we are, in his view, well past the information superhighway, the age of information and well in to now era of opportunity. Information is so 2001, nowadays we are after knowledge.

He proceeded to tell us about 10 websites he had selected and classified in to the categories of Research, Productivity and Personal Advancement. I have not yet had time to review the sites themselves, but I will going through them over the next few days (that’s right: sequel!). Some I am familiar with but now have a deeper understanding of their purpose and scope; others were brand new to me. His sites were:

Research

• Jig
• Blekko
• Quora
• Sharetivity

Productivity

• What That Page
• Google Hangouts
• Pinterest

Personal Advancement

• Wattpad
• Mindbloom
• Skillshare

As you probably know, a couple of weeks ago was the Internet Librarian International Conference ( #ILI2011 ). I was fortunate enough to attend the SLA panel and networking drinks on the opening night, and you can read my first reaction to the FutureReady panel.

Thanks to Twitter and blogs we can still follow these events virtually, and below is a selection of blog posts talking about various ILI sessions, experiences and learning points.

Martin Hawksey’s MASHe blog has a Visualisation of the #ili2011 Twitter archive which proves interesting (canadiancat??).

Information Today has published its own review of the conference entitled The Library is Everywhere.
I also include a couple of personal reviews by Jo Alcock and Karen Marie Øvern.

Brian Kelly published an interesting analysis of What Twitter Told Us About ILI2011, examining both how Twitter was used at the conference and what we can learn from that use.

And to finish, I return to the SLA Panel discussion pointing you to the SLA Blogger’s review of the evening.

A couple of days ago I attended SLA’s pre-ILI2011 FutureReady panel session and drinks.

Sara Batts, current SLA Europe president, chaired the discussion and the panel was made up of Ulla de Stricker, of de Stricker Associates, Library Systems Manager David Pattern, and SLA board member Bethan Ruddock.

There were a number of interesting points made, with regards to systems usability, pace of change in technology and the workplace and also open-mindedness about creative solutions. One point that seemed to resonate very strongly in the room was that of the job description for the 21st century librarian, corporate or otherwise. 

Ulla de Stricker raised the issue of vocabulary in job descriptions: the language barrier that is often created between practitioners and those who hire. She said that there is a gap between how librarians prepare and present themselves, and how CEOs and Financial directors want to hire. This prompted debate as to where exactly that gap lies. 

A student chooses a degree in Librarianship or Information Systems because that is what he or she wants to work in. How, then, is the student to present himself once in the job place? Should more guidance be given in terms of explaining your role beyond your own colleagues and peers?

This is true in so many fields: study finance, art history, sociology (law, even?) and you will learn a great deal on that subject, and too little on how that knowledge applies in the workplace. As Ulla pointed out: focus has to move away from job spec descriptions and rather emphasis put on value given. She suggests, for example, asking firm and company directors: who do you want to hire? What skills do you want to see on a CV? 

It’s a huge subject, much more than I have space for on this blog post, but one worth some thought, both in libraries and beyond.

I have to add a quick note to thank all participants in yesterday's Round Table. 

It was our first time organising such an event - hopefully our first of many. From the Linex point of view, I can say we are very happy. It was good to see everybody sharing their thoughts and asking questions of each other. We got not only great ideas out of the conversation, but also the benefit of multiple opinions on each. I hope participants also found value in hearing how others use current awareness and sharing ideas. 

Plus: I always enjoy a chance to catch up with our clients in person, it was good to see you all. Thank you!

Last week was the actKM Forum’s 12th annual conference in Melbourne, Australia. This is a knowledge management community focused on sharing and learning.
I could not attend the conference myself, I just followed the activity on Twitter, and thought I would share some highlights with you below.

"More important than the quest for certainty is the quest for clarity" Francois Gautier” - @NickyHW

“the adjacent possible - not possible till other things have happened example is the printing press (hence the multiple innovation)” - @michellelamb

“There is only one letter separating you from Networking and Notworking” - @lukegrange

“I'd argue that knowledge management ought not be a *process*. Rather, intuitive, flowing and natural.” - @trib

The forum also has a SlideShare page with all the presentations from the current conference.

And to end in glory, a song about Knowledge, courtesy of @lukegrange.

David Gurteen yesterday hosted a one day workshop to share how and why Knowledge Cafés are of value in a business environment. I, as you will have guessed, was amongst the attendees.

I have attended a couple of Gurteen’s evening Cafés in the past, and you can read about those here on this blog. The calibre of people who organise and participate in these Cafés are a testament to Gurteen’s reach and influence, and yesterday was no exception. I have heard David’s story behind the Cafés before, but for me it all resonates on one point: “people would suffer through the [business] presentations only looking forward to the conversation afterwards at the pub. So what if we cut straight to the part people actually enjoyed?”.

Yesterday’s event was part presentation and part conversation. In fact as the day went on the lines between the two were effectively blurred. There was a lot of very practical advice about the benefits of conversation for knowledge sharing, as well as problem solving, internal networking and more. Even maximising your use of current awareness - a point of particular interest of course for me.

A practical example of this last point: you aggregate information and build alerts for your team. You work hard to ensure they are receiving high quality information, leaving no stone uncovered in what they need to know, and that this is all highly accessible to the end user. And then what? Are they reading your alerts? And if so how are these improving their professional output?
When a big piece of news comes up - a major shift in legislation, unexpected activity by a competitor or client, etc. - why not organise a conversation café on the subject? You will come away with a deeper understanding not only of the implications, but what you can do about it.

A couple of technical points. A Knowledge Café, as I see it, is not a business meeting. The purpose of a business meeting is a specific decision / action point (I am even of a fan of standing-space-only meeting, it keeps them short and focused). The Café comes a step before this. It is the first step in problem-solving, namely: increasing understanding. Unlike a business meeting, you should not enter a Knowledge Café with a specific outcome in mind.

Another quick point to add is that effective conversation in the workplace will bring both direct and indirect improvements in work processes. There are work-specific Cafés, an environment designed to foster in-depth sharing. And then there is simple banter conversation amongst employees. The more non-business-related sharing you can foster amongst employees, the better will those employees interact back within the business environment.

For managers of knowledge, innovation and professional development who are seeing the limitations of current modes of work, an interactive workshop such as this can open flood gates of new possibilities.

Update:

I add a link to a DumbAgent article about further benefits of extended yourself beyond the obvious circle of contacts. Conversations bring to knowledge sharing, which can only be a good thing.

I should also mention we had the chance to give a product demo at the BIALL2011 conference. Matthew presented, and below are his slides.

We are back from the BIALL2011 conference. We have been back for at least a week, but I am only back in the office now.

At the event I mainly was rooted in my spot, catching up with clients and enjoying our great view. I managed to attend just one seminar (don’t tell anybody) which was James Mullan’s talk on using LinkedIn to “Go Beyond Connections”. It boasted a good turnout, and James has clearly got the hang of this whole public speaking thing. Other talks I was sorry to miss included Chris Collison’s Going Off the Road with KM and Taxonomy Management by Mats Bergman.

Fiona Fogden talked about how she is using Linex in her Saturday morning presentation Mashing, Merging and Manipulating Content. So a big thanks to her, and it is great to see Linex is serving her needs so well.

Good summaries of the conference are given by James Mullan and by Nicola Franklin on their respective blogs.

As for me, I got to spend a couple of evenings on the farm: