Thing 16

Thing 16 is on advocacy, speaking up for the profession, and getting published. Advocacy is becoming more important than ever at a time when we are seeing significant cuts to libraries of all kinds. I have been heartened by the range of campaigns and the use of online platforms for this. I have also been particularly pleased to have seen more visible advocacy (online or otherwise) by CILIP, especially since Annie Mauger joined. I agree with the cpd23 post that blogs and the like can lead to other things. When setting up a Twitter account for my library I asked for some advice on the LIS-WEB-2 list. I received a wide range of replies and summarised for the list. A subscriber to the list asked me to write a guest blog about my experience of getting our library on Twitter which I was delighted to do. This then led to my being contacted by the editor of Refer, the journal of the Information Services Group. My brief article was published in volume 27, nos 2/3 of the journal. I have always enjoyed the academic/analytic side of librarianship, and as a librarian I am keen to share information and help others so advocacy, sharing online, and publication while not an everyday task, I do see them as a key part of the role.