Naomi House

Naomi House, MLIS, is the founder and publisher of the popular webzine and jobs list INALJ.com (formerly I Need a Library Job) and former CMO (Chief Marketing Officer) of T160K.org, a crowdfunding platform focused on African patrimony, heritage and cultural projects. INALJ was founded in October 2010 with the assistance of her fellow Rutgers classmate, Elizabeth Leonard. Its social media presence has grown to include Facebook (retired in 2016), Twitter and a LinkedIn group, in addition to the interviews, articles and jobs found on INALJ. INALJ has had over 21 Million page hits and helped many, many thousands of librarians find employment! Through grassroots marketing, word of mouth and a real focus on exploring unconventional resources for job leads, INALJ grew from a subscription base of 20 friends to a website with over 500,000 visits in one month. Naomi believes that well-sourced quantity is quality in this narrow job market and INALJ reflects this with many new jobs published daily. She has also written for the 2011, 2012 and 2013 LexisNexis Government Info Pro and many other publications in the past decade. She presents whenever she can, including serving on three panels at the American Library Association's Annual Conference in Las Vegas; as breakout presenter at OCLC EMEA in Cape Town, South Africa; as a keynote speaker at the Virginia Library Association annual meeting; at the National Press Club in Washington DC; McGill University in Montreal, Canada; the University of the Emirates, Dubai, MLIS program and the University of Hawaii at Manoa. Naomi was a Reference, Marketing and Acquisitions Librarian for a contractor at a federal library outside Washington, DC, and has been living and working in Budapest, Hungary and Western New York State. She spent years running her husband’s moving labor website, fixed and sold old houses and assisted her husband cooking delicious Pakistani food. She is preparing to re-enter the workforce and is job hunting. Her husband is now the co-editor of INALJ, a true support!  She has heard of spare time but hasn’t encountered it lately. She pronounces INALJ as eye-na-elle-jay.

Fines and Forgiveness

by Kristen Jaques, former Head Editor, INALJ Maine previously published 5/8/13 Fines and Forgiveness The handling of overdue charges is a point of contention among many libraries and librarians. Because of our profession’s lack of consensus on this issue, and because different libraries have different needs and serve different populations, I have experienced a wide range…

So I had another miscarriage

by Naomi House, MLIS updated 9/22/14 So I had another miscarriage On Thursday I went in for my 10 week ultrasound. Because I am higher risk we had an ultrasound every two weeks or so and had seen the fetus and heard its heartbeat at 6 weeks and 4 days.  Apparently a week later the…

For the Love of “Librarian”

Naomi House standing in front of a mural

by Naomi House, MLIS For the Love of “Librarian” Anyone who has been following INALJ even for a short period of time will have come to know just how passionate I can be about outside-the-box and non-traditional jobs for librarians and library staff. I even have a list of mostly non-Librarian Keywords for Job Searching…

Happy 18th Birthday to INALJ’s Maria House!

by Naomi House, MLIS Happy 18th Birthday to INALJ’s Maria House! Two years ago my sister, Maria, turned 16 and I asked her to join my volunteers with INALJ so she could learn more about WordPress, librarianship, metadata and more. Happy to report she loves the field and is interested now in pursuing museum librarianship.…

The Day I Was a Mover (not a Shaker)

by Naomi House, MLIS The Day I Was a Mover (not a Shaker) I have done many odd and not-so-odd jobs over the years. I sold vacuum cleaners by phone and door to door for all of 3 days in the mid-1990s. I worked food service twice and have no stomach for the smell of…

Sponsored Job Ads now on INALJ

Sponsored Job Ads now on INALJ INALJ will always offer free job ads to anyone wishing to share an LIS related job, but now we will offer Sponsored ads as well!  Why? demand for quick turnaround time from HR professionals who want to advertise with us but don’t want to wait 4 business days for…

Health and the Job Hunt: On Blood Sugar & Carbs & Me

Naomi House standing in front of a mural

by Naomi House, MLIS Health and the Job Hunt: On Blood Sugar & Carbs & Me One of the things I admire about many LIS professionals and librarians on social media is that they often discuss their own physical and mental health challenges. Their candor helps others. I have learned more from their stories and…

August 2014 Roundup (INALJ Stats)

Another fantastic 500,000+ page view month! 7.5 million page views total! What a great month!  Another fantastic August! Our busiest day in August was 22,768 views on 8/5, and our busiest week Ever with 133,894 views, and our 2nd busiest month EVER at  INALJ.com with 505,807 views!  We also hit 7.5 million page views in total. In the…

Know the Difference: Identifying Obstacles to Employment

by Ellen Mehling previously published 10/14/13 “Know the Difference: Identifying Obstacles to Employment” There is a curious thing I see frequently among those I advise: job hunters focusing on a smaller, though possible, less likely obstacle to employment and ignoring a much larger, definite difficulty – some have an almost superstitious fixation on a certain…

But I Can’t Move For A Job!

by Elinor Crosby, former Head Editor, INALJ Nova Scotia and PEI previously published 12/9/13 But I Can’t Move For A Job! What happens if you graduate from your Masters or Technician program and intend to stay in the city or town you went to school in? For some of us that is the only financially…

The Doctor Is In….the Library!

by Kate Kosturski, Senior Editor previously published 12/27/13 The Doctor Is In….the Library! For the last INALJ blog post of 2013, I decided to embrace the merry of the season (though not that Elf on the Shelf thing), and switch to something lighthearted about libraries…. 23 November 1963 was a momentous date for Britons, and…

Wardrobe Preparation: the interview

by Dan Trout, medical librarian at Edward G. Miner Library, University of Rochester Medical Center. Wardrobe Preparation: the interview Dress for the position that you want, not for the position that you have. I’ve worn a suit and tie to every interview that I’ve attended. You can always gauge the atmosphere and culture of an…

Nancy Kranich …Former ALA President

This interview is over 1 year old and may no longer be up to date or reflect the interviewee/interviewees’ positions by Claire Schmieder, Senior Editor previously published 5/6/13 This interview is from 2013 Nancy Kranich…Former ALA President and Rutgers University–Lecturer, School of Communication and Information and Special Projects Librarian Claire:  Your career path has been…

My House in New Orleans

by Naomi House, MLIS updated 10/28/14 – SOLD! My House in New Orleans My house is for sale! In my article, Why I Quit My Library Job and Why I No Longer Want One, I mentioned that currently my main income comes from renovating old houses and selling them. I have been flipping houses since…

Working Abroad As a Librarian: Challenges and Opportunities Ahead

by Raymond Pun, reference and research services librarian in New York University Shanghai Working Abroad As a Librarian: Challenges and Opportunities Ahead Thinking about working abroad? There are growing opportunities to work abroad as a librarian or information specialist these days. However, when you consider working abroad as an adventure, there will be tons of unexpected challenges…

Plan Your Mission & Conquer Your Goals

by Valarie Swayze, Senior Editor, INALJ Plan Your Mission & Conquer Your Goals Setting goals and accomplishing them is a powerful experience, and one that can motivate you to being better every day. The first step to purposeful goal-setting is writing a personal mission statement. If life is a journey, a mission statement would be…

3 Off-the-Beaten-Paths to Librarianship

by Claire Schmieder, Senior Editor previously published 5/23/13 3 Off-the-Beaten-Paths to Librarianship Librarians have so many amazing skills, all of which are transferrable into any number of careers. If you’re having trouble finding a traditional library job, maybe it’s time to start searching for less conventional, but equally as rewarding, positions. Here is a tree-tops…

July 2014 Roundup (INALJ Stats)

July was our best month ever! 7 million page views total! What a great month!  The big news is July was our busiest month ever, by a lot! In addition our busiest day EVER was 29,449 views on 7/29, and our busiest week Ever had 126,580 views, and our busiest month EVER at  INALJ.com with 544,821 views!  We also hit…

Cold Feet About Cold Calling

by Veda Darby Soberman, former Head Editor, INALJ Hawaii previously published 12/16/13 Cold Feet About Cold Calling Cold calls have long been used by businesses to sell their services or products.  We all dread those telemarketing calls, and junk emails, and we easily hang up or press delete to avoid the sales pitches, but cold…

Why I Quit My Library Job and Why I No Longer Want One

by Naomi House, MLIS Why I Quit My Library Job and Why I No Longer Want One I have worked in libraries for the last ten years but as of December 2013 I have been working only outside of libraries doing my other job, renovating and selling old houses, and forming a new partnership.  I have…