by Elinor Crosby, Head Editor, INALJ Nova Scotia The Cloud and Your Job Search When I was underemployed and doing a lot of job searching, resume re-tooling, and cover letter writing, I decided to pay for an upgrade to my Dropbox account. I’d already gotten a lot of free space by getting my friends to sign…
by Nena Schvaneveldt, Head Editor, INALJ Utah (previously published 7/31/13) How I recovered from being fired My last blog post brought a lot of feedback. Most of it told me what I suspected: I wasn’t alone in having been fired. I know the questions I had were similar to the ones others had, so I…
by Naomi House, MLIS INALJ is an all volunteer effort and I just wanted to take a minute to thank everyone who puts in time Monday-Friday each of the 52 weeks of the year to help bring job opportunities and advice to job hunters. On every page of INALJ.com you will see a list of…
by Claire Schmieder, Head Editor, INALJ New Jersey MLIS + Non-Library Job = A Much Bigger Picture About two months ago, I started a new job as Program Associate at the Alice Paul Institute. We’re a small non-profit organization, based out of suffragette Alice Paul’s childhood home, Paulsdale, in Mount Laurel, NJ. The site is…
by Rebekah Kati, Head Editor, INALJ North Carolina Tips for Writing Amazing Cover Letters Cover letters are an essential part of the job application. In the cover letter, you have the opportunity to explain your interest in the position and how your qualifications relate to the job. Do you have non-library experience that could be…
by Shayna Monnens, Head Editor, INALJ South Dakota Weed, Weed, Weed! Collection Management – the Joy, the Pain, the Sorrow… One of the best aspects of being a librarian is being able to survey your kingdom of written and published subjects. From well loved (and well used!) picture books to fact-filled nonfiction to the awesomeness-on-a-stick…
by Grey Maixner, Head Editor, INALJ Vermont Keep the Log Rolling As we all know, applying for jobs is a daunting task. Cover letters need written, resumes revised, and every 6 months or so you need to contact your references to ensure that they are still willing to vouch for you. Compounding these problems is…
by Michele Frasier-Robinson, Head Editor, INALJ Oklahoma Problem Patrons Before I was a librarian, I naively believed that academic libraries did not face the same problem patron issues that are so common to public libraries. I was wrong. We have had our share of incidents—a few of them quite alarming. I have witnessed unassuming patrons…
by Katherine Kimball Adelberg, Head Editor, INALJ Michigan The Unexpected Benefits of Commuting Imagine that you have a job, but it isn’t as challenging or exciting as it used to be. You recently finished your master’s degree, but you don’t have enough seniority to be promoted. Then you find a position online that sounds intriguing…
by Bradley Woodruff, Head Editor, INALJ Wisconsin Crafting your LinkedIn Summary If you’re a LinkedIn user, you may have pondered over the summary portion of your profile. What IS the LinkedIn summary for? Your profile already summarizes your work history, education, experience, volunteer work, and every accomplishment you’ve made. The Summary? That’s what grabs whoever…
by Fallon Bleich, Head Editor, INALJ Arkansas What is GIS? I started a new position this year—thanks to finishing up my MLIS and my awesome new networking skills—and while it’s not in a library, I do use a ton of my library skills! First off, never let anyone tell you that a MLIS doesn’t transfer…
by Sheryl L. Christensen, Head Editor, INALJ California Who ARE You (choosing to be)? Many of you have probably seen this TedTalk by Shawn Achor. In this video, he very entertainingly tells stories and offers information about how our happiness and positive, self-affirming outlook oftentimes precedes or even brings about what we distinguish as success. …
by Samantha Read, Head Editor, INALJ New Brunswick Part-time MLIS Studies: The Benefits of Taking it One Course at a Time Figuring it Out I didn’t figure out what to do for a career until after I had already finished a Master’s program. Now, this may seem contrary to practical common sense. Not for…
by Rossy Mendez, Head Editor, INALJ Puerto Rico Networking: From Dirty Word to Mantra Networking is often treated as a dirty word, it is the thing we have to do to get ahead but don’t want to acknowledge as the reason we got our jobs. If you are anything like me you stress over things…
by Jennifer Crutchfield, Head Editor, INALJ Connecticut My Experience as an Archivist: Part 1 In my previous place of employment, I noticed a small room in the front of the library labeled “Archives Room”. Having a specialization in archives management, this sparked my interest and I asked if I could spend an hour or two…
by Jennifer Devine, Head Editor, INALJ West Virginia The Myth of the One Page Resume When I first started my job search while still in my graduate program, I read a lot of resources on how to create a great resume. Most sources will tell you that as a student just coming into the workforce…
by Amelia Zavala Vander Heide, Head Editor, INALJ NYC The Sky Isn’t Falling Looking for a job can be extremely stressful, overwhelming, and time consuming. Whether you have some professional experience or no professional experience, like me when I graduated, the job hunt can start to seem insurmountable. No matter how many times someone tells…
by Rebecca Vogler, Head Editor, INALJ Nevada The Skinny on Cruise Ship Librarianship If you’ve been around INALJ.com since the beginning of last year, you may remember a couple of Success Stories that were written about newly minted MLIS graduates going to work as a cruise ship librarian. One was written about me. That article,…
by Kate Kosturski, Head Editor, INALJ Rhode Island Guerrilla Storytime I went to the Networking Uncommons at the 2014 American Library Association Midwinter Meeting in Philadelphia with only one purpose: to Charge All the Things. (Which is why many of us use the Uncommons, really.) It just happened that the time I showed up to…
Over 4 million total page views reached in January! What a great month! The big news is we reached over 4 million page views at INALJ.com on 1/13! In addition it was the best month at INALJ.com for many stats! January’s busiest day was 15,556 views on 1/27, and our busiest week EVER at 86,866 views…
by Heidi Greathouse, Head Editor, INALJ Utah Having A Positive Perspective Have you ever felt like life is going against you and things do not go as planned? I am sure many of us have felt this in the job search world such as when we get rejection after rejection, not getting the promotion we…
by Sarah Deringer, Head Editor, INALJ Kentucky Your Library Board is NOT a Glass Ceiling – Tips to Build Your Library’s Future Together If you have ever worked at a library with a board of trustees, you may have found it to be a struggle when communicating and developing plans for library improvements. The main…
by Angela J.A. Kent, Head Editor, INALJ-Virtual Work Navigating the Bend in the Road The bends in one’s career path can appear with little or no notice or be well-mapped out ahead of time. They are those turning points when you start or leave a job; matriculate or graduate from an academic program; relocate for…
by Clayton Hayes, Head Editor, INALJ North Dakota Digital Monographs: There’s Still a Long Way to Go In many libraries, especially academic libraries, remote resources have become more or less a standard. It has come to be expected that an academic library will have access to a wide variety of scholarly materials, both in the…
by Suzanne Schultz Pick, Head Editor, INALJ UK Library Workshops and Seminars for the United Kingdom in 2014 While searching for your library job, it’s important to keep up to date on library events and news. Even if you’re not working in a library, keeping yourself involved in the library world gives you important skills…