{"id":22147,"date":"2013-05-14T10:00:18","date_gmt":"2013-05-14T14:00:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/?p=22147"},"modified":"2013-05-27T13:06:08","modified_gmt":"2013-05-27T17:06:08","slug":"why-we-do-what-we-do-the-way-we-do-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/?p=22147","title":{"rendered":"Why We Do What We Do the Way We Do It"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Stephanie Leigh Taylor, Head Editor, INALJ British Columbia<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Why We Do What We Do the Way We Do It<\/span><\/h3>\n

\"inalj<\/a>What draws a person towards a career as an information professional?\u00a0 Is it an obsessive need to have things in their right place, the satisfaction of everything formatted correctly, the thrill of a perfectly set-up database?\u00a0 Is it a freewheeling appreciation of reckless teaching & learning, as the contents of a library contain the history of humankind\u2019s learning, thinking and doing?\u00a0 Do we do what we do because we love stories, or engaging ourselves and our communities in cerebral adventures?\u00a0 Are we drawn to information because some of us grew up with computers and were drawn into a life of codes and flash in order to educate others of our passions, or allow others to share with the world?\u00a0 <\/b><\/p>\n

I\u2019ve been thinking about this lately<\/strong>, due to a book I recently finished titled \u201cMr. Penumbra\u2019s 24-Hour Bookstore\u201d by Robin Sloan.\u00a0 In it, the protagonist attempts to solve a centuries-old mystery of the written word using a variety of tools both old and new, computers and e-readers as well as printing presses and audiobooks (on cassette<\/i>, my god).\u00a0 He does this primarily to help his employer, but also, I think, to satisfy the curiosity that draws many of us to the information profession, the urge to know<\/i>, or if not to know, then at least to have that which contains knowledge within our grasp.\u00a0 What could be more satisfying, more delicious, than to stand as a gatekeeper, a guard, a sentry, over all of humanity\u2019s efforts and that most pure of substances, information?<\/p>\n

And get paid<\/i> <\/strong>for it?<\/p>\n

With the right information, as we all know, we can do anything – plant gardens, do taxes, deliver babies, wage wars, cook, have sex, understand theoretical physics or just re-tile your bathroom.\u00a0 Hand in hand with that comes the organization of information, because what good is a mass of information with no way of getting at it?\u00a0 As items are described, we make connections between disparate material, and in doing so, understand the world.<\/p>\n

I believe all of us in the information biz, no matter our roles, are in this career due to our curiosity and our desire to arrange what we learn into new shapes and connections, to add to what has been already known and to share discovery with others.\u00a0 Thoughts or stories on why you joined to information brigade?\u00a0 Please share with the rest of us – it\u2019s always fascinating to hear how other people fall in love.\u00a0 Here is the LinkedIn INALJ discussion<\/a> you can join on this topic.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Stephanie Leigh Taylor, Head Editor, INALJ British Columbia Why We Do What We Do the Way We Do It What draws a person towards a career as an information professional?\u00a0 Is it an obsessive need to have things in their right place, the satisfaction of everything formatted correctly, the thrill of a perfectly set-up…<\/p>\n

Read more \u2192<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":21308,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[145],"tags":[69,3592,3992,4343,4342,3995],"class_list":["post-22147","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-articles","tag-article","tag-blog","tag-inalj-british-columbia","tag-inspiration","tag-motivation","tag-stephanie-leigh-taylor"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/inalj-april-2013-worditout.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1WoMK-5Ld","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22147","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=22147"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22147\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/21308"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=22147"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=22147"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=22147"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}