{"id":85134,"date":"2014-12-01T08:00:16","date_gmt":"2014-12-01T14:00:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/?p=85134"},"modified":"2014-11-30T17:54:30","modified_gmt":"2014-11-30T23:54:30","slug":"my-inalj-u-k-success-story","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/?p=85134","title":{"rendered":"My INALJ U.K. Success Story"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Suzanne Schultz Pick, Senior Assistant,\u00a0INALJ UK<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

My INALJ U.K. Success Story<\/span><\/h3>\n

\"Suzanne<\/a>I went on holiday to Florida at the end of September, as we usually do, so I wasn\u2019t checking\u00a0up on job posts for a good two weeks. I arrived back in England on the morning of the 7th\u00a0October, and went straight back to checking for jobs on Direct Gov<\/a>. I found two local listings\u00a0for library positions that were through an agency.<\/p>\n

I admit, that in these past few years, I\u2019ve felt so discouraged that I\u2019ve dismissed job\u00a0applications because the process is long and arduous with all these repetitive fill-in-the-blank\u00a0tables that totally screw up when trying to fill out in a Word document. The agencies, though,\u00a0they accept a CV only, so I sent mine in to the two who posted the Library Assistant job\u00a0roles.<\/p>\n

I immediately heard back from both. The main questions the agency staff had for me was if I\u00a0had a current DRB\/CRB (criminal background check) and any experience in libraries and\/or\u00a0customer service. I did. After working in the schools, both as a supply teacher and a teaching\u00a0assistant volunteer, I have had background checks done a lot in the past three years. Also,\u00a0I have worked in the public library in Florida for part of my Practicum through my MLS\u00a0program, and when I started at the university, I worked at a grocery store for a handful of\u00a0years.<\/p>\n

One agency wanted the CRB copy up front and an application filled out before I could even\u00a0apply for the job. The other agency sent my CV to the Council who was doing the hiring for\u00a0the libraries, and was able to give me an offer for a job within a couple of days.<\/p>\n

Once I was at the job, I found out that during my time on holiday, the Council had posted for\u00a0twenty one library assistant jobs, but the deadline for applications was that weekend before\u00a0I came home. But they were desperate for staff, so I came in with a few other people from\u00a0other agencies, to help out over the Christmas holidays.<\/p>\n

After working well at the position for a month or so, I was given the opportunity to apply\u00a0for the same job, but as permanent staff for the Council libraries. I had to fill out the long\u00a0application form and answer two main, important questions:<\/p>\n

\u2022 What are your current job duties?<\/strong> \u2013 I took the job spec and reworded everything\u00a0that they were looking for in a library assistant role, using bullet points.<\/p>\n

\u2022 What makes you qualified for this position?<\/strong> \u2013 This is where I had a chance to really\u00a0spell out everything I\u2019d been doing at the current job post. I cited customer service (a\u00a0major factor), IT skills, working with children, internal computer systems, events I\u00a0had worked on, clerical duties, and opening\/closing procedures for the branch.<\/p>\n

I was given a day to get myself ready for an interview, and the main questions I was asked\u00a0were about customer service and team work:<\/p>\n

\u2022 Give examples of how you\u2019ve provided good customer service.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u2022 What do you think are the qualities of good customer service?<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u2022 If a customer (they are not using the word \u201cpatron\u201d here) has a complaint, what\u00a0do you do?<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u2022 If a customer\/member of the public is desperate and needs your help, what do\u00a0you do?<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u2022 What skills do you have to provide excellent customer service?<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u2022 Give an example of how you handled conflict with a team member.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u2022 How important do you think working in a team is?<\/strong><\/p>\n

These are things we do every day as librarians and library assistants, but it\u2019s hard to explain\u00a0in detail without sounding repetitive. Luckily, I had been at the job and have a fairly good\u00a0memory, so I was able to give specific examples that I had experienced at the current library\u00a0within the last month.<\/p>\n

This whole experience is something I really didn\u2019t think would happen for me, since I\u2019ve\u00a0been searching so long to get my foot in the door. There are internal jobs for staff with an\u00a0MLS degree, so being a full member of staff at the Council will be a great to kick start my\u00a0career.<\/p>\n

The bottom line is, if you take every opportunity, don\u2019t give up, and really let the\u00a0interviewers know that you are eager to please a customer, and willing to work as a team,\u00a0you will do really well in an interview. Even if you\u2019ve worked in shops or grocery stores,\u00a0volunteered, or had another career previously, it can all tie into work at the library. We serve\u00a0the same basic purposes: working with the public, working with kids, handling money,\u00a0handling products, and getting along with our co-workers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Suzanne Schultz Pick, Senior Assistant,\u00a0INALJ UK My INALJ U.K. Success Story I went on holiday to Florida at the end of September, as we usually do, so I wasn\u2019t checking\u00a0up on job posts for a good two weeks. I arrived back in England on the morning of the 7th\u00a0October, and went straight back to…<\/p>\n

Read more \u2192<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":60449,"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":[146,69,3592,5900,13,217,144,5902],"class_list":["post-85134","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-articles","tag-advice","tag-article","tag-blog","tag-inalj-uk","tag-interview","tag-interview-questions","tag-success-story-2","tag-suzanne-schultz-pick"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/01\/Suzanne-Schultz-Pick1.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1WoMK-m98","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/85134","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\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=85134"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/85134\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/60449"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=85134"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=85134"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=85134"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}