Dance like there's no one watching you

THING 15: ATTENDING, PRESENTING & ORGANISING EVENTS

Capture your audience from the get-go: Make an entrance.

It's only recently that I've began really taking advantage of library related events when I got my first proper full-time post after Uni – I joined ARLIS which meant I could go on free tours of libraries and get a taste of real-life networking by attending events – my first every library related event being a symposium called Artists in the Library, which was really engaging and gave me a dose of enthusiasm.  I would like to think I’ve learnt a lot from attending these, but the most difficult part of such is applying things to the workplace and making it beneficial in the long-run.  Until now, I have hardly written reflectively, especially for my “career” (until recently when work-funded opportunities require a short report in order to share the experience with peers) but I am certain that the fact I am simply seeking out and attending as many opportunities as possible shows that I am interested, aware and engaged (or at least making the effort to try). 

I would definitely be interested in applying for funding or bursaries for the bigger conferences in the future, as I’ve had colleagues who won these places and really benefitted from them.  I have found it hard to not treat some events like a university lecture.  I furiously write notes for comfort but rarely make sense of them retrospectively.  I even found that on the last conference I went to I needed to close my notepad on reflection and just write from what I remembered – it definitely helped the cohesive writing flow rather than struggling to re-write the whole day exactly as it happened (boring).  I also tried my hand at “networking” with the help of a fellow networking-pro colleague on day one, I was alone on the second day and managed to converse with at least 2 people (!) but I am yet to actively engage with the speaker!  

Whilst I am nowhere near even thinking about ‘presenting’ I am looking at this in more of a general sense.  The thought of presenting a paper (or suchlike) instils me with great fear – I haven’t spoken to a group on something intellectual/academic since 2010 – from the point of thinking what to speak about (“if you’re working in a professional way - evaluating your services and modifying them in the hopes of improving them, you’ve probably got something to speak to others about”) to the physical speaking but I am trying to work on boosting my confidence and have applied to go on an internal course which I hope will do just that, and I can start speaking again.  Ideally, I’d like to do library tours but there are lots of other opportunities at work to speak either to an internal or external audience and hope, someday, I’ll be involved with this too. I also think Ned Potter’s slides on top-notch presenting are awesome - just check out his slideshare for proof! - but when it really comes down to it Obama is my speaking-hero (with these gifs I don't even need to explain why...)

I also hope the course will be beneficial for the tiny bits of presenting I do weekly to introduce speakers at our library staff development sessions – I always feel like I’m either laughing the whole time (I’m probably not) and have forgotten what words mean and how to put them together to make sentences (I probably haven’t) but I guess it’s all about practice.  

Which leads me nicely one to organising events… Since February this year (just a little after I began my secondment with another library department and aside from this) I took over the role of coordinator of our library staff development sessions – these are held weekly on a Wednesday morning, last roughly half hour, and allow library staff, Trust staff or relevant and interesting external speakers to speak to library staff about their work.  As far as staff development goes I think it’s a great forum for all staff to get together, collaborate, share ideas and recent projects or hear about how our work fits in to the wider world of history of medicine, or how our collections are being used in a wider sense (in the hope that this will improve our service).  I have always been interested in events organisation (I've interned and invigilated at galleries and for outdoor arts associations in the past) but had a gaping hole in my CV so I snapped up this opportunity as soon as it arose.  It’s small-scale and not hugely stressful it gives my job another element and I’m learning new communication/liaising skills all the while - I even set up a surveymonkey to encourage feedback to ensure the sessions still provide all staff with a beneficial half hour and, of course, to promote contributions! 

I'm definitely going to come back to 'presenting' both after my course and after I've presented something or another... Just to see how bad (or surprisingly OK) I was and to see where I can improve for the future. Hopefully it won't be so horrific I'll vow to never speak to other humans again, or crack out a fabulous rendition of Let's Stay Together...!

This is how we do it...