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Making it to the major leagues: career movement between library and archival professions and from small college to large university libraries

Library Trends, Spring, 2002 by Timothy J. Johnson

ABSTRACT

ISSUES OF CAREER MOVEMENT AND CHANGE are examined between library and archival fields and from small colleges to large universities. Issues examined include professional education and training, initial career-planning and placement, continuing education, scouting and mentoring, job market conditions, work experience and personal skills, professional involvement, and professional association self-interest. This examination leads to five observations: 1. It is easier, in terms of career transitions, for a librarian to become an archivist than it is for an archivist to become a librarian; 2. The progression from a small college venue to a large research university is very manageable with the proper planning and experience; 3. At least three of the career elements--professional education, career-planning, and professional association self-interest--in their best moments provide a foundation that enables a future consideration of change between institutional types and professional areas and in their worst moments conspire against the midcareer professional in terms of change; 4. The elements of scouting, continuing education, work experience, and professional involvement offer the greatest assistance in career transitions; 5. The job market is the wildcard that either stymies or stimulates occupational development.

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INTRODUCTION

Eleanor Gehrig once asked her husband, baseball legend Lou Gehrig, "What's the difference between a baseball player in the high minor leagues and a man in the major leagues?" The Yankee great responded, "One step." The answer was both simple and complex, loaded with all the pain, passion, and perplexities of a game that has been transformed into a business and anointed as the national pastime. As a former high school baseball player who has seen at least one classmate make it into the majors, Gehrig's answer made sense in pondering a professional path in the library and archival fields. That autobiographical and professional pondering, in both its simplicity and its complexity is examined here. What are some of the elements of that one step that might separate a player in the informational minor leagues from one in the majors? Is this distinction of the quicker-stepped major leaguer valid when technology is in some sense leveling the playing field? Are there, indeed, major and minor leagues in the information world? And can a baseball player (read librarian) learn to successfully play cricket (read archivist) or vice versa?

The first part of this examination requires a brief autobiographical sketch. In early 1998, I accepted an offer to join the University of Minnesota's library staff and felt, in the process, like I had finally made it to the bibliographic big leagues. For sixteen years I had been trying to hone my game in the minors, first as a reference/instructional-services librarian in a small private college, then as the library director for that same struggling enterprise (moonlighting at the same time as a medical librarian at the local hospital), and finally as the director of archives in another, more financially secure, small college (now turned university). Now, at one of the nation's leading research libraries, I had the chance to take all those hard-learned lessons (and more than a few pleasant experiences) to the next level. Although physically older, I was a step quicker and (I trusted) a step wiser. I had made the one step.

I had followed, for the most part, a course mapped out in graduate school. The course was simple and straightforward: I wanted to be an academic librarian who began my career in a small college library. From there I hoped to move to a midsized college or university setting (with some additional administrative responsibilities) and finally find my way to a large research university. Small college, university, multiversity: that was the plan.

But even while formulating this plan I wondered if one could go straight from library school to a research university position. Other recent graduates seemed successful in jumping straight to the majors. But as graduation neared, I was still waiting on the bench. The library market for entry-level professional positions in the early 1980s was rather bleak. At the time there was only one half-time academic position available in Minnesota (where I attended library school and spent the better part of my second year lobbying to keep the school open. It was, quite possibly, my first taste of life in the major leagues.) Given that dim career-market prospect--the professional equivalent of Fenway Park's Green Monster in left field--resumes were scattered abroad in a kind of preprofessional fungo. Eventually I secured interviews with two Chicago-area institutions: a renowned private research library and a small undergraduate college. The college interview was facilitated by informal contacts with the previous library director, much in the manner of a minor-league scout, and resulted in a successful appointment. The major leagues, in the form of the research library, became a later career goal.

Making it to the major leagues: career movement between library and archival professions and from small college to large university libraries

Library Trends, Spring, 2002 by Timothy J. Johnson

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