Comments on: Bill & Ted Had It Right!

By: BES

BES — Thu, 20 Dec 2007 19:48:00 +0000

Word! I come from a retail background and now, as a librarian, I am often surprised at the lack of “customer/patron service” mentality I find throughout our profession. It is changing, and that, I am excited about. Patrons ARE choosing us over so many other sources, and we HAVE to really change the perception of librarians from bitter information hoarders, to helpful, willing, information specialists. Great Post. I hope that you (and I) can keep up this idealism throughout our careers.

By: Chris

Chris — Tue, 18 Dec 2007 20:11:00 +0000

“Take a position in a system that has a high tax base. This ensures that your customers will be mostly pleasant to interact with, “
I must take issue with this comment. I have worked in both the richest and poorest communities in my library system. And the gap between the 2 is huge – multimillion dollar mansions vs abject poverty. I was treated like garbage by more than a few noveau riche types in the upper crust community. Customers would bitterly protest a 25 cent fine and “ask” for help at the copy machine by reminding me “after all, you are a servant”. (I am not kidding.) On the other hand, residents of the poor community, while admittedly under a lot of stress, were unfailingly polite and respectful. They almost always behaved with dignity and treated me like a human being.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 14 Dec 2007 18:33:00 +0000

In four short notes, you’ve fully encapsulated everything I wish all public service librarians would be. Kudos!

By: Booktender

Booktender — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 23:01:00 +0000

"I love everybody" is a sure trip to burnout within a year. No doubt. "I respect each person's right to be human" will last you decades. At least it has for me the last 20 years.

The attitude you bring to your profession determines your success in any aspect of that profession. Whether you're in the front line or behind the scenes, you'll always have customers (both internal and external) and you'll always have administrators and their wacky mysterious ways.

Good luck at your behind-the-scenes job. I hope you find it easier to regain your perspective in your new job.

By: Booktender

Booktender — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 22:24:00 +0000

Well said. To me, it often comes down to Raganathan's Fourth Law of librarianship: Save the Time of the Reader.

Be unapproachable? Hate public service? Talk about wasting the time of the reader! Just turn 'em off and you're wasting their time - and your energy. It takes a lot more energy to be crabby than it does to be welcoming. Trust me on this.

To the 4th law I am always aware of Booktender's Corollary: "Wear comfortable shoes." It makes it so much easier to smile.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 16:31:00 +0000

Dear Folks, This is a beautiful post. I truly hope that after you graduate and enter public service, your sentiments will remain the same. I too was an idealistic, “I love everyone” type of person when I finished grad school. I have just completed one year of being a public librarian. Here are four key points of advice for maintaining that excellent attitude: 1) Take a position in a system that has a high tax base. This ensures that your customers will be mostly pleasant to interact with, and that there will be funds for useful things such as a sensor gate that actually works (ours doesn’t, which means items from our collection walk out the door on a regular basis) and a full time security guard who is professionally trained to handle difficult people. 2) Don’t take any job in a MAJOR metropolitan area that pays less than $40K. If you can barely pay your living expenses, that stress will transfer to the job. Not to mention that when you work for less than what you’re worth, it’s harder to prove you deserve a decent salary bump when you look for your next position. 3) Make sure your library admin staff really cares about its people and isn’t just paying lip service, telling you to bend over backwards for customers while failing to have a clue about what life on the front lines is really like. If they say stuff like, “oh we haven’t been able to offer that training on how to supervise people for a couple of years now” and that training is required in order to move up into a higher position, they’re not in your corner. 4) If you can maintain a smile on your face while being chewed out by a customer, if you can maintain professionalism when being insulted by someone who would be furious if the same biased sentiment (“you people all look alike to me”) they just spewed at you were turned back upon him/her, and if you can stand being asked to do students’ homework for them while they impatiently drum their fingers on the ref desk expecting you to pull a miracle out of your rear end in 5 seconds, then you’ll be a stellar public reference librarian. Alas, a year of trying to measure up to such standards has burned me out. Very soon, I start a new job–blessedly OFF the front line–in a government library.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 16:17:00 +0000

peter, people are no different from place to place. i've never had any problems with verizon (in fact, i prefer them to comcast) and can only guess that your own bad experience can be chalked up to the fact that customer service will always be, and has always been, in corporations as in libraries, hit or miss. even i fail once in a while, great attitude, smiles and all. it's difficult to be on and perfect all the time, particularly when you are doing it for hours at a time.

i'm only responding because i've seen you complain about verizon at least twice now. not that i have stock in verizon, but they are the only game in town next to comcast, which means you and i need them to drive/keep prices down.

By: Janie L. Hermann

Janie L. Hermann — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 15:43:00 +0000

This post is bringing back memories. When I was a teacher I had one rule and only one in my classroom. It hung at the front on a sign:

Be Excellent to Each Other ~ Bill and Ted

Really, this one sentiment covered everything I needed by way of rules. The kids grew to understand that talking too loudly meant that they were disturbing their classmates and thus they were not be "excellent" to a friend. Also, not raising your hand or interrupting while someone else was speaking broke the rule, etc.

Perhaps libraries just need this one simple rule too? [tongue partly in cheek, but partly serious too]

By: Peter Bromberg

Peter Bromberg — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 12:25:00 +0000

Hi Cynthia, and welcome to Library Garden! I love, love, love your point: "that the person asking me for assistance has chosen the library over many other resources. I will do everything I can to make them happy about making that choice."

If we all remembered that every day we'd be half-way home! I also whole-heartedly agree that "being excellent to each other" is our great point of opportunity. It doesn't cost anything to be kind to the person standing in front of you (or on the phone, etc.), and all the money in the world can't buy that. If it could, I wouldn't receive such crappy treatment from [fill in your own corporate customer service horror story here. ] (I'll start: from Verizon!)

Thanks for choosing librarianship, and thanks for blogging with us at LG!

By: Jeff Scott

Jeff Scott — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 06:11:00 +0000

Great attitude! I think that feeling is shared with almost all librarians.