AaL Comes to FLA
Please join us for this year’s Ask a Librarian Annual User Forum at the
Florida Library Association 2011 Conference in Orlando, Florida.
Thursday, May 5, 2011
1:15 – 2:15 pm
Conference Room: Volusia/Cape Canaveral
We’ll recognize our Exemplary Reference Award winners, and give you an exciting recap of the past year in Ask a Librarian. You’ll get the inside scoop on the incredible Instant Invite tool and hear about a brand new texting development that will make you jump for joy.
The first 20 attendees to give Beth or Traci a high-five get a nifty Ask a Librarian drawstring bag, so be there or be square!
your help needed – upcoming shifts
Your help is needed for the following Ask a Librarian shifts! Please consider taking one of the following to help your peers:
Sun., May 1, 2-3 pm (collaborative)
Thurs., May 5, 5-6, 6-7, and 7-8 pm (collaborative)
Fri., May 6, 1-2 and 3-4 pm (collaborative)
Sat., May 14, 1a-12p (collaborative)
Tues., May 17, 7-8 pm (collaborative)
Please check your schedules and let me know (avett@tblc.org) if you can help out with a one-time or ongoing shift.
Ask a Librarian Mentoring Program
Attention, staff:
Have you attended training, but just haven’t had much opportunity to practice or staff the desk?
Are you trying to staff… but still feel a little like a fish out of water?
Would you like someone to help you apply your knowledge and skills to the exciting world of virtual reference?
Since its debut in 2009, the Ask a Librarian Mentoring Program has helped others just like you. From live, one-on-one guidance during actual patron chats to anytime-emails of reassurance or feedback and support, your mentor will work with you to meet your individual goals in chat reference on Ask a Librarian.
Who is an Ask a Librarian Mentor?
Ask a Librarian Mentors are librarians, just like you, who have experience working with real patrons in live chat through Ask a Librarian. Your mentor is there to share his or her knowledge, experiences, and wisdom in conducting chat reference and using the Ask a Librarian InstantService software. Your mentor’s foremost goal is to help you – to encourage your comfort, growth, and achievement in a warm, supportive environment. Who can beat that?!
What will I learn?
Your mentor will help you to navigate successfully through the InstantService software (such as pushing nifty Web pages to patrons), to feel more comfortable utilizing online resources that help you – and your patron – during chats, tips on building and maintaining patron rapport from their own personal experiences, and more.
How does it work?
We’ll find you your very own ‘seasoned pro’. Your Ask a Librarian Mentor will work with you to establish a plan of action that best fits your needs and schedule. Some mentors even prefer to work evenings and/or weekends – so chances are great that we can find someone whose availability matches yours. From emails and phone calls to practice sessions and real-time assistance during actual patron chats, your mentor is there to help you succeed!
Where do I start?
Interested? Fill out this form to become a mentee: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=PXvDmojyoBFJ3iGvcUEnXg_3d_3d or email me for more information. What do you have to lose, but maybe a little anxiety or fluttering stomach? Virtual reference experience builds your professional growth and your experience portfolio, so take advantage of your peers’ generosity and increase your skill & comfort levels in Ask a Librarian.
Support Florida Libraries! – online submission tool
Have you tried FLA’s automated contact tool yet? It allows you to voice your support of Florida’s libraries with just a few clicks. Just enter your contact information and choose from email or print delivery. You can use the fully-crafted default message as-is, or you can modify it to add your own positive messages for a more personal perspective.
http://capwiz.com/ala/fl/home/
I chose to modify my message a bit, and it still only took me maybe 2-3 minutes total for the whole process. When you click “Send Message”, your message is automatically distributed to the following people:
Rick Scott (R-FL), Governor
Jennifer Carroll (R-FL), Lt. Governor
Your State Upper Chamber Representatives
Your State Lower Chamber Representatives
Hillary Clinton, Secretary of State, Secretary
Denise Grimsley, Representative, Committee Chair
Mike Haridopolis, Senate President, Senate President
Mike Horner, Representative, Committee Chair
Don Gaetz, Senator, Committee Chair
Dean Cannon, Speaker, Speaker of the House
Have a great day,
Traci
Chat, Text, Email Statistics – March 2011
The following statistics are now available for the month of March 2011:
Hot Topics: Customer Service Excellence, or How to Win an Exemplary Reference Award
Please register now for our upcoming webinar:
Hot Topics: Customer Service Excellence, or How to Win an Exemplary Reference Award
Mon., June 6, 2011 – 1:30 – 3:00 pm ET
Each month, the Quality Assurance Workgroup presents awards in 3 areas – Brief, Detailed, and Teaching chats – based on outstanding virtual reference customer service in Ask a Librarian. In this workshop, Susan Livingston of South Florida Community College, who has won four Exemplary Reference Awards, will provide the tips and tricks she has developed to provide superior customer service. Pat Barbier, co-chair of the Quality Assurance Workgroup, will provide valuable tips and insights from the Quality Assurance Workgroup perspective. Let Susan and Pat give you all the tools you need to provide customer service excellence and secure your next Exemplary Reference Award. Register today!
March Madness Month – Wed., March 30
** Note: If you didn’t receive this in its more attractive email format earlier today, please email Traci at avett@tblc.org .
March Madness Month
A month of surprising facts, informative highlights, and fun activities… all for the chance to brag about our incredible services!
When Ask a Librarian Day (February 22) was over this year, we didn’t want your enthusiasm and focus to stop there – we wanted to continue the increased promotion with our second annual March Madness Month. Like last year, we used the month of March to promote awareness of Ask a Librarian through interesting tidbits, tips on customer service in virtual reference, marketing suggestions, and fun service-oriented challenges to heighten enthusiasm & interest and encourage active participation among all member libraries.
The primary aim of this month’s campaign was to encourage you who staff Ask a Librarian to think about Ask a Librarian in different ways. We wanted to bring you out of the box a bit to reenergize your support of the incredible service available to all Florida residents. We know that increased motivation means increased Word-of-Mouth Marketing (WOMM) to your own colleagues and library users, and we were thrilled to see some of those ideas put to creative use! Thinking more about the benefits of Ask a Librarian makes it so much easier for you to share those observations and experiences with others.
And we must say… you did a fantastic job. We enjoyed spotlighting your own experiences and ideas for everyone statewide to see – in your own words – not only as a real marketing success story, but also because your own words reach out to your peers in a way that germinates enthusiasm like wildfire.
Thank you for sharing your observations and experiences with us, and please keep spreading the word!
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March Madness Month – Mon., March 28
** Note: If you didn’t receive this in its more attractive email format earlier today, please email Traci at avett@tblc.org .
March Madness Month
A month of surprising facts, informative highlights, and fun activities… all for the chance to brag about our incredible services!
AaL Day 2011, Hodges University
And the Winners are…
In Issue 11 of the March Madness Month series, we challenged you to take our Customer Service Question 3 Quiz – to tell us which option you’d choose in the below scenario and why. This scenario deals with how your active participation during your shifts is so crucial for the success of Ask a Librarian, to ensure that staff are not overwhelmed on the desk and that statewide users receive the help they need.
To refresh your memory, here is the original question and the 3 possible responses:
You are scheduled to cover the statewide desk. During your shift, you preview a question that you are not sure how to answer; however, no one else is picking them up. Several others are on the desk. What do you do?
1. Continue to research the question; maybe you’ll find eventually find the answer and be able to pick them up.
2. Just let it be – others are on the desk, so surely someone else out there could be more helpful than you at this point.
3. Pick up the question. Let the user know that you aren’t quite familiar with that topic, but you will definitely see what you can find.
So which one would you choose? Let’s preface this a bit by saying that if you’ve ever experienced a tiny moment of panic when previewing a user’s question, you’re weird. Just joking… seriously, all that really means is you’re human, like most of us on the desk. We all have areas of strength and those other (shh) areas, and that’s perfectly okay. In fact, we think it’s great. Remember that it’s not your all-consuming knowledge of every topic under the sun that makes you great at what you do. You definitely don’t want to leave someone waiting indefinitely because you’re unsure of your steps. Just pick them up and do the best you can! Use the Agent Room for reference stumpers, or the AskRef listserv. Remember that not every user needs that information pronto – always keep in mind the possibility of following-up by email so you can consult with your peers. We are all in the same exciting boat, and you are in the company of others who can help – those who participate in Ask a Librarian make up an incredible professional peer network, so you are quite literally never alone.
And the Winning Responses are…
Jane DeBellis, Santa Rosa County Library System
“In the scenario given, I would select number 3. If the question is difficult or tricky for a trained professional imagine what it seems like to the customer who had the guts to ask the question in the first place. Oftentimes the question is not difficult as it first seems but needs to be clarified and broken apart to make it manageable both for yourself and the customer. Only by taking the question and beginning the reference interview can you really assist the customer in meaningful manner. Option number 2 only gives AaL a bad reputation. Option number 1 allows you to learn something and perhaps hone your own skills but again does nothing to assist the customer unless you eventually pick-up the question. In option number 3 you assist the customer while at the same time learning something yourself about where information is available to help with the question in the future.”
Angela M. Falsey, Sarasota County Library System
“The answer of course is option 3. We are librarians–we are not supposed to know all the answers, but we are supposed to be able to figure out how to find the answers. Chatting with the patron will yield more detail and help you focus on what they really need–researching before picking up is a waste of time. And sometimes you know more than you think you do–maybe the patron just needs help choosing the right search terms. There’s no point in staffing the desk if you’re not going to pick up questions!”
Laura A.B. Cifelli, Lee County Library System
“I would pick up the question so the patron is served. If the patron has been waiting, she (for the ease of answering this question, let’s assign gender) may be getting frustrated and I want her to know I’m here to help. The reference interview is meant to clarify the question so what is typed may not exactly be what is needed. As we work together, I may become more sure of myself or the patron may provide me with enough information that I know what direction to go in. I can also establish a timeline. The patron may not need the information during our session but the information I gather and the contact we make will allow me to do this question as a followup and email her later when I can do more research. If I just let the question sit in queue, no one is served. By tackling it, we all have a good experience.”
Congratulations to our winners!!!
We are truly proud of your incredible insight and standards for customer service. You make your library systems and us look great!