How to be in-demand library science professional?

[Ramesh]

Hello friends,

Sorry for being inactive over the forum for so long. Some personal chores have taken me aback. Now I am back to my fraternity with a wonderful well researched article. I hope you'll be benefited.

Specially the students who are looking forward to get job are going to be the true beneficiary of this.

How to get job in LIS after a marked shrinkage in job opportunities

[Siddhartha Shankar Ray]

Dear Sri Ramesh,

Thanks for your post and your concern.

I have read Ms. Garima Kaushik's writing also.

This is a bare fact that job opportunities in our profession is shrinking. I believe that there are several reasons and the foremost is supply is abundant against requirement. Besides, with the advent of computers, demand for human labor has been diminished to a considerable extent.

Ms. Garima has correctly mentioned the shrinking recruitment policies of National Research bodies.

There is another aspect which needs to be mentioned simultaneously, and that is excessive dependence on Machines over human brain & ability.

The questionable quality of education and pathetically poor knowledge level of individuals are adding to the downfall of the quality of the profession and lastly, but not the least, is the huge gap of required efficiency and knowledge gained in academia. I would like to add another issue as an extension to the last point I mentioned; which is the trend of recruitment of contractual and retired professionals. 

I intend to highlight the last one as I belong to the last group (the working retired professionals)  Unlike our days, there are plenty of private organizations coming to academia and govt. jobs are shrinking  for many reasons; while one of which is introduction of Computers, while among the others is improper employment coupled with inactive attitudes of many of us worked in govt. sector!! Fortunately or unfortunately, It is mostly known in a city or even a metropolis who are competent in the profession; mostly irrespective of their ranks. So we all know them more or less. I must add here that it is the ethical responsibility of the 'elders' to guide and train the younger generations (especially when they were not so trend at the universities and one possible reason as openly discussed that today's teachers though mostly hold Ph.Ds never worked in Libraries and as such lacks practical experience to train their students) which very few do!! Libraries need long time planning to develop effective while with time bound contractual recruitment this is not possible so neither good Libraries nor good Librarians are found to be in the making!!

The gap of Degree and knowledge level is so big that many Ph.Ds are compelled to work in school or village public libraries. As the UGC has introduced career advancements for College Librarians, everyone is racing for Ph.Ds with extremely poor topics and contributing worthless papers to even paid conferences/publishers. The screening system in NETs are designed to maximize the number of "qualified" candidates while very little percentage of them have ability to write even a 500 words paper on a given topic!!

The employers are cutting recurring costs on human resources paying one time cost to infrastructure and e-materials which were not imaginable some 20-30 years ago. We make one time investment on RFID, Bar Codes, Kindles, practice copy cataloguing and admittedly, all these make the system smarter and error-free but all these shrink employment of professionals. Earlier Libraries subscribing to 350 print periodicals had to recruit at least two professionals while today, one person can manage 5 online databases comprising 35,000 full text e-journals with access to their back volumes at the readers' desktops and the foot falls in libraries became extinct so also the importance of the Library professionals. There is no denying that in spite of these 'modernizations' library professionals are regularly recruited in Western Countries, especially in USA. I often doubt whether we are doing anything professionally which are not covered by e- resources and cyber media. Honestly, I have no clue as yet but I suspect that priority of Machines over human ability/brain might be one reason in our country.

Sincerely,

Siddhartha S. Ray, Calcutta   

[Ramesh]

Hello Siddhartha,

I must say your reply is very insightful. I am also concerned with the jobs cut in LIS profession. But when you are a small fish in big pond, you have to learn hunting more cleverly. Jobs cuts are inevitable & hence what we can do is improving our skills.

I would again thank you for reading the blog & giving your thoughts on the same.