There is a huge difference between using other people's data and being truly co-operative. Most people nowadays seem to take, but not to give back - and my manager was criticising me, not completely seriously, but not completely in jest either, some years ago, for taking extra pains to get something right so I could contribute it back to a shared database so other people could reap the benefit.
Discussion around RDA, and economic exigency, has often touched on the necessity nowadays of being able to take data from as wide a range of sources as possible, to save cataloguing time and effort. There is, rationally enough, a consequent acceptance of the "good enough" rather than the pursuit of an absolute gold standard. I used to be quite fundamentalist about this myself when younger, regarding a deviation from the standard as not error, but sin. I've mellowed over time.
Because of our dependence upon derived records, indeed, standards are coming to be seen as comprising consistency not with universally-agreed rules but with the style of your principal source of records and, to use a UK example, I have heard people say that they catalogue "according to BDS". (This is not to decry the work of my colleagues there, which is excellent). It does, however, reinforce the idea that you take the best records you can find, and tailor your own house style to them.
The emphasis is so much on taking and accepting, and editing as little as possible, that the idea of sharing has rather gone out of the window. And arguments have been made that if RDA allows a greater scope for cataloguer's judgement, then sharing is no longer possible - noone is going to want your version of the record anyway.
What I don't understand is why, if we are being looser about standards, this isn't going to make sharing easier. What is wrong with making something a bit better, even if you don't make it perfect? Can we, actually, afford not to be altruistic?
Tuesday 7 June 2011
Thursday 2 June 2011
Building a career on laziness
It worked for me - building a career on other people's laziness.
Most people don't want to spend time checking data, or working on data repairs - it's not exciting or glamorous, even if it teaches you an awful lot about the way the database works.
Most people don't want to go to boring routine meetings - but even the dullest meeting has other people at it who might turn out to be really interesting.
Most people don't want to engage with detail, with a mass of routine tasks, with the daily repetitious grind, and they'll be delighted if you offer to help them out with it. And cataloguers are naturally good at this sort of thing, after all - we've got the eye for detail, we can manage a whole heap of tasks, we can sort stuff out, we can spot patterns in things and fit things together - we've got that sort of mindset.
So it always surprises me that more people don't want to get involved in what seems to be the boring stuff, but is actually the stuff which teaches you an awful lot about the way your system, your organisation, fits together and works (or doesn't work). I've heard all sorts of excuses - I'm too busy, I haven't got time, I'm stressed enough already, why should I, it's not in my job description, why can't someone else do it. Some cataloguers even shun this sort of thing because they think that it feeds the stereotype and that cataloguers too should be dealing with ideas and strategies and policy.
Of course we should. Even if what I am advocating seems like the very opposite of high-visibility cataloguing, I don't want cataloguers to get stuck in the mud. But one of the ways to get influence and respect is to be able to sort out other people's problems, contribute ideas which help them achieve what they want to do, come up with ideas for developments which fit well with what's already being done and take it a bit further forward. These are the things which come out of knowing how things work and having a mastery of the detail, of the underside of stuff.
I think we should engage with our inner geek and take advantage of any opportunity to get involved with what's going on around us, even at the lowest level, and make that the first step on the ladder, because knowledge really does become power.
So, next time one of your colleagues is complaining about having to do something really really boring, offer to help out by doing it for him; he'll thank you for it, and you'll be doing yourself and your future a power of good.
Most people don't want to spend time checking data, or working on data repairs - it's not exciting or glamorous, even if it teaches you an awful lot about the way the database works.
Most people don't want to go to boring routine meetings - but even the dullest meeting has other people at it who might turn out to be really interesting.
Most people don't want to engage with detail, with a mass of routine tasks, with the daily repetitious grind, and they'll be delighted if you offer to help them out with it. And cataloguers are naturally good at this sort of thing, after all - we've got the eye for detail, we can manage a whole heap of tasks, we can sort stuff out, we can spot patterns in things and fit things together - we've got that sort of mindset.
So it always surprises me that more people don't want to get involved in what seems to be the boring stuff, but is actually the stuff which teaches you an awful lot about the way your system, your organisation, fits together and works (or doesn't work). I've heard all sorts of excuses - I'm too busy, I haven't got time, I'm stressed enough already, why should I, it's not in my job description, why can't someone else do it. Some cataloguers even shun this sort of thing because they think that it feeds the stereotype and that cataloguers too should be dealing with ideas and strategies and policy.
Of course we should. Even if what I am advocating seems like the very opposite of high-visibility cataloguing, I don't want cataloguers to get stuck in the mud. But one of the ways to get influence and respect is to be able to sort out other people's problems, contribute ideas which help them achieve what they want to do, come up with ideas for developments which fit well with what's already being done and take it a bit further forward. These are the things which come out of knowing how things work and having a mastery of the detail, of the underside of stuff.
I think we should engage with our inner geek and take advantage of any opportunity to get involved with what's going on around us, even at the lowest level, and make that the first step on the ladder, because knowledge really does become power.
So, next time one of your colleagues is complaining about having to do something really really boring, offer to help out by doing it for him; he'll thank you for it, and you'll be doing yourself and your future a power of good.
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