HR Working Group on Librarian Orientation

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HR Working Group on Librarian Orientation

• UTL Staff ConferenceMay 08, 2006

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HR Working Group on Librarian Orientation

• Overview
• Terms of Reference
• Introduction to Committee Members
• Sub-Groups

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Needs Assessment

• Started with working group
• Sub-group
• Janice Crichton Patterson,
• Alastair Boyd and
• Gail Nichol
• What type of survey?
• How we communicated

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What email built
Results?
Trends?
Summary
Chart update
Ready to go?
How to use chart
Chart
More questions
Choosing Participants
Groupings good
P2P
Conversation
Multiple-choice?
How many?
Groupings
Survey?
Questions?
Who?
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Needs Assessment

• Survey results
• Wide variety of experience
• Knowledge from days as a student
• Local orientation generally good
• Unclear on UTL structure, PTR, PS
• Intranet and web-based resource
• Mentoring
• Interest in a checklist for follow-up

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Mentoring Sub-Group

• Mentoring subgroup
• Debbie Green (Robarts)
• Patricia LaCivita (UTSC)
• Ian Whyte (UTM)
• At UofT, mentoring programs are available for new
  faculty, female students and managers.

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Mentoring Sub-Group

• Mentoring at UTL draft document included the
  purpose of the mentoring relationship, the
  benefits, an outline of a pilot mentoring program
  and recommendations.
• The HR Working Group recommended that...

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Orientation Checklist for New Librarians

• The purpose of the Orientation Checklist is to
  facilitate the systematic and consistent
  provision of orientation for new librarians at
  the University of Toronto

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Checklist Subgroup

• The subgroups mission was to collect and collate
  key information to ease the transition for new
  librarians
• Members
• Veronica Chase
• Lee Robbins
• Ian Whyte

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Where to start?

• Looked at other universities orientation
  documents
• Based on personal experiences of group members
• In particular, focused on what had been lacking
  in the process
• Thought about the process of acclimating a new
  hire

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Checklist Creation

• Original checklist was huge!
• Lots of details and overwhelming amount of
  information
• Decided to organize by time and major categories

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Checklist

• Before Arrival
• First Days of Employment
• First Weeks of Employment
• First Six Months of Employment
• Ongoing
• Appendix

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Checklist Appendix

• Policies
• Procedures and Forms
• Benefit Programs
• Performance Assessment
• Planning
• Library Environment
• Technology
• Facilities Information and Other Services

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Checklist Evolution

• Discussed with and distributed to the Senior
  Staff of the central library and members of the
  Council of Campus Libraries
• Comments received were overwhelmingly positive
  with some helpful suggestions for additions

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Orientation Website
content.library.utoronto.ca/general-information/or
ientation-librarians/
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Report Recommendations

• Permanent committee
• Communications strategy get input from all
  librarians

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Key Factors for Success

• Willingness to listen
• Important topic to everyone
• Each member made a valuable contribution
• Shared experience of being the new person
• Sharing introduced additional ideas
• Common goal to ensure new librarians entering
  UofT would be armed with the knowledge they need

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Key Factors for Success

• Each person shared own experience added value
  to process
• Each person drew from areas of strength
• Humour enthusiasm experience was fun!
• Knowledge checklist would be used and would be of
  value to librarians
• Added value as training tool for GALTs
• Leadership of Co-Chairs kept group focused

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HR Orientation Working Group
Questions