worked with him or were on his course.” But­despite­his­library­roots,­his­first­ career was archaeology: “It was a bit like­being­a­glorified­student.­It­was­ good fun but for saving any money and putting roots down anywhere, it was more­difficult.”


In his late 20s he decided to retrain. “I remember having a conversation with my mum one Christmas. I said ‘Don’t be angry but I think I might retrain… I’d like to work in libraries’ and she said, ‘Why would I be angry?’.” Asked how his parents might have influenced­him,­he­said:­“I­saw­the­real­ impact­and­benefits­of­the­work­that­ mum did in a school library. Yes, I saw that she had loads on her plate, but I think the role that the school library played at the heart of the school, that really had an impact on me.”


Career path


Choosing a route into the profession was done almost by chance. Luke says: “I went through the traditional route,


July-August 2023


library school, got a degree, got experience as a library assistant, got a job as a librar- ian,­got­my­first­management­role­and­ progressed from there.” It sounds linear, but asked why he went for the public rather than the academic librarian route he put it down to “just doing what was available,” adding: “I did my two-week placement in the prisons in County Durham then ended up volunteer- ing in prison libraries. And when a paid job came up, I worked in prison libraries, which then got me the role working in local studies libraries.”


He doesn’t remember making a con- scious choice, but he acknowledges there “may have been a slightly subconscious leaning toward public libraries because they were such a big part of my growing up and I saw the potential to have an impact. Once in public libraries, that’s where I felt comfortable.”


Blocked view


Luke’s point about the dearth of national level roles is an acknowledgement that the


sector’s resources for in-depth horizon scanning are limited. It also means that those institutions that do it, need to make sure their horizon scans are shared with all the professionals in the sector for whom it is relevant.


Luke says “When I got the job here at Arts Council England as Director, Librar- ies, one of the requirements was to have experience as a head of service. So even though I might quite quickly forget what it’s like to be a head of service, I’ve still got that understanding…”


His point is that there is still an advo- cacy job to be done to get the message across to library services about what Arts Council England can do for them. “There is still some work to be done internally because the Arts Council has ‘Arts’ in the title. Because of the variety of ways that library services are managed within local authorities, some (library) services­don’t­see­us­as­a­natural­first­ port of call for support. In Newcastle, we were part of operations and regulatory services. We came under school meals


INFORMATION PROFESSIONAL DIGITAL 33


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