INSIGHT ‘‘ I
Job shadowing and library visits have long been a useful way to learn from others and reflect on your own development and how your library runs its services.
Paul Cannon is College Librarian Medical, Veterinary and Life Sciences, University of Glasgow
Hong-Anh Nguyen is Library Service Manager, The King’s Fund
Health Libraries Group
Shadow magic: connections for professional development
Networks draw people together, allow us to share ideas and best practices, and make connections across a wide range of library and knowledge services. However, ‘networking’ is a term that often brings people out into a cold sweat (particularly for the introverts amongst us), conjuring up awkward small talk over drinks breaks at professional events!
N CILIP’s Health Libraries Group (HLG), we recognise that our rich network of members, across a wide range of organisations, are one of our greatest strengths.
Like many other CILIP special interest groups, we leverage this diverse and active membership to create an accessible CPD programme that aims to meet the needs of health and care library staff across the UK, regardless of sector or where they are in their career.
Job shadowing and library visits have long been a useful way to learn from others and reflect on your own development and how your library runs its services. Plus, who doesn’t like a day out at a library?
Opportunities
Prior to the pandemic, HLG ran a programme of library visits and shadowing was commonplace. That has fallen away slightly, but new opportunities have arisen, such as virtual visits and meetings, offering new ways for people to connect services and one another. We wanted to create an offer that met our members’ development needs with hybrid ways of working by facilitating connections for both virtual and in- person shadowing. We believe that both can be a great way to build knowledge a sector and the variety of roles and services within it, regardless of whether you are new to the profession or established in your career.
To aid these connections and help develop our members, we have created the Shadowing Network (
https://ciliphlg.com/ shadowing-network). Health and care libraries can join the network via the Health Libraries and Information Services Directory (HLISD). By joining the network, libraries are indicating that they are happy to provide continuing professional development (CPD) opportunities to support existing and aspiring library and knowledge professionals within the health and care sector.
Often shadowing is seen as a CPD activity that primarily benefits those who are interested in exploring the library
Spring 2025
profession as a career path or those at the early stages of their career. However, reverse shadowing (where the shadower is the more experienced person), can be a valuable way for those who are more established in their career to continue developing their technical, practical and cultural knowledge.
Shadowing
In an age of great technological and societal shifts that will have a significant impact on the world of work, reverse shadowing can be a rich source of learning for all. For example, if you are a leader thinking about developing your workforce, understanding the challenges and opportunities that are unique to the current generation of early career workers can help boost you future planning. Or are you still grappling with the idea of how you can use AI in your work? Why not learn from others who are a few steps ahead in their journey with experimenting with the use of AI in their services?
Alongside the more obvious CPD benefits of shadowing, it can also be hugely beneficial for those who are undertaking professional registration or revalidation. Whether working towards Certification, Chartership, Fellowship or Revalidation, the shadowing network can play an important part of developing and reflecting on your skills and wider professional knowledge. Whether you are working in a health library and knowledge service, or wondering what working in the health sector is like, the shadowing network can help you meet all three areas of the assessment criteria. Shadowing can help you develop skills outside of your current job role or employer, enable you to contrast and compare service performance in your current and different organisations, and develop your knowledge of other sectors. To help shadowing hosts and shadowees get the most out of their visits, we have created guidance about shadowing on our website (
https://ciliphlg.com/shadowing-network). This offers a series of questions and prompts to help both parties get the best out of the shadowing experience. If you work in a health and care service, we would love to see your library join the network: https://
ciliphlg.com/shadowing-network IP
INFORMATION PROFESSIONAL 39
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68
