Law librarians and the importance of training

May your training room be full!

In this article I want to highlight the vital role that UK legal information professionals play annually each September. My team can testify to the fact that late summer is a busy time. Those of us involved in legal private practice are preparing for a new intake of trainee lawyers. Depending on the size of the client firm, this can be from 5-20+ new starters, so there is much to do. 

A personal approach to mentoring

Looking for me?

Independence can be an obstacle to effective mentoring. From a personal point of view I'm happy to go away and look up an answer myself if I'm struggling. That's perfect if it is a fact based problem but what if it is more empathic or personal? Allowing yourself to develop your soft skills through discussion is actually a skill in and of itself. Asking for mentoring assistance can be tricky and requires an exchange of trust. 

Virtual teams and collaborative working #BIALL2017

I've now completed my first full week of truly remote working so am reasonably well equipped to comment on and consolidate the notes taken from the various relevant sessions. As usual BIALL had ensured that although there were topic overlaps, a different perspective was given by each expert. Eleanor Windsor from LibSource presented on 'Managing a successful virtual team', whilst the entire Vinge law firm library team came in to offer insight on working together in different offices. And finally a duo from the University of Law talked about collaborative working to reduce pressure on library services.

Being Informed about Brexit #BIALL2017

The notes that follow arise out of the BIALL Conference 2017 and given the theme of the conference was 'Together or Apart? Effective ways of working'  I'm happy to share my notes! This has recently been updated to reflect the #BIALL2019 conference on Vable.

Being Informed about Brexit

The first plenary session - and Willi Steiner Memorial Lecture was entitled 'Informing the debate about Brexit', presented by David Allen Green. This is obviously a contentious topic as a whole but at least law librarians can claim to be well informed as to the arguments. After all, it is the legal chaos in which we are interested. As I have noted in the past information specialists are experts in spotting fake news. We have all the skills and expertise required to assist the general public and others who rely on us to get things right.