Library user behaviour and co-operative differences across state borders

As ever, opinions expressed here are entirely my own. This goes for anything in this blog, but it's worth reiterating today.

Once upon a time, a reference inquiry was a rarity in my library life. And when I went on a road trip, I could stop over for another CD just about anywhere without consideration of whether I'd stop in that town again.

Adelaide and Melbourne have very different public library behaviours and internal environments - from the little things all the way up. I've had a lot of time to observe and think on these and write down scraps of what I might say. Instead of writing a tome of minutiae I've decided to focus on two observations - customer usage patterns and inter-library co-operation. The implications of different funding models, particularly the long-term influences, are a third topic that might be worthy of future investigation but I don't feel that I am well enough informed to tackle that subject at present.

But first, some context

My public library experience has been in three library services, and these shape my observations. The first was a large suburban Adelaide library service with five branches (currently four), a range from wealthy to extreme economic disadvantage and incredible cultural diversity. The second was just outside of Adelaide, a town with two library branches, one of which was full-time, which also served a lot of visitors from nearby regional areas. The third, in Melbourne, is a large five-branch service in an area that's predominantly very wealthy.

As a serial visitor-of-many-libraries, I believe these two observations hold at least broadly true, if not universally.

On reference inquiry frequency

In Melbourne, library users understand that the staff are there to help navigate and pinpoint resources and make use of this opportunity.

Freshly arrived in Melbourne, during my first week in training, I was amazed how many reference inquiries I responded to. In Adelaide I did respond to reference inquiries, mostly local history and family history, but they were far fewer in number. Readers' advisory questions had been even rarer and I had begun to question the relevance of training in this, but now I receive several each day. Having always loved this part of the job, I am very happy! The only noticeable downturn I've observed since moving is in providing general purpose support in computer and device use outside of supporting library-specific systems and resources. In both services I worked in during my time in Adelaide libraries these were common, general website, email and word processing inquiries being particularly frequent - now inquires rarely stray outside of e-books, WiFi login and printing.

The reasons for this aren't immediately obvious, I can see the effects of differing user attitudes but the core eludes me yet. I have inklings, but nothing I can make a statement about.

Whilst I continue to observe and try to understand what makes library users in Melbourne more aware of the professional service capacity of libraries I'd be grateful to anyone who can share their own insights.

Strength in numbers

Adelaide's - and indeed all of South Australia's - libraries are recognised for their co-operation by way of the achievements of One Card / OneLMS / PLSA consortium, something I'm asked about often. Their co-operation, however, is much older and deeper. The systems providing public Internet and WiFi are shared rather than operated by each individual service and have been for years. I could visit any public library with my SA library card and log in to WiFi with the same login and no re-registration even before One Card, though that has substantially streamlined the experience. A system less visible to the public, P2, whilst no longer doing everything it was once built for, still offers state-wide consortium buying of collection materials so that even the smallest libraries are able to leverage some of the opportunities of a large buyer. Cross-promotion between library services at both staff and customer levels is quite commonplace.

Melbourne is different - the library services have a powerful individualist streak - there's the capacity to search across all public library catalogues and for customers to initiate inter library loans thorough Library Link Victoria  but asides this the co-operation I see is with other types of organisations - community centres, interest groups and other council or government bodies. Whilst there is interest and talk between library services about doing things differently, they don't seem to have gone terribly far with a myriad of reasons given - though I must add a caveat there, I'm further from such things than I once was so might be missing a lot. It will be interesting to see how co-operative efforts change over the next few years as other examples from around the country continue to appear.

Both Melbourne and Adelaide have very strong professional interactions (though in Melbourne this is more structured with many more events and the number of people involved vastly higher) - librarians talk to each other, share ideas and values but in Adelaide this has led to more joint efforts.

I believe that the difference in past and present funding models for the libraries in each city have played a substantial role in shaping the co-operative differences, however as previously stated, I don't currently feel well enough informed to analyse this with any confidence.

Lastly

There is greater difference between the libraries in Adelaide and Melbourne than I expected - I knew before I arrived that differences of scale would be substantial, in the city-wide sense if not in every branch I visit. Through Twitter I had become well acquainted with several librarians in Melbourne and noticed professional attitudes were similar in each cities and so expected it to continue into the working reality.

The various environments - particularly the historical environment - are what I presume to be the driver of difference. I suspect that funding challenges of the past are especially significant to co-operative differences. The user behaviour differences are harder to understand - it appears more fundamental than a short-term publicity effect.

Most of all I see that each city's librarians have a great deal to learn from each other yet, and that moving from an area of familiarity to another geographically removed from my roots has been a professionally valuable decision

If you'd like to discuss these differences, or others, I'd welcome it either in the comments or via Twitter.

Things I learned moving to Melbourne

I haven't posted for ages - I suppose that deserves an explanation. I've got a new job (woo!) which involved moving out of my house in Gawler to my parents' house in Adelaide then across to Melbourne, all in the space of two and a half weeks in mid-June. Then, a month later I realised I was going to have to move again. By the end of July I'd racked up my third move in two months. I really hope not to need to move again this year.

Time to share a few of the lessons I've learnt, though there will be more to share later and most could be expanded into posts of their own later.

So far, Melbourne weather has generally had higher lows and lower highs. I don't mind this at all, as it's the savagely cold mornings that I most dislike in winter. The rest I can deal with.

One of the single biggest adjustments has been to roads and traffic - not the size of the city or the volume of it, so far I've avoided problems with that, but just that it's different. So different that I'm going to write a future post about it. In the meantime, I'll just note that wet tram tracks are disconcerting to drive on as you slip all over the place.

The public transport is better than Adelaide's generally, though that you can't use Google Maps for journey planning or buy a single trip ticket is a little frustrating. Most of my trips have involved stringing multiple legs together so the app for the system has been a must have, used in combination with Google Maps as I have to work out the intersection or station I need to get to, not just the name of the final location. It's so far managed to get me where I go without serious event, though I did quickly learn that my station in the first house was not the one named for my suburb, and if I made that mistake I had a long walk ahead of me. I'm trying to walk or use public transport wherever realistically possible, but the newer house isn't so well placed for it. I'm looking forward to cycling more when my bicycle gets here.

Libraries here exist in a different environment and the user trends are also quite different to those I've encountered in the SA libraries I've worked in. There's plenty adjusting and learning to do, I think  making that adjustment offers a great opportunity for professional improvement. When I have some thoughts in order I'll see about posting them.

Free plastic shopping bags. They're still a thing here, and the first time I saw them I hardly believed my eyes. Just about every shop or take away place reflexively puts whatever you have, however small or easily carried, into a bag. Supermarkets often put very little in a bag, whereas in SA where the bags are purchased they are fully loaded. I've had a single lemon and a take away container with its own handle presented to me in a plastic bag. I'm doing my best to use as few as possible.

I'm living in a very small flat - not as small as a bedsit, but not much bigger. Easily the smallest place I've lived in for more than a week or two at a time. I also have very little of my stuff with me. I miss having access to some of my stuff, most notably my bicycle, comfy sofa and bookshelves, but it puts very little pressure on me. I like this very much. I didn't feel like my volume of stuff was excessive before, but next time I get to de-store it all I'll have to think hard on how I want to live in future.

Possibly as a result of two well-spoken parents and the focus on clear enunciation from singing and choral classes at a young age I've always fielded the occasional "where do you come from", but they've usually been months or years apart. Adelaide's accent is notably milder than Melbourne's, and now I'm getting this a few times a week, especially from library customers and random shop assistants who are surprised to learn that I'm Australian and have spent almost all of my life here. To a person from another country I sound Australian, to Australians, apparently not. I don't like the where-do-you-come-from-ing, but I'm resigned to it.

On the whole, I feel like I'm doing well at work and I'm certainly enjoying the chance to learn and do new things. Outside of work has been a little difficult for a while now but I think it's settled down and I like my new place.

I'm sure there's much, much more, but that will do for now.

Matryoshkas and Melbourne

Quite a few things have happened since my last post, and some things that I had made but could not yet show off can now be shown.

There have been two farewells from work and I made cards for both. One card was very much like those in my previous post, the other quite different. I modified an image from My Sparkle's matryoshka doll ornament tutorial to make it suitable for stitching into a card.

I do love making cards, but I hope not to have to make another farewell card TOO soon.

I also took a trip to Melbourne - travel is another thing I love, though this time going on a grand adventure was not an option. I saw many sights and relaxed for four days which was well needed. I went to the Esplanade Market at St Kilda where I found these fantastic geeky earrings. There were many single earrings to choose my pair from, but this pair just worked so well?

Of course, the food in Melbourne was amazing too. I had meals from all corners of the world and even found a cupcake bakery with more than twenty varieties of cupcakes, that decision was a hard one! The best meal I had was from Xpresso Mondo in Degraves Street. Such a small restaurant that there were no indoor tables, but on a clear night the outdoor tables were very atmospheric. Braised lamb shanks from the specials menu were absolutely delicious and cooked beautifully. I might have missed out on Mum's Sunday roast, but this went some way to making up for it!

I did many other things in Melbourne - visited ACMI and played fantastic games at the Best of the Independent Games Festival 2012 display and got to call it a cultural experience! I also visited NGV, wandered around the Fitzroy Gardens and generally had a wonderful time.

Now I've got some knitting to do - I bought some sashay yarn at Clegs and am working on making a fabulous frilly scarf.

Until next time!