Some of us don't express our skills very adequately. Are you able to pull it out of them and get it into an attention-getting resume? 

I think to the extent we can do that within these sessions, we definitely focus on that. What you say is 100% true. So many times a professional will say, but that's just what I do in my job. What's the big deal? And I say it is a big deal because that is a strength you have. And this isn't the time to hide it under a bushel basket. 

[ROCK MUSIC] 

CHARLIE BENNETT: You are listening to WREK Atlanta, and this is Lost in the Stacks, the research library rock 'n roll radio show. I'm Charlie Bennett in the studio with-- and normally I say some names here, but it is crowded. The oxygen level is starting to drop. I can feel it. I'm in the studio with a big old crowd. 

Each week on Lost in the Stacks, we pick a theme and then use it to create a mix of music and library talk. Whichever you are here for, we hope you dig it. 

MARLEE GIVENS: And our show today is called, "You Can Take It With You." 

ALEX MCGEE: OK, I was wondering where we were going to put the emphasis. I thought maybe it was, You. Can take. It with you. 

CHARLIE BENNETT: Oh, Alex. 

FRED RASCOE: Right. You got to put the em-phay-sis on the right syl-ab-ble. I was thinking you can take it with you. 

CHARLIE BENNETT: I honestly thought it was, you can take it with you. 

MARLEE GIVENS: Yeah, actually, that one also makes sense. 

CHARLIE BENNETT: Oh, good. 

ALEX MCGEE: Yeah. Because it is what we're going to be talking about with our guest today. 

CHARLIE BENNETT: OK, so to quote Faith No More, what is it? 

MARLEE GIVENS: It refers to the universal skills that we acquire at work, things that are not necessarily in our job descriptions or hard skills, like coding or cataloging. We often call these portable skills, or transferable skills, because they apply in multiple job contexts. They carry from job to job. 

ALEX MCGEE: Skills like communication, problem solving, adaptability, leadership. 

CHARLIE BENNETT: Don't forget creativity, public speaking, and improvisation. 

MARLEE GIVENS: Exactly. And our guests today are four fairly new members of the Georgia Tech Library faculty who rose through the ranks from a variety of public-facing staff positions to where they are today. But they haven't forgotten their roots, and they continue to apply the transferable skills that they acquired in earlier roles to do what they do now. 

FRED RASCOE: And our songs today are about skills, the people who have those skills, and whether one needs to stay put or move on to really put those skills to use. That's a different decision for everyone. But today we're talking to some folks who have decided, for now, that this must be the place here at Georgia Tech. So let's start with "This Must Be The Place (Naive Melody)" by Talking Heads. Right here on Lost in the Stacks. 

CHARLIE BENNETT: It's a love song for a lamp. 

[TALKING HEADS, "THIS MUST BE THE PLACE (NAIVE MELODY)"] 

MARLEE GIVENS: "This Must Be The Place (Naive Melody)" by Talking Heads. Our show today is You Can Take It With You. And we are pleased to welcome some returning guests-- Karen Manning, Raven Davis, Justin Ellis and Danielle Evans. And I would like for everyone-- because you all have something in common, right? 

Part of the reason that you're here is that you have kind of coalesced as a group around making the transition from a paraprofessional staff role to a faculty position within the library, and you're now all part of the Georgia Tech Library faculty. So what I'd like to do as you're introducing yourselves is just to share, what was the staff role that you moved out of? And then what is your faculty position now? And we'll start with Karen. 

KAREN MANNING: So hello, everyone. I'm Karen Manning and I'm the Student Experience Librarian at the library. My role actually started in the public-facing position in the biggest-- the largest library in the world, the Library of Congress. And then it transitioned here with my first position at the Georgia Tech Library at the circulation desk. 

And I just want to make a distinction that at the time it was called Public Services, which now, if we reference Access Services, is also the same thing. And so I worked in that position for years, and then I transitioned into Technical Services, which now I am in the faculty position as a Student Experience Librarian. 

RAVEN DAVIS: This is Raven Davis. I started about eight years ago in Public Services, and I'm now a research scientist in Data Analytics. 

JUSTIN ELLIS: Hi, I'm Justin Ellis. I am currently the Digital Learning and Instruction Librarian. This month I am celebrating my 18th year at Georgia Tech. I've been in my current role for a little over two years. And I'm probably best known-- I've held a few different Public Services roles, but probably best known as Public Services lead and service owner and co-manager for our equipment-lending or gadget service. 

DANIELLE EVANS: And I'm Danielle Evans. I started in public services at Georgia Tech in 2022. And I am now the Affordable Learning Librarian in Technical Services. 

MARLEE GIVENS: All right. So yeah, everyone has had, I guess, some time on the desk. So part of what we wanted to talk about today was just this idea of these transferable skills that you sort of grew in your previous roles. And you now-- I think you all feel like you have brought something of that into your current experience. So does anyone want to talk about what's a skill that comes to mind when you think about that? Yeah, Justin. 

JUSTIN ELLIS: I'll say listening skills, having spent many hours on an info desk or circulation desk, listening to the needs of students or faculty members and just trying to understand, even if they don't necessarily know how to articulate it in the moment. Your job is to try and ask those probing questions and figure out the reference interview. 

CHARLIE BENNETT: And I think we should dig into that just a little bit more. Because obviously, listening is something many people have to do. What's the particular thing about that at-the-desk listening that feels different than say, research, consultation or listening in a meeting? 

JUSTIN ELLIS: Very time sensitive. You are in the moment, so you have to really develop or hone those listening skills to hear beyond the initial question, and sometimes probe a little bit deeper. And again, you only have maybe a couple of minutes to get to what the real need is. 

MARLEE GIVENS: And so what's the kind of listening that you feel like you're doing now? 

JUSTIN ELLIS: That's a good question. I mean, probably one of the biggest skills-- and I'm a shy person. Some people may not believe that. But listening and talking to folks, too-- one of my sort of things that I worked on a lot, even in my gadgets role-- was listening to faculty and reaching out to faculty, which is something that I have to do now on a regular basis. 

So understanding what faculty are trying to do with particular projects, what technology needs they have, what are the learning outcomes for their students. 

MARLEE GIVENS: And Karen, I think you might have raised your hand? Is there something that you wanted to add? 

KAREN MANNING: Well, I wanted to add those types of skills were skills that were already being conducted as staff members. And that's a perspective I want to discuss, is that staff have always been doing things that traditionally are supposedly librarian roles. We do information literacy courses, we teach, there's instruction, collection development. 

And so different roles that-- research, managing other people has always been a part of the roles. It's just never been correlated as far as the librarianship. 

MARLEE GIVENS: Yeah. And I think we've talked about that on the show a little bit, just-- and maybe in a way that Georgia Tech is kind of leading the way in creating these opportunities or distributing the work in a way that's not necessarily the traditional, faculty do this and staff do that. 

CHARLIE BENNETT: I was in a lunch with a search-- with a candidate. I was helping a search committee out, talking to a job candidate at the Georgia Tech Library. And they were really pleasantly surprised, maybe more surprised than pleasantly surprised, that we promote from within. They felt like that's not common, that there's not a lot of thinking of staff as doing librarian work and building towards librarianship. 

MARLEE GIVENS: Yeah. And I actually wanted to give our non-librarian faculty member a chance to talk about that, because Raven, you have a research scientist position. So what's something that you definitely have carried from your former role into that? 

RAVEN DAVIS: I think even just going back to what Justin said, I think I get a lot of questions that span the gamut, like technical, research, et cetera. And being able to hone in on what people are actually asking is a skill that I had to grow being in Public Services. So that's definitely something that I've taken. I think it makes me a lot more helpful to people who are reaching out to me. 

And so I think that's pretty general. But as a research scientist, you get a lot of research questions and people who are looking for a lot of different things. And so that's definitely been really helpful. 

CHARLIE BENNETT: This is Lost in the Stacks. And we will be back with more on transferable skills for career transitions in the library profession after a music set. 

MARLEE GIVENS: File this set under Z710.P4. 

[MUSIC PLAYING] 

"I Know How To Do It" by Naomi and Her Handsome Devils. And before that, "I've Got the Skill" by Jackie Ross. Songs about the skills that pay the bills. 

[MUSIC PLAYING] 

FRED RASCOE: This is Lost in the Stacks. And today's show is called You Can Take It With You. 

ALEX MCGEE: Our guests are Danielle Evans, Justin Ellis, Karen Manning, and Raven Davis, all members of the Georgia Tech Library faculty. 

MARLEE GIVENS: So in our first segment, we talked about what you do now compared to what you did previously at the library. And I'd now like to talk more generally about a stereotype in the academic library profession that in order to get ahead in the profession, you have to move. 

You have to change institutions and essentially grow your skills elsewhere. And maybe after doing that, you can come back to where you started. So, Danielle, is that something that you have also heard? Something that you heard as you were sort of coming up and going to library school? 

DANIELLE EVANS: Oh, definitely. When I started at Georgia Tech, I was about a year out from graduating with my MLS. And I started here and thought, man, I'm already at the best institution. How am I going to go somewhere else? 

I was really-- I kind of felt this bittersweet feeling that I really wanted to pursue my dream of being a librarian at an academic institution, but also having this idea that it wasn't going to be possible because I already started in another position at Georgia Tech. And so I do think that stereotype was just in the back of my mind in talking with people in grad school. 

CHARLIE BENNETT: Were you directly advised by anybody that you would have to leave? Like, that's great that you're at Georgia Tech, but you're going to have to go somewhere else once you graduate. 

DANIELLE EVANS: No, I don't think I was directly told that, but I do remember being in a group discussion in one of my classes and giving the intro and saying, I work in public services at Georgia Tech. And somebody replying and saying, oh, that's awesome. So you could easily end up at-- and listed about 15 other schools. None of them were Georgia Tech. So I was like, yeah, yeah, that's true. I could end up at somewhere else university. 

MARLEE GIVENS: Yeah. I mean, is that-- so it's been a while, I think, Justin, since you were in library school. But do you remember getting that same advice? 

JUSTIN ELLIS: Oh, definitely. Yeah. I had probably three different supervisors tell me that, I think. When I got my first graduate degree, I heard that from a couple of different supervisors. When I got my second graduate degree, I heard that again, a little more emphatically, that you really have to consider that. 

But I loved what I was doing, and I loved the campus. I loved our library. So I wanted to hang on to see if I could continue in some form or fashion. 

CHARLIE BENNETT: So did you two-- I mean, I know you did this separately, but you two just fight the stereotype? Did you just say I'm not doing it? Like, how did you-- how did you get through this? 

DANIELLE EVANS: I think I was too new into the profession to get jaded. 

CHARLIE BENNETT: They call that naive strength. 

DANIELLE EVANS: Yeah. I had a lot of hope. I got really lucky in that I was able to apply for this position that was brand new six months after I walked across the stage and got my diploma. So there wasn't a lot of time in between for me to consider other options. 

I think that had I had a longer stretch of time between, I don't know what I would have done, but I like to say that I would have had the same hope and perseverance to stay at Georgia Tech. 

JUSTIN ELLIS: Well, the thing, too, is I had so many opportunities to grow my skills. And within the past few years, in particular, with our portfolio project management process, being able to lead projects as a project manager, work across cross silos and integrate skill sets with other folks across the library. 

And also our partnership program and public services, where we were paired with faculty members and worked through-- Raven and I worked in data visualization. I think I can look at everyone in this room just about and say we've worked on some sort of project together. Danielle and I built an articulate course together, so a lot of stuff. 

Of course, Karen and I have worked on many different projects over the years. So all of these little leveling up opportunities that sort of culminated in, oh, I have these skill sets and these relationships that I can now leverage in a faculty position. 

MARLEE GIVENS: Raven, you don't have an MLIS. You have a master's in analytics, but from Georgia Tech. I have told people that it seems like Georgia Tech does like to hire their own. Is that something that you remember hearing when you were in the OMS program? Or did you I guess I'm just wondering, did you picture yourself staying at Georgia Tech? Or when you were in that program, were you kind of looking all around? 

RAVEN DAVIS: I definitely did not picture myself staying at Georgia Tech. The library didn't have any positions like that when I was in school. It was like the last year, I think, that this position was even created. And that's really kind of, I think-- leadership was really working to build out these types of research faculty positions. 

So I have the first research faculty position in the library. But since that did not exist when I first started school, I was definitely thinking, oh, I'm going to have to leave, which I was really not looking forward to. 

CHARLIE BENNETT: We're almost at the end of the segment, so I don't want to open a can of worms, but did people tell you, hey, this new position is coming and we know you're doing the degree? 

RAVEN DAVIS: Yes, they did. Yes, they were seeking me out. 

CHARLIE BENNETT: Yeah, yeah. All these stories are about cultivating the staff within the library. It's nice to hear. 

MARLEE GIVENS: It is nice to hear. You are listening to Lost in the Stacks. And we'll talk more about transferable skills for library careers on the left side of the hour. 

[ROCK MUSIC] 

CLIFF LANDIS: Hi, this is Cliff Landis, Digital Curation Archivist at the Georgia Tech Library and Archives. And you are listening to Lost in the Stacks, the research library rock 'n roll radio show. That's a lot harder to roll off the tongue than I would have thought. WREK, Atlanta. 

CHARLIE BENNETT: Today's show is called You Can Take It With You, or You Can Take It With You, or You Can Take It With You! We're talking about the benefit of transferable skills for library careers. We're also trying to bust the myth that you have to leave where you are in order to grow. 

MARLEE GIVENS: In a 2023 issue of College and Research Libraries News, librarians Annie Pho and Dustin Fife published a column entitled "The Cost of Librarianship, Relocating for Work and Finding Community." Their conversation covered moving for their careers and, as they put it, the problematic norms that librarianship and higher education reinforce. 

ALEX MCGEE: Both of these librarians received the advice that willingness to relocate was essential for career growth. Annie said, I've moved to four libraries, three states, five cities and seven apartments. And Dustin, similarly, describes frequent moves to advance his career. He goes on to say-- 

CHARLIE BENNETT: "However, the more I think about my professional path, I realize how problematic that advice is and how it recreates privilege in our field, especially on the academic side of librarianship. My positionality--" excuse me, "as a white, cisgendered librarian in management positions has allowed me to thrive in these situations. But I know that others have been kept out, and I wonder how we can move away from some of these practices." 

MARLEE GIVENS: Annie adds, "That advice to move anywhere for a job could take a very heavy toll on someone to be the only person of color in their library, and then when they leave work, to be in an area that might be hostile toward BIPOC or trans folks, or where women have limited autonomy over their own bodies. Now, I would caution new professionals to make sure wherever they go, they have a safety network in place or a community to support them." 

ALEX MCGEE: Dustin and Annie call on leaders in the profession to consider the emotional toll of this typical advice and to offer more support for library workers, including moving stipends, tuition support, and internal mechanisms for advancement and growth. Dustin concludes-- 

CHARLIE BENNETT: "I want librarianship to support more library workers, many who have not been given the opportunities I have. So moving should be one way for advancement, not the only way." And as you unpack your bag, you can file this set under LB2362.G7T73. 

[MUSIC PLAYING] 

ALEX MCGEE: That was "I Can Help" by Billy Swan. And before that, "Soft Skills" by Take Turns. Songs about recognizing the expertise of those around you. 

CHARLIE BENNETT: This is Lost in the Stacks. And our show today is called You Can Take It With You. Our guests are all new, or new-ish, members of the Georgia Tech Library faculty. Danielle Evans is the Affordable Learning Librarian. Justin Ellis is the Digital Learning and Instruction librarian. Karen Manning is the Student Experience Librarian, and Raven Davis, not a librarian, but a scientist, research scientist in data analytics. 

You're all here because you're doing a conference presentation, right? Basically pulling these ideas together. Now, we've been making our own show out of these ideas, but I'd like to know what's the push in the conference presentation? What are you trying to do? 

Karen, will you-- oh, because of the look on your face, I'm going to make you do it. Tell us about this presentation. What's the thesis? What are you trying to say? 

KAREN MANNING: Well, we all-- Danielle, Justin and Raven and myself-- we were having conversations, and we really, really just thought about our trajectories. And we were just comparing them with each other. And then the a-ha moment came and we realized, and we-- it was more gratitude of being able to have the opportunity to have these-- be presented with these positions. 

And so we were in gratitude, and we thought of a way to maybe talk about it. And that's how we thought about the conference presentation, is to talk about how we got to where we was and then to also point about leadership in the fact that they took us and felt the value in what we were doing and thought it was worthy of giving us those positions. 

CHARLIE BENNETT: Do you feel like you can get other staff members to recognize that this is how it can be? Do you imagine that there's a lot of people out there who don't think they can do this, and you want to get them going? 

KAREN MANNING: Absolutely, absolutely. I think this will help motivate people and it will give people an idea. And what I-- basically, it would be great if leadership makes sure that they pay attention to this kind of a conversation and this kind of discussion and this type of career ladder for their employees. 

And that's where we make sure that we notate it and point it out and made that definitely a part of something that is needed, is the leadership portion. So being able to talk about the leadership portion and having those envision these newer, evolving roles for their employees, it has to come from that standpoint also. 

CHARLIE BENNETT: So I want to open it up to the other folks about that "leadership needs to hear this" kind of thing. I don't want to make a joke about you being aggressive, but clearly there is some change that you're pushing for. 

RAVEN DAVIS: Yeah, I think that we have a lot of success stories in our library. And I think that, I mean, when I first started eight years ago, I think that the hope that Danielle was talking about was nonexistent. I think that there was a much different idea. And I think that new leadership has definitely changed the hope. 

I think that it's changed a lot of people's career trajectories. I think we have a lot of success stories of staff who have developed skills while they were staff, and were able to get faculty positions. And yeah, I think it's been a model that's really worked for us. 

DANIELLE EVANS: And I'll just add to that, I think that it's also important to note that all of us, even though we started in public-facing roles in kind of the same area, we are all in different areas as faculty. Now I'm in Technical Services. Justin's in academic engagement. Raven is a research scientist, and Karen is our Student Success, Student Experience Librarian. 

So we are all in different areas and have used those skills that were curated by our roles in public services and other public-facing roles in the library, and been able to turn those into more specific trajectories in other areas. 

CHARLIE BENNETT: Justin, you've been witness to this for a long time, right? 

JUSTIN ELLIS: Yes. 

CHARLIE BENNETT: You've been at the library a long time, as have I. So I'm not-- I'm not dragging anybody. Have you seen a change in how our library leadership has cultivated after they started cultivating? 

JUSTIN ELLIS: A significant change. And like my colleagues, I feel an enormous amount of gratitude, especially over the past few years, because we have leaders who have stopped to identify and assess skill sets and build these career ladders. So the mentorship that I've received, like over the years, these are all wonderful things that have helped me along on my career ladder. 

And there was a period where I was content in my position, but knew that-- I guess the common thought was that I would have to leave. And I didn't want to leave. I had worked to build a career here. And even though I thought I could leverage a lot of those skills in a different role, yeah, the opportunities slowly became present. 

MARLEE GIVENS: And, Justin, you're one of the folks in the room who's actually gotten a glimpse of what people outside of Georgia Tech think about all of this. I was wondering if you see any signs of hope out in the profession at large. 

JUSTIN ELLIS: Well, I do see signs of hope. I will say that in a conversation with a former supervisor and leader not too long ago, we at Georgia Tech have always kind of approached things a little bit differently than some of our peer institutions. And there are peer institutions that really reinforce that divide between paraprofessional or staff and front-facing roles and the faculty roles. 

So I think even for our colleagues in staff roles to see these success stories and to see how our folks have advanced their skill sets, pursued graduate education, and taken on different leadership roles-- whether it's project leadership, other skill sets, and other service areas-- it builds morale. And you start a momentum where folks are excited to build their skills. 

CHARLIE BENNETT: So if there's someone listening right now-- and I open this to everybody because we got two minutes left. If there's someone listening right now and they're staff at a library and this is blowing their mind, is there anything you want to tell them? Anything that you'd like to remind them of before they go talk to their manager immediately? You're laughing, Justin. I think you should lead off. 

JUSTIN ELLIS: It's a good question to ask. And I mean, maybe that is a conversation that starts with your manager. What does my career path look like? How can I develop new skills? What skills would you like to cultivate, or what should I focus on cultivating? And how do I do that? How do I partner? 

Most of us have, in our staff roles, had partnered with library faculty members and gotten a sense of a faculty role might entail, whether it's a teaching role or a research role. So you have a lot of folks, when you start sort of prodding, I think-- or maybe annoying people-- just to ask the questions. And you can start to change mindsets. 

I think a lot of-- in a lot of academic libraries, leaders want to cultivate skill sets and want to build professional development avenues. But oftentimes, there is kind of an older model of thinking where we're looking at new positions, hybrid positions, different types of technologies, especially in the age of AI that I think there are a lot of opportunities. So you can assess the landscape where you are and see what you can do to climb that ladder. 

MARLEE GIVENS: This is Lost in the Stacks. And you have been listening to our interview with Georgia Tech Library colleagues Danielle Evans, Justin Ellis, Karen Manning and Raven Davis. And thank you all so much for joining us. 

CHARLIE BENNETT: I will remind you that you are past and future guests. File this set under HF5382.75.U6R53. 

[MUSIC PLAYING] 

You just heard "There Only Once" by The Soundcarriers. And before that, "It's Your Move" by Howard Tate. Those are songs about the decision to leave or stay put. 

[ROCK MUSIC] 

MARLEE GIVENS: Today's show is called You Can Take It With You. And before we roll the credits, I wanted to ask everyone, what do you see as your main transferable skill? What's something that you brought to every job, maybe even without planning to? Mine is patience. I've had more than one boss comment on my patient and calm demeanor in evaluation letters, so I guess I don't bring the drama. I guess that's helpful, Fred? 

CHARLIE BENNETT: Some of us think so, yeah. 

FRED RASCOE: Yeah, that sounds helpful. Yeah, self-evaluation is not my strong suit. I'm going to venture a guess, flexibility. That'll be my answer. 

MARLEE GIVENS: All right. Alex? 

ALEX MCGEE: So I'm going to say, I've gotten this in my performance reviews, that I'm very good at building relationships with folks, whether it's students or people in our department. I can build trust with folks, and that has served me well over the years. Yeah. 

CHARLIE BENNETT: You all probably know this. I can talk about anything as long as we need to talk about it, until we all understand it. 

JUSTIN ELLIS: I kind of agree with Alex. For me, I think it's-- and Marlee and I have talked about this-- collegiality. Like, I like-- I'm a team player. I like working in groups and teams, as hopefully some folks in here can attest to. I think I'm likable. I think-- [LAUGHS] I'm just throwing that out there. 

MARLEE GIVENS: Raven? 

RAVEN DAVIS: I'm going to say problem-solving. That is a very generic job interview answer. But yeah. 

DANIELLE EVANS: Along the same lines as Raven, I find myself to be an idealist. So I like finding solutions for things and having big picture ideas for everything that I do. 

KAREN MANNING: For me, it's interpersonal skills. And I also am very influential with people, and people always want me to do things because of those skills. And so, sometimes I have to pull back. I may be doing it too well. 

CHARLIE BENNETT: We have a show about saying no, librarians saying no, that might be-- OK, anyway. Let's roll the credits. 

[MUSIC PLAYING] 

ALEX MCGEE: Lost in the Stacks is a collaboration between WREK Atlanta and the Georgia Tech Library. Written and produced by Alex McGee, Charlie Bennett, Fred Rascoe, and Marlee Givens. 

CHARLIE BENNETT: Legal counsel and a clear path to promotion based on cultivated skills were provided by the Burrus Intellectual Property Law Group in Atlanta, Georgia. 

MARLEE GIVENS: Special thanks to Danielle, Justin, Karen, and Raven for being on the show. Thanks to the Georgia Tech Library leadership for investing in our people. And thanks, as always, to each and every one of you for listening. 

CHARLIE BENNETT: Our web page is library.gatech.edu/lostinthestacks, where you'll find our most recent episode, a link to our podcast feed, and a web form if you want to get in touch with us. 

ALEX MCGEE: On next week's show, it's time for another installment of our series, "There's an Archivist for That?" And I'm giving out no spoilers today. You've got to tune in to find out. 

CHARLIE BENNETT: FBI. 

ALEX MCGEE: No. 

CHARLIE BENNETT: CIA. 

ALEX MCGEE: No. You should just stop now. I'm not going to give away anything. 

CHARLIE BENNETT: Sewage systems. 

ALEX MCGEE: No. 

FRED RASCOE: We don't even know. It's suspenseful. OK time for our last song today. We're lucky enough at the Georgia Tech Library to have folks with skills and expertise who want to stick around and help our library. But as we've heard today, even though they may be staying in the same library, their careers are always on the move. So let's close with "Born to Move" by The Surprise Sisters. And have a great weekend, everyone. 

[THE SURPRISE SISTERS, "BORN TO MOVE"]