Experience of being in the position

Reactions to appointment
Everyone had different experiences in relation to the reactions of others to their appointment. Wilma said there were a few comments which she could have been offended by but they were fairly general, however, there was one particular comment by someone who said that if they were a supervisor they would fill all Level 6 positions with graduate librarians; they did not, however, have anything against library technicians. Wilma could not give much credence to their comments because she was doing the work at the level it was re- evaluated at, and doing it well; 'that's why the position went up because it developed while I was in it'. John had been warned that there might be some negative reactions to his appointment, however, he only experienced one from a librarian who had previously indicated their non-acceptance of library technicians in the work place. John experienced some negativity from peers who saw him as advancing 'because I knew the right people' which he found annoying. He was also aware of some resistance to his ideas and he believed that colleagues thought that he didn't know what he was talking about and some who thought he was empire building. He was aware of a general lack of confidence in his ability to do the job: 'I had a procession of people who told me that they'd either done the job or been acquisitions librarian somewhere else and if I needed help just to give them a call'. John also experienced some pressure to comply, with people insisting on giving him advice about how things should be done. Despite there being a very public reaction to Sandra's appointment, she was not fussed by same because 'as far as I was concerned I had the [management] skills and they obviously chose the right person' for the position.

Position development
John spoke about the development of the acquisitions manager's position: he was appointed to the position at Level 6 and after approximately a year, he approached the division head about the fact he was doing the same things as the other section heads who were at Level 7 and that there was a need for equity in salary. She actually supported him but because there was a review of the management structure being carried out a temporary arrangement of a personal loading to the bottom of Level 7 was organised.

Sandra said she had been trained in the INNOPAC circulation module to provide her with a broader overview of the system which was crucial to her work on the implementation team.

Personal qualities
A number of personal qualities and abilities were identified mainly by John when talking about his experience of being in the position. He spoke about his willingness to take risks, for example telling the divisional head that he wanted to work directly with the other two sectional heads and didn't want her to be involved. This had developed to the point where the divisional head wanted them to work things out at their own level in the first instance. John believed that he was willing to take risks firstly because he was confident in his ability, secondly because he did not have overall responsibility, and thirdly because he had the support of the divisional head. John spoke about his greatest weakness being the lack of professional knowledge in the area of acquisitions; 'there's so much detail [that] I don't know off the top of my head ... it's professional detailed knowledge' that he had to look up such as who certain suppliers were. John referred to such knowledge as 'the professional nuts and bolts of librarianship' and he believed that lack of such knowledge affected his relationships in that he felt very insecure when talking to knowledgeable staff, 'I always feel that I'm about to be found out'; he dealt with this problem usually by being open about gaps in his knowledge. In John's opinion those who had been around for a long time had a lot of historical knowledge and he believed that was seen as 'a way of displaying how good you are at your job'. He also believed that having such knowledge served to prevent repetition of mistakes. Paradoxically, John operated on the basis that he did not have to be expert in all areas; that it was important to acknowledge his limitations and to call on those, often others within the section, who had such expertise. For example, John stated he was limited in his computer knowledge but he was aware of members of staff within the section who were very skilled and would turn to them as required. Such awareness of himself was also evident in John stating that he trusted himself and that his responses to staff would be appropriate; he would not lose his temper when staff made mistakes. John also spoke about his willingness to share problems, to ask for assistance when thinking through a process in order to counteract his tendency to jump essential steps.

All of the participants spoke about reflecting on their practice. Wilma spoke of her need to think about how the work was done in order to achieve the most efficient service, 'to cut corners wherever we possibly can just to get [loans] out'. Sandra spoke of her reflection on the best way of achieving aims and carrying out procedures. John spoke about reflecting upon what was being done and the best way of achieving it and his involvement of staff in the reflective process by getting them to consider other ways of doing things. He saw his ability to reflect as important to service improvement: by considering and recommending changes to work flows, he had been able to facilitate reduced pressure on over-burdened staff.

Also, there was the ability to analyse, for example John spoke of the importance of considering supplier details such as numbers of delivery problems, 'the amount of money spent on fixing problems is inordinate to the amount of time in putting stuff through' and of deciding to pay more money to achieve less problems.

Work relations
Other work factors which were covered included work relations. The theme of work relationships was only minimally identified as a specific in the experience of being in the job. Wilma did not have many library technician peers and her main interaction outside the Unit was with the supervisor of the Loans staff who allocated support staff to Interlibrary Loans. Wilma described her relationship with the staff in the Unit as very good, 'we've got a good working team'. Wilma also admitted that she had not acted according to the inferred guidelines that one should not have friendships with subordinates. She believed that it was important that 'a supervisor should lead by example' and that this together with her willingness to socialise with them had in fact contributed to the cohesion of the team. John spoke of the fact that most of his working relationships involve 'quite a deal of humour' because he believed that humour facilitated the willingness to consider what one was doing especially 'to look at things you are doing wrong'. He also spoke about the importance of his work relations in terms of his needing 'those personal connections at work' in order to know where he stood and how he should approach issues. John identified cooperation as being an important aspect of his experience especially cooperation with other section heads to develop services and to provide staff in order to get rid of backlogs or to get urgent work done. He seemed to be particularly committed to breaking down the barriers between sections and had been involved in a cooperative multiskilling effort. He was involved with some section heads in ignoring traditional boundaries for example copy cataloguing staff were going to train some of his staff. John and the other section heads were not waiting for the restructuring plan [arising out of a review] but were leading the way. Sandra also identified her involvement in a multiskilling project which required cooperation between divisions and resulted in information services staff working in the serials section.

Values and beliefs
Although the values and beliefs of the participants implicitly underpinned many of the themes previously described, there were some which were more explicitly articulated. For example, John was worried about the idea of 'being professional for the sake of it' and thought some staff used it as a power issue which could get in the way of relationships. He also believed in the power of language, 'the language of how we work is so important', and spoke of how he negotiated with the self management team not to 'get bogged down in the formality' of meetings when someone suggested the need to have the minutes signed. John said he consciously used language to break down barriers when necessary and sometimes to assert his position as manager and get staff to listen to him because he had to get something moving. I identified other beliefs which were obviously important to John's management style: that section leaders were paid to accept responsibility for a certain amount of independent judgement; that he was 'not better than a pool of 25 people'; that managing upwards was the only way; and that he had to support and nurture his staff, all of which impacted on his leadership of the self management team. Sandra's belief in the importance of training to work practice and staff development impacted not only on her own practice but on the plans for her career.

Management aspects
It was not surprising that a major theme during the interviews was that of 'management' and was shared by all participants. John expressed interest in human resources management as that aspect of his work that challenged and interested him the most and this was reflected in his having structured his job with a personnel focus. He described that aspect as reactive: 'people come up and ... need to ask ... it may be procedural ...it may be policy, it may be personal' and the importance of his attending to same, 'if people don't have that chance to discuss those issues ... I don't think they'll work the way they need to'. John also acknowledged his skill in judging and understanding people's abilities and that this was important to his allocating the right person to a task, not only for efficiency's sake but because lack of effectiveness may indicate that a person did not like doing a task. The main human resource management issues that Wilma had to address were related to co-ordination and quality control: she had eleven casual staff, from other departments, inputting fourteen hours which of course created enormous training demands and very close monitoring. Wilma also spoke of the supervisory aspects of her work such as staff discipline and in the example she gave she had motivated the person to change by linking the behaviour to her future career 'OK you're bored ... but you want to leave here - how are you going to get a good report' and that staff member had obviously heard Wilma's interest in her future because she returned soon after to discuss same with Wilma. Sandra identified the importance of resource management to the implementation of changes in order to deal with backlogs. She also spoke of the importance of participative management; she very much saw herself as part of the work group who had a leadership role which included facilitation, helping the staff to develop decision making skills, and team building. Sandra demonstrated her effectiveness in this role: 'I think about 90% of our strategic plan' was achieved.

Self management was a major aspect of John's management style demonstrated by the operation of the work group who had mainly taken John out of the daily operational work of the section. John, like Sandra, played a facilitative role such as suggesting to the group that the best way of integrating the orders and BSS sections would be to intermingle the seating. The work group actually adopted this suggestion but John would have accepted if they had not done so. At times he had lobbied the group in order to get the consideration of an idea. Both he and the work group had been involved in communicating and demonstrating the effectiveness of the self management approach to their peers. John described the effect of those negotiations: 'the bibliographic searching staff had to understand that they actually had responsibilities - they had the ability to make decisions - they had the responsibility that goes with that - and they worked very hard in a fairly short period ... to catch up'. The two work groups had reached the stage of not needing their managers at the meetings and had set up a feedback mechanism. Again demonstrating his facilitative role, John had spoken to them about the need to consider whether they were experiencing any problems associated with having two managers and to inform them. The staff had told John that they did not have any problems with having two managers and he expressed his concern to me that the staff believed they did not require a manager and did not completely understand that he was their link with management; he was their advocate and representative with management and with other sections. An example of such representation was his having to clarify protocols in relation to dewey classifications whereby he was able to ascertain what the boundaries were for the staff's contribution to copy cataloguing. In his opinion the self management approach had contributed to making less mistakes; problem sharing with the work group had led to more effective decision making.

Team building was another facet of their work that the participants identified. Wilma spoke of the effort she had to put into developing what she saw as a 'good working team' because not only were there a lot of staff but some of them were difficult. John had spent the first six months in the job focussing on personnel matters, mainly team building. He said that his motivation was his preference to work in a team environment which not only enhanced his abilities but challenged him to do better. In addition to using his team building skills in relation to his own section, John thought he had a responsibility to contribute to the building of the team of Sectional managers. One aspect of team building that all participants were or had been involved in was that related to re-organisation of work flows.

Organisation and planning were also explicitly identified as essential elements of their management by Sandra and John. Sandra had been immediately struck by the need for a strategic plan and had set one in place in order to keep the Section 'moving forward'. She saw achievement of goals as one of the most important positives to being in her position especially because the section's strategic plan was one of the first developed in the Library. John also saw being organised and 'knowing what I've got to do ... the planning side of it' as crucial. Wilma's organisation and planning were implicit in her development of the service; she identified what was required and then planned for and implemented improvements. They were also apparent in her ability to manage, sometimes rapid, change, which she described as 'daunting - I mean there's new systems coming up', and having to decide 'what's the best way to go?'

John's project management expertise seemed to be based on his team building skills especially the ability to gather around him staff who complimented the way he worked. John emphasised his contribution to the management of projects as primarily his ability to select the right people. He also identified an important aspect of his project management skills as his willingness to listen to the problems that staff experience in achieving their tasks and of sometimes accepting responsibility for problem solving. Essentially, John identified his interpersonal skills, especially listening.

Staff development
Staff development issues were high on the agenda for all participants. Multiskilling was seen as essential: John was very keen on a 'complete task' approach whereby the relevant people could complete all tasks involved in both orders and urgent work. Whilst performing the strategic planning process, Sandra had the staff consider the issue of multiskilling, which she saw not only as a means of developing staff but as a sound resource management principle (more than one person could do a particular task) whereby conflict between the different service points would be dealt with by making all staff aware of the demands placed on same. Such conflict had been evident between those doing reader services work and those doing technical services work who all saw their work as being the most important; Sandra's strategy of multiskilling all staff served to dispel those conflicts.

John saw appraisal as an important aspect of staff development and during same focussed more on communications than on specific and detailed critiques. Also, his staff appraisals were based on self-evaluation and he had found that staff were much harder on themselves. Of course there was a staff development aspect to other themes/subthemes such as cooperation with other sections and subsequent allocation of staff; such allocation not only supported that other section but provided the staff with opportunities for growth.

Service development
Wilma stated that 'it was part of my job to keep informed' in order to develop the service. To achieve this she read a great deal and she networked with interlibrary loan services in other academic libraries, subscribed to e-mail lists, and attended seminars.

Pressures
The experience of pressure (stresses and demands) was identified by all participants. Wilma stated that her's was a very demanding job with a very heavy workload and Sandra said that 'serials [work] has always been highly pressured'. John experienced pressure because he had a 'huge learning curve' and there was so many detailed aspects to the job. He also found the personnel aspects of the job 'very tiring' at times. Sandra also spoke of the stress of the serials manager position being that she 'had to constantly motivate certain people' and 'because of the volume of work coming through ... it's a constant stress'.

Wider contribution
Wilma at one time had been involved in reader education activities and reference desk work, and was disappointed when this ceased because they had provided her with the opportunity to maintain her reader services skills. She had been working on the information desk for at least half a day per week. There had been no parameters for that work therefore she fielded all reference questions and believed that her knowledge of the collection, gained from her work in interlibrary loans, had contributed greatly to her ability to do so. Wilma had often been required to assist clients in their research activities and the librarian on the information desk regularly referred clients to her for assistance with searching. Wilma contributed on a university-wide basis. She was president of the campus branch of the staff association and vice president on the executive of same. Wilma was a grievance advisor for University staff whereby she gave advice in regard to problem solving about grievances with superiors and peers and when required acted as a mediator between the two parties. She was also a member of the staff awards panel which selected nominated individuals or groups who had made outstanding contributions to the university, and allocated grants for projects or professional development activities.

Obviously Sandra's involvement in the INNOPAC implementation team was evidence of the library administration's willingness to acknowledge her ability to contribute beyond the serials section. John's work with the other section heads and his project work evidenced his contribution to the Library and his concern that the divisional head 'missed out on some corridor discussions' [because she was not located in the administrative suite] demonstrated his awareness of and interest in external [to the section] matters. He spoke of his position in the organisation as being analogous to being up a ladder: 'it's not that I'm smarter - I'm just higher up and I can see further' and of how he had 'tried to make the position less focussed on the Section' by working more co-operatively with the other section heads in the division; 'by its very nature that cooperation requires you not to be locked into your own section'.

Support
John stated that his support came from different areas and different levels of the Library, however, primarily the section staff were very supportive; they were immediately responsive when he shared problems with them. He saw other supports outside the section as providing him with a forum for ventilating feelings and discussing issues related to the demands of managing such a large staff group Sandra also primarily identified her support sectional staff who had wanted to achieve the same goals. Wilma did not identify any support systems, however, said that her immediate supervisor had been at one time.

Constraints
Wilma was the only subject who spoke about the constraints attached to her position. These included being locked into the position: she felt trapped in a very demanding, very specialised job and she was not provided with any opportunities which would in turn provide career alternatives. She was excluded from any project work because she was needed in the Unit; there was never any money for extra staff and the demand for service was increasing to the point where deadlines were not being met. Wilma had difficulty coping with this because it was out of keeping with her personal standards of service but her main reason for leaving was that she needed a new challenge. Wilma felt that the organisation stifled her creativity and that it was not proactive in its dealings with the university as a whole.

Job satisfaction
I only raised the theme of job satisfaction with Wilma because her leaving was based on frustrations and dissatisfaction. I was keen to check whether she had ever felt satisfied and Wilma identified that at one time she had felt very rewarded and challenged: 'the whole unit had turned around from something that nobody had faith in' to a situation where lecturers sought out the service. She had gained a lot of experience, especially supervisory experience, and skills in relation to computers and had the opportunity to develop a lot of skills such as the development of procedures. It was only her lack of opportunity to further develop herself and the service which had resulted in her moving on.

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