Qualities to Look for in a New Librarian

As I quietly shuffle toward geezerdom, I find that many people mistakenly correlate age with wisdom. Especially library school students who are asked to “interview an expert” and contact me. Thankfully I don’t learn the grade they get on these assignments.

Anyway, one such student contacted me this week and asked a question that was intriguing: What do you look for (skills, experience, etc.) in the people you recommend for hiring?

I do help hire media specialists and it is about the most nerve-wracking thing I do. Given tenure laws, when you hire somebody in the public schools, you’d better figure your relationship with this person has a better chance of being a very long one that of most marriages.

Our district’s hired about a dozen new library media specialists over the past 15 years and all have been happy choices, thank goodness. This is what I look for, in this order:

1. Great people skills. My librarians need to be people who are approachable, great communicators, and exude personal warmth. If these qualities aren’t there, it’s a no go. We’ve passed over a lot of people who look very, very good on paper, but come across as controlling or cold in interviews. People I wouldn’t want to work with.

2. Self-starting. I look for people who have initiated and carried out projects beyond the classroom. It doesn’t have to be school related, but if a person can’t describe a cool project of which s/he is proud, s/he won’t get my vote. The other part of this is passion – the person has to have a passion for something! Books, computers, whatever, but h/she’d have to convey an excitement about some aspect of the open position. I always say the secret to being a successful supervisor is to hire people who don’t need to be supervised.

3. Successful teaching experience. These candidates have “cred” with teachers and empathy for teachers. I don’t really care if a person can catalog a book, but if s/he can’t teach a child or teacher, I don’t need’m in my libraries.

4. Willingness to learn. One doesn’t have to be the computer guru or even have a library degree (but one will need to get one quickly) to get hired by our district. What a person does need is to demonstrate s/he is willing to learn and keep learning. I always ask, “What is the last thing you learned and how did you learn it?” If people struggle for an answer, I keep looking for some one who can.

5. Record of past successes. Don’t just tell me you’ve been a librarian or teacher, but you better be able to describe a lot of cool things you did in that position. (Have a portfolio with lots of pictures of you working with Happy, Productive Library-Using Kids.) I am looking for OUTSTANDING people, not just competent ones.

How’s that? I can teach people all the technical/library skills they need to know, but I can’t teach them how to be great people. And I like great people – they make ME look good :-)

What do you look for in a new librarian when you serve on the hiring committee?

PS. The technology worked just fine at this morning’s MEMO keynote. Thanks for asking.