Member interview: Emily Allbon

SLA Europe DigiComms

Emily AllbonIn the latest in our series of member profiles, we talk to Emily Allbon, Law Librarian for City Law School.

Can you tell us a bit about your background? How did you first become involved in the information profession?

I didn’t really know I wanted to do with my life, and a chat around what I wanted out of a job during my English Literature undergraduate degree (to be expert in something, to help people…) pinpointed librarianship as a possible profession. I applied for various year placements via the graduate trainee scheme we have in the UK. My first interview and offer came from the Institute of Advanced Legal Studies, our national legal research library. It was a great place to work as you’re dealing with people from all corners of the legal profession and materials from all over the world; its collections of foreign and international law are the most extensive in the UK. I suppose you could say I was rather sucked into law as a specialism after this. After my year I started the MSc Information Science at City University and on applying for jobs ended up at crunch time – an offer came from Deutsche Bank and my own institution, City. Although the salary was more attractive at the commercial firm, in the end it was the teaching and self-start aspects of the academic role which won through. I’ve been at City a massive 11 years, but have had a hugely varied role which has meant me developing new things each year. I still get really fired up about my role there, which has changed beyond all recognition from when I first started.

I understand you were named Best Legal Information Professional in an Academic Environment by BIALL in 2005, for your work on Lawbore. Can you tell us a bit about Lawbore?

Sure – I will happily bore for England on this subject! Lawbore is a legal portal I started working on in 2002, which has grown in scope, functionality and notoriety over the years. What began as a simple gateway to resources has grown into huge legal portal offering support to students completing the academic stage of legal education. It is split into the Topic Guides, City Hub (the community bit for our own students – access to e-resources, news and upcoming events), the careers blog, Future Lawyer and Learnmore the skills wiki. The ‘vision’ for me has always been in making learning law more fun and trying to ease the transition between school and university.

I’ve been on the conference trail this year talking about Learnmore – it’s pretty unique for its quirky style, utilisation of different mediums (text, video, audio, talking slideshows and prezi) and student-created content.  Pretty soon my students are going to stop asking me things, for fear of hearing those words “hmmmm that’s interesting – do you think you can write a piece for me on it?”! I think it’s really important that students get to hear from others who have ‘been there, done that’ and I’m constantly amazed that, on the whole, alumni and students are really happy to help out others. Lawbore, although created for City students, is used by students all over the world and I’ve ensured that the majority of it is free to everyone. It amounts to a large part of my job these days, but is testament to the fact that the skills you gain as an information professional can be used in such a variety of ways. I’m proud of the fact that it’s a site that develops organically with, and around, the students and that they think it’s cool.

Learnmore screenshot

As you may know, SLA’s theme for 2011 is “Future Ready”. What does this theme mean to you? How would you make, or how are you making, yourself and your career future ready?

I think being Future Ready is all about making yourself as indispensable as you can; by developing new skills, not being afraid to experiment with new technologies or try out mad ideas every so often. I’m lucky that I was given a free hand to get started on Lawbore all those years ago, I suspect it would be a very different story today with web development policies, marketing strategies and the seemingly irresistible pull of commercial content management systems to large organisations and institutions.

Understanding what my users want is a big part of future proofing too; with the UK Higher Education system undergoing such massive changes it’s all going to be about giving students the best support possible and I can only do this if I take the time to get involved more – I’ve taken on the role of moot coordinator for the coming year which is a big challenge and certainly not a role traditionally undertaken by librarians in the UK. I’m also part-way through an MA in Academic Practice which should keep me interested in the bigger picture as well as demonstrate I have lots to offer alongside my traditional expertise. Constantly adding to your armory of skills is extremely important for future proofing, but difficult when the financial climate dictates that employers are more hesitant about sending its employees on courses or conferences. Make the most of the free webinars out there and dedicate time to reading, whether via journals or blogs.

What advice would you give to someone just starting out as an information professional?

The big one is simply to get involved; don’t be scared of your inexperience and think that member organisations are simply for the ‘old guard’, just remember that you have an invaluable contribution to make. Similarly, use your time to gain expertise and experiment with the tools out there which you might not get a chance to use at work. Write a blog, play with the widgets, and most importantly perhaps, find your professional voice. Don’t be afraid to get in touch with other professionals whose work interests you; they’ll be only too pleased to share their thoughts with you. Take the time to get a feel for a number of sectors and their challenges. There are so many opportunities for networking, both online and face-to-face – take advantage of them.

What are your plans and predictions for the next year?

My plans will be quite focused around a move; my law library, which currently occupies a floor within the main library, will be transferring into a temporary (and much smaller space) in May 2012, with a permanent transfer to a new law building in Jan 2013. It’s an exciting time but there’s much planning work to be done! For Lawbore I have a number of new initiatives on the boil, around feedback – a talking essays tool, where students can see examples of real essays of varying standards complete with audio feedback and hopefully a series of video resources to help with note-taking. I’m also hoping to take Lawbore to new platforms. I’d like to do some more professional writing next year too: have been slacking a little this year on this front.

Prediction-wise I’m wary of being laughed at in a year’s time! The things to watch for are obviously going to be around the cloud, and probably further outsourcing and how to deal with this. Within my own field of Higher Education centralisation is a big threat; with universities wanting all schools to sing from the same hymn sheet. It will be more difficult to retain independence and fight for why you do something differently. This scares me when I have forged my career on tailoring a service for my students. Mobile working clearly has a way to go before it reaches its apex, and we all need to get a handle on how we can design services that fit changing demands. Educational apps are still in their infancy – lots of opportunities there, as in the commercial sphere.

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Thanks Emily for taking the time to talk to SLA Europe – and good luck with further developing Lawbore!

If you’d like to take part in a member interview for SLA Europe, please contact blog editor Laura Woods.

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