Director of technology for the Shenendehowa Public Library in Clifton Park, New York.
kgs@bluehighways.com
Column for August 2000
If you have ever prayed for a blizzard so you could stay home and finish a major library project, you will be happy to hear that telecommuting is one of the quiet revolutions in our profession, allowing librarians to work out of their homes for tasks as diverse as writing projects, Web site design, and live online reference.
One major advantage of telecommuting: It is “enormously productive since there are virtually no interruptions,” says Linda Knaack, library systems manager at Hatch Library of Bay Path College in Longmeadow, Massachusetts. (The word “interruption” appeared in over a dozen e-mails I received from happy and would-be telecommuters.) Linda spends three hours a week at home developing Web pages, working on Web standards and systems procedures, and maintaining the Sirsi library system.
Gail Griffith, deputy director of the Carroll County (Md.) Public Library, has been telecommuting one day a week for the last five years. This has been so successful that most of the materials-management staff (selectors and clerical) now telecommute from two to six days each month, and some of the outreach and administrative staff members telecommute about one day each week.
Beyond preserving chunks of “quiet time” to complete major projects, telecommuting offers the potential to help libraries broaden the time, place, and manner of traditional services such as reference. Griffith said that after centralizing telephone reference “it didn’t take long to determine that about 90% of the questions were being answered using electronic sources, so we are going to send some of these librarians home to work.
. . . We also see this as a way we can offer reference service before or after library hours.”
One librarian who requested anonymity wrote, “Our director doesn’t believe in working from home.” Assuming your belief system is open to change, planning for telecommuting is time well spent. Will you provide computers for staff (as major car manufacturers recently did) or expect them to provide their own equipment? If your network is secured, will your system open access to essential services through its firewall? How fast and reliable are home-based connections in your area, and will you help employees add second lines if necessary so they can be reached by voice as well as e-mail?
Griffith and her board used the first year of telecommuting to evaluate the pilot program and develop a policy. Most reservations administrators have about distance work boil down to concerns about communication. Part of the success of the Carroll County project, Griffith told me, occurred because she made it a goal “to be accessible to staff and customers during work hours, wherever I might be.”
Some library jobs, such as cultural programming and hands-on computer support, do not lend themselves to telecommuting. (Shelving might be a challenge, too.) Andrea Johnson, Children’s Librarian at Cook Memorial Public Library in Libertyville, Illinois, noted that children’s craft programs would be a disaster: “Hang on . . . I just got hot glue all over the keyboard.” Library administration, depending on the position, may require a human presence. “Being in the office, where I am readily available to anyone who wants to talk to me, is part of my job,” said Susan B. Hagloch, director of the Tuscarawas County Public Library in New Philadelphia, Ohio. (Still, Susan liked the idea of finishing major reports from home—which could also improve the quality of her “open door” time.)
Furthermore, some employees aren’t cut out for virtual workplaces. As any standard guide on telecommuting will tell you, it’s important to be self-motivated, focused, and organized, and to have a family life that won’t create frequent work interruptions. But for library tasks that involve working with others, particularly our patrons, it’s also very important to have strong communication skills. John Kupersmith of the UC/Berkeley Library, who has telecommuted in his last three jobs, explained that telecommuters need “the ability to create an effective online presence . . . in a way that fosters the sense of a live human being at the other end of the e-mail link.”
We may soon see incentives—or even mandates—for supporting distance workers. Laurie Mahaffey, adult services consultant for the Central Texas Library System, wrote, “Telecommuting is becoming a hot topic down here in Austin because the city manager is very interested in not bringing as many cars into the central city.” Don’t forget the library’s annual report: You may want to include how many gallons of gas were saved through your library’s telecommuting program—which could endear you to local officials and “green” organizations.
Telecommuting is also an excellent perq to offer employees who live just out of convenient commuting range—and can result in better productivity. Tami-Jo Eckley, electronic services and media librarian at Manhattanville (N.Y.) College Library, who works on the library’s Web site from her home, says that “for that one day a week, I save about two hours in driving time, which instead is invested in uninterrupted work.”
Temporary telecommuting positions have existed for some time for the usual reasons—maternity leave, illness, special projects—but Internet technologies have resulted in more creative uses for distance work. Often, employers want a new hire to start “yesterday,” while that person may have commitments that make this impossible. With telecommuting, you really can be in two places at once. Giles Martin, assistant editor at OCLC Forest Press, may have set a telecommuting distance record: He spent three months working for OCLC in Dublin, Ohio, from his home in Newcastle, Australia.
Whether for a few hours a month, one day a week, or as a way of life, librarians are taking advantage of Internet technologies to untie themselves from traditional library settings and work wherever their modems take them. Could you telecommute? Try it: Fill your briefcase, and go home three hours early this afternoon!