What Shall I Be?



What Shall I Be?, originally uploaded by liamlightyear.

This has been a weird time for me professionally. I vacillate between periods of freaking out about not having anything thing to do after July 30th to feeling totally overwhelmed by all the possibilities. The world is wide open! If only the classic board game What Shall I Be? had a career track for this. Harumph.

The one thing that has sort of been a constant with me is that I don’t necessarily want to work in a library any more. I still want to be a librarian, but I don’t think what I’m interested in doing is happening in the library per se. So I’m flirting with contracting and all that other stuff – indexing for TRB, working for OKFN, doing interesting projects for people.

The scariest part is that I don’t if this will work out. It could all blow up in my face and I could be on the streets (OK, not really…), but I also feel like it’s worth taking the risks. A traditional library job would be safe, I would probably enjoy it, but I would also probably wonder what if I went for the risks? I guess this as good as a time as any. So like Sarah Glassmeyer, I suppose I’m running away and joining the circus. Or maybe making my own? I don’t know yet, but it’s going to be interesting either way.

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Kendra

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3 responses to “What Shall I Be?”

  1. Froggie Avatar
    Froggie

    State budget impasse notwithstanding, I think you’d be a good fit for the MnDOT library. Though with the aforementioned state budget deadlock and the likelihood of a government shutdown, I doubt they’d be hiring anytime soon…

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  2. Kendra Avatar
    Kendra

    Froggie, the situation faced by most of the state DOTs is making me turn away from traditional libraries even more. I just don’t see the money coming back just yet. It’s sad, but I seriously think current funding models encourage outsourcing. I feel like a sell out, but I’d be foolish not to be a part of it.

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  3. Million Avatar
    Million

    The good thing about outsourcing? If it goes too far, they basically have to consider you one of them. That’s the case with me. Benefits and losses. Plus, contracting out will let you get in there, do the job well and make sure that someone else doesn’t charge an outrageous price.

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