Technology Skills for Law Librarians

We recently had a discussion with students interested in law librarianship which included course recommendations for library school. In today’s environment technology skills are an important component of your knowledge base, and in some positions are just as essential as research and instruction skills. But what skills do you really need? Over the last five years I have had the opportunity to broaden my horizons when it comes to the software and hardware that have become necessity for my job. Much of what I have learned has been self-taught, and though it would have been nice to have learned these programs in a classroom environment, I’m not really sure there was the option to learn Final Cut or Photoshop (to name a few) in my library school coursework.

So this begs the question of what skills are valuable for new librarians to have coming into the field (or for a librarian transitioning into a new position) and what technology applications are better taught once you’re already on the job?

I wish there was a simple answer to that question, however, much of it depends on the focus your position and institution take. Honestly, technology skills are commonly learned (or mastered) on the job. While you may have a basic familiarity with a specific type of programing or experience using Final Cut or Photoshop, the opportunity to extensively utilize the skills often doesn’t present itself until after graduation. And just because you don’t have experience with a particular software or coding language, doesn’t mean that you can’t excel in a position that requires you to use it.

To be honest, I think that it rarely possible to predict all of the skills you will need on the job – I would never have guessed when I was in library school that I would need a strong understanding of digitization technology for multiple types of media as well as skills in editing images, video, and audio. And these skills weren’t a part of the job description when I started, so it’s unlikely that the administration thought they were essential tools to perform the work. The good news is that the most valuable (and accessible) resources are your colleagues – both within your institution and within the profession. While you may have to develop local policies, there is always someone out there with experience in a software/hardware, programming language, web platform, app, etc. that can at a minimum point you in the direction of resources (and in the best case has the time to walk you through the process).

So what kind of skills am I talking about? Here is a brief (and by no means comprehensive) list:

Social Media platforms are becoming increasingly popular as communications tools in libraries. There is definitely not universal acceptance of social media, however, it is becoming an increasingly popular way to communicate with current students as well as alumni. Facebook and Twitter are likely the first 2 platforms people think of, however, many institutions also have accounts with YouTube, Instagram, Flickr, and Google+ (to name a few). Experience with social media is fairly easy to gain if you have your own individual account, but you don’t have to directly post to any of these sites to participate – check out the section on photo, video, and audio editing below for a way to contribute to your library’s social presence.

Programing, Coding, Automation Projects, and Website Development are additional components of law libraries today. Every institution is different, so some, or even all of these, may be outside the realm of your library. However, as budgets shrink and we look towards open source solutions for digital projects, any (and possibly all) of these become relevant. These are great examples of skills that are good to learn or master on the job (and even to pick up in the middle of your career). My experience with programming and coding is that the more you can practice the better you will understand it and likewise, if you don’t have the opportunity to use it, you might forget it. So getting involved in a project that allows you to hone these skills, especially under the tutelage of someone who is familiar with the medium, will benefit both you and the library in the long run.

Finally, Photo, Video, Audio Editing experience are a newer skill set in law libraries, and like all of the above, not necessarily something you will need (or know you will need) in advance. This is in part because we are pushing to have a social media presence, but also because we are looking at institutional repositories and digital archives as permanent homes for multimedia content. Our libraries and constituents are also producing significantly more content across these formats and learning to manipulate them now will better prepare you as the need for providing access to them will increase in the future.