Communicating Professionally: A How-to-Do-It Manual for Librarians

by Catherine Sheldrick Ross, Kirsti Nilsen

This updated and expanded version of the training guide Booklist called "one of the most valuable professional publications to come off the presses in a long time" is completely revised with new sections outlining the opportunities offered by contemporary communication media. This third edition incorporates updated and expanded references with more resource information on cross-cultural communication, including new applications of communication principles and the latest research-based material on communication in general. Ross, together with new co-author Nilsen, has maintained and updated sections on

Mastering individual skills
Sensitivity to cultural, ethnic, and linguistic issues
Communicating with current technology using presentation software

Practical tips and skills training exercises, examples of common library situations, interesting research facts, a special section on support staff, and references to other sources are listed throughout this practical guide.

Genres: Nonfiction, Library Science

424 pages, Paperback

First published March 31, 1989

About the author

Catherine Sheldrick Ross FRSC (November 4, 1945 – September 11, 2021) was a professor and later dean of the Faculty of Information and Media Studies at University of Western Ontario. In 2018, she was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada.

Ross earned her undergraduate and master's degree at the University of Toronto before completing her PhD at the University of Western Ontario. In 1995, Ross was awarded the Jesse Shera Award for Research by the American Library Association for her article “If They Read Nancy Drew, So What? – Readers Talk Back."

In 2013, Ross was the recipient of the NoveList's Margaret E. Munroe Award for her “significant contributions to library adult services.” In 2015, her book "Shapes in Math, Science and Nature: Squares, Triangles and Circles" was shortlisted for the Information Book Award by the Children's Literature Roundtables of Canada.

In 2018, Ross was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada. -- Wikipedia

Reviews

[Paul · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a good overview of communication from a librarian's perspective. I feel like this might be something I would grab off the shelf after a frustrating day of bad communication with patrons or co-workers and it would give me some much-needed guidance.

[Kiri · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well written and full of communication advice - some of it rather obvious, and some quite insightful. The book is well structured (although as suggested, I did start with Chapter 5 and then skip back to Chapters 1-4 which I thought worked well). I liked the pedagogical philosophy behind the authors' encouragement to learn a skill, practice it, and ultimately teach it to someone else to really solidify your mastery. Some later chapters felt a big tedious and long-winded (like the ones on proposal writing and presentations), but this could just be a side effect of the large-format layout with ample margins for notes. I got most of my insights out of the first four chapters.

[Christa · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you work in a library, you need this book. Excellent how-to-do-it manuals for librarians who need to use correspondence from email to social media or dealing with the public. A must read.