Are you either a subject matter expert (SME) or a collections strategist? Think for a moment before you say no. First, you might need to think about what these terms mean in relation to what you do. Second, there is the thought that we have set job descriptions without room for growth beyond “other duties as necessary.” I believe that every law librarian is actually both. Here is my reasoning.
As to being a subject matter specialist, I am currently working with two other AALL colleagues on the AALL Continuing Education Committee’s next web-based class dealing with collection development. There was an application process to be selected as a subject matter expert in this area and help develop the online class. The call for experts touted the experience as allowing SMEs to “contribute substantially to the future of education in law librarianship” and “play an important role in supporting AALL’s mission” among other benefits. Being selected by the committee to serve in this role is exciting and an honor, but after three solid months of working on this project, I have concluded that we are all SMEs of some type based on our positions. The goal of SMEs is to instill in our future students (hopefully some of you readers) the basic knowledge concerning collection development as it relates to law libraries. While our final product is going through reviewing and editing, I believe that we are on the right track to deliver a self-paced course that does justice to the goal. Our experience runs deep on this topic and we are two academic librarians and a government/court librarian who have had a total of over fifty years dealing with collection development of some sort. But this is only a portion of what the three of us do in our daily work lives. The result is the same. We need people to work as collection development librarians in at least a portion of their positions.
My take on being a collections strategist comes from my never-ending fascination with job descriptions. I have seen roles containing the collections strategist in the title becoming more common including two on the same day. They were from Texas A&M and Notre Dame University which are very different types of schools. What happened to the term collection development? The word development doesn’t exist in either job description. While I think they are the same type of job, they are described differently. One wants someone who can “empower users with extensive and diverse collections, deep expertise, and innovative programs.” The other is looking to fill the position with someone who has “the primary responsibility of holistically assessing library collections for their relevance to the university curriculum and research priorities.” In either case, they are positions dealing with collection development. Sometimes the job descriptions are an issue of semantics. The result is the same. We need people to work as collection development librarians.
What does this all mean concerning our work and the approach to it? We are all experts of some sort whether we are called SMEs or strategists or some other currently trending term. Be proud of the expertise you have developed and take advantage of using your knowledge to be successful in your work as a librarian. Seize the opportunity to showcase your skills and be the professional authority that you are.
For additional reading and information:
https://elearningindustry.com/breaking-into-the-industry-become-a-subject-matter-expert (a detailed article about becoming a collection strategist)
Or
https://www.indeed.com/q-collection-strategist-jobs.html?vjk=3088ae055f86b6b7 (for job postings with collection strategist as part of the position)
RIPS Law Librarian Blog 