Previous training

Coping with Change

Staff in library & information services are experiencing change on an unprecedented level – new structures, new technology, new ways of working. Such changes impact on working lives and can be stressful.
LIEM is offering a one-day practical workshop to help staff working in libraries, information and archives services understand how people typically react to change. It provides some personal strategies for dealing with the changes experienced.

Delivering Excellent Customer Service

The quality of customer service is an essential element in an organisation’s reputation and success.  LIEM  offers a one-day training event aimed at staff working in library, information and archives services to help them:

•  Gain confidence and skills in dealing with internal and external customers
•  Build a rapport with customers and get to the root of an enquiry or problem
•  Follow best practice when making and receiving calls
•  Be assertive in managing a situation and achieving solutions
•  Present a positive image of their organisation at all times

Handling conflict situations

Do you face conflict situations during your work and want to learn how to resolve these constructively?  This one-day training event for library, information and archive services staff will help you to:

Understand why conflict occurs and recognise the signs
Assess the risk before taking any actions
Manage your emotional reactions and cope with others’ emotions and behaviours

Know how to act assertively and defuse aggressive situations
Understand the advantages of different conflict strategies
The programme is aimed at any level of staff who may experience conflict in their roles - within their organisation, within their team, with external agencies or customers. Please note it is not a course about dealing with physical aggression.

Influencing Skills

Achieving your goals at work often means gaining the help, co-operation and commitment of others both within and beyond your own organisation.   
This one-day training event is aimed at middle managers working in library, information and archives services to help you:

Increase your personal influence and build working relationships
Develop an effective influencing strategy
Recognise the impact of your own style and approach on others
Express your views confidently and persuasively with a realistic outcome in mind.

Introduction to People Management

LIEM's one-day training event aimed at team leaders and operational managers working in library, information and archives services to help them:

• Be clear on their role and responsibilities in relation to managing people
• Develop a personal leadership style
• Performance manage in a way that motivates & gets the best from employees
• Identify actions to deal with their most significant challenge in managing employees

Managing for Excellent Customer Service in Libraries, Archives & Information Services

This course is for managers & team leaders responsible for delivering excellent customer service through their teams, to enable them to: 

• Recognise the role of the manager in promoting & delivering excellent customer service
• Develop a strategy for improving customer service and managing expectations at an organisational and a local level
• Be pro-active in making systems more customer orientated
• Handle customer problems & complaints effectively
• Coach & support staff in developing & maintaining excellent customer service skills

Supporting the curriculum with Local Studies and Heritage Resources

The Schools Library Service for Derbyshire and Derby was the venue for this training event for colleagues from libraries, museums and archive services in November 2010. 

The day aimed to enable staff working with local studies resources to produce relevant materials and activities to make these more accessible to children and to meet the needs of the National Curriculum; to help develop outreach/in-house sessions which are relevant to schools and to deliver lively and enriching sessions for children, and to provide participants with an opportunity to share experiences and good practice with regional colleagues.

This lively event included presentations from Ruth Gordon, Local Studies Development Librarian for Derbyshire, Chris Weir, Senior Archivist at Nottinghamshire Archives, Denise Pritchard, Manager of the Schools Library Service, Christina Raven Conn, Librarian – Local Studies and Social Inclusion, Nottingham City and Ruth Sharpe, Enquiry Service Co-ordinator, Derbyshire. 

Copies of some of the presentations and worksheets highlighted during the day are attached below.

Fair Flora   Notes to go with Fair Flora slides presentation  

Using the internet for Local and family history useful websites   

Signposts for memory boxes   Memory Boxes Guidelines   

Having a Go at the internet - class visit 2006 year 7s   

Back to School - Chris Weir   

All Change Please – Contemporary Issues in Document Supply

LIEM was delighted to work with the Forum for Interlending to deliver a joint workshop at the University of Leicester in January 2009. Over 40 participants from a variety of libraries across the region and beyond took part and the event was very well received. Speakers included Peter Robinson of the British Library, Tim Peacock of Derby University and Joan Bird of the British Geological Survey and there were workshops on Secure Electronic Delivery, International Document Supply and Music Performance Sets. It was an excellent example of partnership and collaboration between the two organisations and grateful thanks are extended to Linda Clark, Document Supply Manager at the University of Leicester, and her colleagues and to Rose Goodier, Chair of FIL, and members of the committee.

LIEM visit to RNIB in Peterborough

This visit on Thursday 22nd January 2009 aimed to provide a chance to explore behind the scenes and discover how the Royal National Institute of Blind People supports people living with sight loss. It included insight into:

Transcription of braille into foreign languages, mathematics and music, as well as the production of tactile images, maps and diagrams. (The largest braille production facility in Europe)
The RNIB’s famous Talking Book Service. Around 8,000 books a day are distributed, using the latest digital technology, to over 40,000 customers.
The warehouse, where products and information are dispatched around the world. Hundreds of everyday living products - from large button phones to liquid level indicators, braille publications to speaking clocks and watches are sold through Customer Services, or the online shop, as well as through local blind societies.
Volunteering teams: meeting some of the many volunteers who work in a wide range of roles.
An account of the visit written by participants Christina Raven-Conn and Val Sellars can be accessed here: Three cheers for J.K.Rowling

The British Library Bursary scheme

The British Library Travel and Research bursary awards were established in 2005, funded by the British Library, Libraries and Information East Midlands and the East Midlands Branch of CILIP. The funds have been used to support two awards to date. These were made to Lesley Phillips for her work on the history of the Old Theatre Royal in Chesterfield, and to Madeline Cox for her study of Nottinghamshire’s Astronomical Past. You can read more about their experiences in the article published in Impact in Spring 2008, Vol 11, No 1 pp 16 – 20 "Calling all studious and curious persons” The British Library Bursary Scheme.

In August 2007 the bursary fund was also used to cover the travel costs of fifteen members of staff from a wide range of libraries across the region for a one-day visit to the British Library in London.

The final two British Library Travel and Research bursary awards for East Midlands’ library staff have now been made. The awards, which were widely advertised across the region, attracted a strong field of applications and the winning two were selected by the British Library to go forward.

The bursaries have been awarded to Carol Barstow, Librarian of Bromley House Library in Nottingham and to Jon-Paul Carr, Northamptonshire Studies Manager for Northamptonshire Libraries. The awards will enable Carol and Jon-Paul to undertake a period of research at the London site of the British Library with the support and guidance of Dr Michelle Brown, former keeper of manuscripts at the BL.

Please note the scheme is now closed.

Further information can be read here:BL Bursary scheme