Career Changer? How to Use Your MLIS Program to Make Your Move
In a recent survey of its alumni, the San José State University School of Information asked whether their library and information (LIS) studies had been a career pivot for them — was this going to be their first career, or were they, in fact, choosing a new career path? Just over half responded that this was a second career for them.
That’s great news for the information profession, because it brings fresh viewpoints, different skill sets, often management experience, and the broadest-possible perspectives into play. But it’s also great news for those career changers, who can combine existing skills with a new suite of professional expertise to increase their career options.
Where were career-changers coming from?
According to the alumni survey, the largest number come from education. But business is also a popular previous career, including business administration, marketing, customer service, retail management, and communications/marketing. Other professionals moving into LIS work come from areas such as:
· technology, telecommunications, information services, and research technology;
· editorial and publishing;
· the military; and
· nonprofits, among others.
In addition, the STEM disciplines were also strongly represented, with anthropology, biotechnology, environmental engineering, healthcare logistics, natural science, nursing, veterinary technology, and zoology careers among the careers that led alumni into information work.
Advice from career-changers on using grad school to pivot
This diversity of career backgrounds makes sense given the multiple ways individuals are using their library and information science skills these days. But another secret these career-changers know is that completing a Master’s degree in Library and Information Science presents terrific opportunities to transition from an existing career into a new information-based one.
Your goals should be to take every opportunity to explore career paths of potential interest, start building your new professional network, and use every opportunity to create visibility in your new information profession. That way, by the time you’ve worked your way through the myriad assignments, activities, and engagements of your program’s curriculum, you’ve also been building the new professional platform in the information profession, the one that will help you launch your LIS career.
Some of the best advice from experts who’ve done this themselves in grad school:
Use your assignments to start building your new network. Is there an expert you can interview as part of your assignment? A group of specialists on a LIS topic that interests you whose opinions you can solicit and include in a term paper? (Some great ways to identify potential experts to reach out to: check out the online programs for LIS conferences to see who is speaking on topics that interest you, scan annual “best of” issues of publications like Library Journal’s annual Shakers & Movers award-winners, or see who’s writing on topics that interest you in relevant peer-reviewed journals.) If you’ve reached out to someone for an interview or a quote, make sure to send them a thank-you note along with a copy of your completed assignment, and then ask if they’d be willing to connect with you on LinkedIn.
Create a good LinkedIn profile — even if you’re still a student. LinkedIn profiles enable you to be present and visible to people who might want to contact you about a job, or share information or opportunities, or ask you for advice, or consider you for a volunteer project…all those things that you want to have happen in your new career.
So make sure your career-transitioning LinkedIn profile emphasizes information aspects of work you did in your previous career and all the cool stuff you’re learning (including projects you’re taking on) while in grad school. Your LinkedIn profile is one of the most powerful career-transition tools you have; make sure it’s helping you move from where you’ve been to where you’re going while you’re still a student.
Look for projects that help you become visible to your target audience. For example, suppose you’re hoping to transition to work in a corporate library. Take a course in Special Libraries or Business Intelligence Sources or Competitive Intelligence and create projects (even if they’re not part of the course) that let you research and write on topics of interest to professionals (and employers) doing this type of work. Then if possible, present your findings at a conference. If not possible, write a killer article on your research and see if you can get it published in a relevant journal.
If not, post your terrific article on the Medium publishing platform and market the heck out of it (translation: email all of the appropriate chapters and/or divisions to let them know of your research and ask they if they’d like to share with their members). Or post a reference and link to your research write-up LinkedIn’s LIS Career Options group, where over 13,000 members will see your name and the subject of your expertise. Your goal is to have your new professional persona as an information professional in training begin replacing your old persona as a nurse or teacher or engineer, for example.
Join — and become active in — as many LIS professional associations as you can. One of the great things about the SJSU iSchool program is that as part of its professional development commitment to students, the school pays for one professional association membership during your first year in the program. (The good news is that if you want to belong to more than one association, student memberships are usually steeply discounted.)
Becoming active in a professional association is one of the fastest routes to becoming accepted as a high-value contributor in your new LIS field. You quickly make friends who value your willingness to contribute, your expertise will be recognized and appreciated, and people who come to know and trust you are much more willing to recommend you for jobs in your new information discipline. It’s a fast and easy way to become “part of the community” even before you graduate, which is just where you want your transition to land you.
Do as many information interviews as you can. (Or as one SJSU iSchool career advisor noted, “Do them early and do them often.”) Information interviews are your opportunity to have a brief (usually about 20 minutes) conversation with a practitioner regarding their job, the work they do, their career, their opinions about the future of that specific career path, and any other information they feel would be useful for you to know.
The reason information interviews are so helpful for career-changers is that they offer three important benefits: 1) you have an opportunity to vet your assumptions about a specific type of LIS work might (or might not) be what you’re looking for; 2) they enable you to expand your network of connections in a potential LIS field of interest; and 3) they enable you to raise your visibility with those individuals as an information professional in training who asks thoughtful and insightful questions, who listens attentively and appreciatively, and who conducts themselves with a professional demeanor while you are vetting your assumptions. Bottom line: once again, you’re laying the foundation to move forward into your new LIS career.
Oh, the places you’ll go (depending on what sounds interesting!)
One of the reasons the LIS profession has such a high proportion of career changers is that it supports both those who want to completely leave a previous career behind and focus completely on, say, public or academic libraries, museums, or archives, and those who want to build on their previous skills with an opportunity-expanding overlay of information skills.
These individuals might include the healthcare professional looking now at health informatics, the aerospace administrator considering records management for a defense agency, or the marketing firm account rep exploring digital asset management, among hundreds of other options. All of these roles build on previous expertise and professional connections, which often results in higher pay based on specialized knowledge.
But the most important take-away is that career changers who are mastering LIS skills have a choice as to which direction they want to take their new career, and with a bit of strategic planning, they’ll be able to use their grad school studies as the perfect way to build their launch platform.
