Drawing on the past; looking to the future, a dialogue with CILIP NW members and Sue Lacey Bryant (MMU, Wednesday 4th December 2024)

After an initial introduction from everyone present covering their current roles and what drew them to libraries, Sue began her presentation by looking at her first experiences with libraries. In her childhood Sue associated libraries with her father, a working Royal Marine, as they would often attend her local public library when he was on shore leave. She also associated libraries with social justice, seen in her decision to attend the bus route planning discussions at Medway town public library as she was aware how many people would be impacted by these routes. 

At her first library job in Rochester public library, her manager saw a kindred library spirit in her and advised her on potential career options, sectors and qualifications. This information proved useful with Sue's first graduate job as a library assistant in an academic librarian, where she learnt how to adapt her workshop skills to any academic library and role. Her first health role appeared, where she covered for a nursing librarian and again saw how transferrable academic library skills are across subjects. 

Sue then started her first role developing education and training materials at the Library Association (now CILIP), including developing Prestel. Whilst here she had a manager who influenced Sue's management style due to her devotion to team diversity, continued professional development (CPD), and professional standards. This role provided useful experience in stakeholder communication, governance, and educational material assessment. 

Sue continued working in information development at Croydon Health Authority (CHA) where she created information documents to support planning and end users. Whilst Sue was at this role, Maureen Valdez published an article on information brokers which gave Sue an idea of what she would like to do next in her career. Whilst here Sue ensured all staff had a voice by developing a staff suggestion scheme and secured funding and advertisement through ensuring that the CHA's phone number was listed on CHA-published health literature. When the CHA was absorbed into other organisations, Sue started freelance work linking GPs to health librarians as it fit around her family. 

At this stage in Sue's career, she had some renown so was invited to join committees and review literature, including writing training documents on CPD and solo librarianship. During this time she learnt her current job was defined as a portfolio career. She added to this portfolio by joining Primary Health Organisation to write health literature, which she would have liked to have done more of with a focus on primary care and health management. 

During the many NHS restructures, she found that quality improvement impacted change so wrote Knowledge for Healthcare which focuses on using the right knowledge at the right time and place. In this role she created a kitbag of quality improvement techniques which can be used to show one's impact.

After her career summary, Sue presented her view on on the future of the information and library profession. She acknowledged the global shortage of employees across sectors and that the reliance on international employment is not fruitful. She discussed the need to develop skills that add value beyond what technology like automatons can achieve, such as digitally-based ones like cognitive, interpersonal and self-leadership. As technology adoption rises, there will be economic growth which will require individuals with analytic and creative thinking - skills commonly found in libraries. Sue cited her experience cowriting the Topol review as making her realise the opportunity for working with digital transformation. 

Regarding AI and job loss, Sue stated that jobs will be lost to those comfortable with replacing people with AI. AI will impact everything in libraries, and drew attention to the Dr. Andrew Cox & CILIP AI impact report that stressed the importance of centring ethics and values in these developments and the CILIP AI survey which will inspire future learning offers. Sue recommended that library staff should nurture links between libraries and AI due to the need for trusted professionals who work with information. The wide range of library services and information pool will need sophisticated AI models and collaboration between libraries and other teams. Sue acknowledged the common criticism of bias in AI, but stressed that it comes from humans and greater focus should be placed on supporting organisations who understand real world use of AI and what the biases are. 

Sue briefly discussed the role of knowledge mobilisation in shaping political and organisational policy. She explained that library staff can create a bridge between knowledge users and content, making such policies more omnidirectional and interconnected. This is reflected in her current work on a Bauhaus-inspired knowledge management visual model [LINK]. 

During the session discussion, Sue highlighted how the need for technological advancement during COVID has improved systems used to run NHS health libraries alone. This includes an AI PICO search tool which supports researching as humans cannot fully assess all new materials due to the publication speed. She also detailed a need for progress in school libraries with more digital skills and health knowledge training, as 13+ teenagers can access their doctor results online. 

Sue concluded by explaining one of the current aims of CILIP is supporting librarians with talking to their local representatives with a toolkit and utilising the expertise of volunteers and members.