Summer In The Library

This summer I worked at a small library. I was part time circulation clerk and part time “intern”. As part of the intern aspect of the job, I was asked to audit the library to find various things that were causing inefficiency and come up with solutions. This is essentially the job that I want following college so it was perfect! The first thing that had to change was the youth services closet. This closet is where EVERYTHING for the kids’ events is kept. Any craft supply you can think of, as well as a bunch of random stuff. I spent 3 weeks going through the closet, throwing stuff away, organizing, and labelling it all. The next thing I did was completely reorganize the circulation desk. For anyone who isn’t aware, the circ desk is where you go to check out books, return books, ask questions, or pretty much anything else at the library. I spent a day putting things in more efficient places based on how often they were used, making it easier for staff to find what they needed.

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The last major thing I did was create a new policy for shelf reading. Shelf reading is when we go through all the books and just make sure they are in the right place. Everything is alphabetical, or in numerical order, it’s all in the right section, etc. The previous way was not efficient at all, meaning it never got done. We had a color coded sheet of every shelf in the library, and each staff member had a color. They were responsible for those sections. However, people were not ever doing this task, and some of the sections were easier than others, which is unfair. So I created a new, non color coded sheet, and had them implement a policy where each circulation staff member was required to shelf read 2 shelves a week. They would initial on the paper, and could only choose a section that hadn’t been done yet. As soon as the sheet is filled, it is turned in to the director. She then can see if everyone participated. This system allowed for the whole library to be efficiently covered in a short amount of time, with some amount of freedom for the employees.

Overall, this experience gave me a chance to see how much industrial engineering can actually apply to everyday work. I was able to identify problems, come up with solutions, and make processes more efficient, which is exactly what I hope to do in my future career.

-Chloe Blunier, President