Sue Hill, FREC Hon FCLIP Hon FCDG Managing Director
Nicola Franklin, FREC Head of Information Recruitment
Sue Hill Recruitment Blog
There has been much discussion in the UK recently both openly and behind closed doors about whether having an association (or, in actual fact, a plethora of associations) for information workers makes us an information profession. Certainly there seems to have been a slow but steady move away by many organisations (from banks to public libraries and all in between) from seeking out candidates specifically from what we regard as our profession when they are recruiting roles that we might consider to fit our niche.
We see this in the job descriptions we receive from clients, which call for a Masters in Information Management or Chartered Librarian status less and less often. We also see jobs advertised by generalist agencies, or directly by companies in the generalist press, which clearly have a primary or major focus on knowledge or information management but appear to be seeking candidates from an IT, HR or Marketing communications background.
People with an information (KM/IM/LIM/RM) background could clearly do these jobs, but in this new information age so many potential candidates appear to have information skills that employers don't necessarily see the 'information profession' as a distinct entity or as their first port of call to recruit. The same could be said of students when they decide to pick a course to study at university, since our niche is so small and so invisible that fewer students are attracted to study in our field.
Another trend within the UK information profession is convergence between Information, Knowledge and Records Management, on the ground if not within the associations. New systems such as MS Sharepoint, which offers functionality for content management, document workflow and records management, are helping to drive this trend. In the UK government, the creation of a KIM Competency framework and establishment of the KIM Profession within the civil service, to sit alongside the IT, HR and other functions Professions, is also pushing convergence.
I am not sure that we should look to attach blame for the fragmented nature of the profession, but more to try and figure out how to attract people who end up working in our arena to join our networks and associations and to try and understand how to deal with the fact that the rapid development in information functions and techniques means that information is now part of every role. It is no longer 'ours'.
RSS
Feedback form
