View from the Hill

The Future is Bright, the Future is...

I was back at the Royal Society of Chemistry in Burlington House yesterday to take part in the Chemical Information And Computer Application Group's (CICAG) event about the future of the chemical information profession. In the beautiful Science Room, the delegates sat at round tables which allowed for lots of interesting discussion after each session.

Dr Sandra Ward started the day in style giving us her Long View of the chemical (& wider) information world. The two best things I'll take from listening to Sandra are her framework for valuing a service and the wonderful phrase "optimistic curiosity" - in Sandra's words, a key skill of the information professional. She also got us thinking about what opportunities there are in your organisation. On our table we looked at the small opportunities that we could facilitate for our own development.

Next up was me. I was invited by Stephanie North to give the recruiter's view of the market. My theme was Maximising Your Impact. I'm very grateful to everyone attending for throwing themselves whole-heartedly into all the group exercises. It's a good thing for a facilitator to have trouble breaking through meaningful discussions!

After a delicious lunch and a thwarted attempt to get some fresh air (the air was a little too moist for my liking), we heard from Pam Toplis who spoke about setting up as an independent information specialist.

Our last speaker was Joanne Thomson (@chemicalscience) who talked us through the RSC's publishing pipeline, from acquisition to delivery. Not only was I impressed by the breadth & depth of their output, but it was fascinating to hear Joanne describe their processes and the expertise of the team. One stat that stood out for me was that ChemComm journal rejects 60-70% of their manuscript submissions. It feeds into Joanne's point that good usage stats on their products = better sales = more content submission = good usage... you see how this works! I really liked one of her closing slides which asked "what makes our people succeed?" The answer is "a shared vision". She's right - having a diverse team with differing experiences is wonderful but you need to work for the same goal.

Stephanie North chaired the meeting and asked us to finish up by completing the ... in the title of the event. The theme of discussion on our table during the day had been personal development - we comprised a PhD student, a first professional post subject librarian & a many-years-in-the-job subject librarian and also someone about to set up their own business. How did we finish it? Well, what is an info pro if not curious? And I am determinedly optimistic, so...

The future is bright, the future is ours to shape.

- Suzanne (@suzyredrec)

Inspirational Monkeys

How often do you feel inspired?  What or who last inspired you? It was last night for me and the inspiration was the Uncaged Monkeys. Let's start with the audience - 3500 people turned out on a Monday night at the Hammersmith Apollo to hear about science. Impressive. I speak at conferences, running workshops about the mechanics of using your voice effectively - pace, tone, volume, projection - so I was particularly interested in how these (now seasoned) presenters but above all, scientists, communicated to the audience in such a huge venue.

We were treated to a whirlwind look at carbon dating by Chris Addison (who, if I’m honest, could speak a bit slower - it pains me to say this as I'm a BIG fan), geek love songs by Helen Arney (ukulele + science = lots of laughs) and a look at perception with Richard Wiseman (Carmina Burana will never be the same). For me, it was Robin Ince hosting who set the tone and got me hooked. He was as excitable as a small child who had discovered a new insect in the garden and thus found a new toy.

Now, I'm a musician, not a scientist. But I have a fascination for all things medical so the last presenter was of particular interest to me - Dr Ben Goldacre, actual doctor and also writer, broadcaster and author of Bad Science. He bounded on to the stage and whizzed around it like another excitable child. His language was, quite rightly, medical and scientific whilst talking about clinical trials and withheld data. But it was the musical delivery which made him stand out as an inspirational speaker for me. He set off at an allegro pace, sometimes hitting vivace as his passion poured out of him but he slowed to a purposeful andante to give us a chance to properly listen to and digest his key points. As if to highlight how invested he is in pursuing the truth (sorry, I went a bit X Files there), Goldacre’s voice occasionally hit the high notes usually only emitted by choir boys but this only served to show us how much he cares.

Moving from the musical Dr Goldacre to the poetic Prof Brian Cox, who was the highlight of the evening for me. Whilst I have a fair grasp of medical terminology (thanks to an early stint in St John’s Ambulance and a love of Casualty, ER, City Hospital & a Dr best friend), my understanding of particle physics is, well, lacking. It didn’t matter. Listening to Cox speak was like soaking up Shakespeare – I got the general gist of it, picked up a few key phrases, but mostly enjoyed his lilting delivery. It was quite a geek-fest at the Apollo and I imagine the scientists in the audience appreciated Cox not dumbing down his language – and so did I. But it’s not just about the words. Why was I hooked on hearing more about the Large Hadron Collider and Gravity Probe B? I think it was the combination of being utterly enthralled by someone so passionate and knowledgeable about their subject and also the imagery he used. There was no background music (controversial or otherwise), just images projected onto a big screen (which were easy to view even from the cheap seats at the back) – far away galaxies viewed by the Hubble telescope, the curvature of the Earth as seen from the moon. It was pure poetry.

What makes an inspirational speaker? For me, it’s someone who speaks clearly but with passion and emotion. It’s someone who knows their subject. But ultimately it’s someone who commands my attention and my respect, someone who engages me and makes me listen whether or not I understand every word. Thank you Dr Goldacre and Prof Cox for making me want to be a better speaker.

We were all entertained and educated last night. I wish all CPD was this much fun.

 - Suzanne

Tents & Technology

Two articles on technology caught my eye over the last couple of days – in today’s Metro (easy to find – I was holding the newspaper) and yesterday the BBC’s website (took me 5 minutes to find it again today!).

Those who know me will know I’m a big fan of anything Spooks or James Bond related so you can imagine my delight when I read about Obama’s tent that is “one of the safest places in the world to have a conversation.” Before I read further in the article, I tried to imagine how this was done, surely with waves that block signals but how do they silence the voices? Sadly the secret ingredient isn’t revealed but the levels of security involved in the construction of and admission to the Sensitive Compartmented Information Facilities are fascinating. It seems a far cry from the occasional stories we read of our politicians and government employees leaving files and USBs on the train.

I very nearly missed my tube stop this morning when reading about the project Planets (Preservation & Long-term Access through NETworked Services) and the involvement of Dr Adam Farquhar from the British Library. It is a project to “deliver a sustainable framework to enable long-term preservation of digital content, increasing Europe's ability to ensure access in perpetuity to its digital information”, capturing ciphers to enable future generations to decode any data stored on what will be obsolete technology. We often find our candidates discussing digital preservation but it is mostly in reference to archives and dusty old books. The capture and future accessibility of information stored on various media really is essential on a short-term and long-term basis. Only last week I found myself wanting a document stored on a floppy disk and had no way of retrieving it, but I think the project has a higher meaning than just helping me…! I would urge you to read more about this project and its partners. The foresight of the scientists is something for which we should all be very grateful.

- Suzanne

Chemically reactive library

In the historic surroundings of the Royal Society of Chemistry's (RSC) Library last night, I found out that chemistry is, actually, pretty cool.

Entitled "A Little Light Relief", it was a public lecture on the use of light in medicine, presented by the President of the RSC, Professor David Phillips OBE. He explained to the assembled audience - comprising RSC members, students and people like me - that this is the International Year of Chemistry, describing some of his advocacy work with young people and the increase in applications to study chemistry at Imperial College, where he is Professor Emeritus. A seasoned presenter, Prof. Phillips started off with a big bang (in a library?!), moving to surprisingly fluorescent tonic water (still thus when gin is added) finishing with a remarkable demonstration of the treatment of jaundice with photodynamic therapy (PDT). I'm always more engaged when listening to a speaker who is so passionate about their subject, so last night I was gripped by Prof. Phillips, even though a few of the technicalities were a little too, well, technical for me.

Thanks to the delightful Professor Brian Cox, we all know that physics is cool. I'm now feeling that way about chemistry. We surely need more media coverage about the discoveries, achievements and applications of chemistry and how science makes life possible.

Oh, yes, the RSC library... first bookshelf acquired in 1842 and it became central to the growth of the Society. If you are able to visit Burlington House, do - the library is beautiful and just looks like it is full of fascinating discoveries!

I'm off to buy the latest edition of the New Scientist...

- Suzanne

Wellcome Library Workshops

A colleague today alerted me to the Wellcome Library's programme of Autumn workshops, starting on 26th October. The workshops provide training on research and resources in the Wellcome Library, and are aimed at the general public. The programme includes:
- thematic workshops on Science in the News, Medicine and Literature and the History of Medicine
- training on specific resources such as PubMed Central, and Nineteenth Century Newspapers Online
- and introductions to the Archives & Manuscripts collection, the Wellcome Images database, and genealogical research resources.

Seems like a good example of a library reaching out to its members (and indeed potential members) and helping them to get the most of the collection so I thought worth a mention here.