Are staffers outside of youth services ever responsible for staffing your children\u2019s desk in a programming pinch?\u00a0 Would employees outside of your department feel comfortable and confident in providing this service or would they feel stunned like a deer caught in the headlights?<\/p>\n
At our community branch library, information services staff members also staff our children\u2019s services desk, and we receive a great number of children\u2019s reference questions at our adult information services desk.\u00a0 Staff members outside of youth services must be familiar with the needs of children and those that work with them. Being cross-trained to provide customer service to customers of all ages is a necessity, but how do we ensure that staffers receive the training necessary to handle the unique needs of our young customers?<\/p>\n
My colleague recently presented training for library staff outside of youth services. Not meant as a substitute for advanced youth services training in reference or readers\u2019 advisory, this overview highlighted many of the traditional questions staffers receive when they work in the children\u2019s services department. This training served as a perfect introduction for those employees who may occasionally need to staff this service desk.<\/p>\n
Where are the BOB books?\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n During this youth services basics training, my colleague used questions that have been previously asked by customers as training examples. Just as when working in the information services department, training participants realized that questions are often not as simple as they appear.\u00a0 The question, \u201cwhere are the BOB books?\u201d\u009d is a perfect example.\u00a0 The answer could mean numerous things in our library system, depending on the needs of the library user, and could include a request for a standard beginning reader series; it could also serve as a request for the TV inspired books based off the popular Bob the Builder character, or the extremely popular Battle of the Books (BOB) competitions sponsored by our public school system.\u00a0 Understanding how this one type of question, \u201cwhere are your BOB books?\u201d\u009d could mean various things to different people, was rated by attendees as one of the most valuable pieces of information they learned during the training.<\/p>\n Let\u2019s Take a Tour<\/em><\/p>\n As part of the training, participants toured our children\u2019s department at our Headquarters Library.\u00a0 This touring component provided staffers with a close and personal look at our collection and was helpful to staffers from each of our branches as our youth services departments are structured similarly in each of our eight library locations.\u00a0 By including this hands-on training component, participants were able to view exactly where items were located, from the juvenile biographies placed at the end of the children\u2019s nonfiction collection to the difference among board books, picture books, and beginning readers.\u00a0 Knowing our collection is critical in providing excellent customer service, and this tour helped our trainees gain confidence in providing that service for our young patrons.<\/p>\n Priorities of Programs and Services<\/em><\/p>\n Questions about children\u2019s programming, and the specialized services offered within the children\u2019s services department, are often questions asked by patrons.\u00a0 Adults may frequently register their children to attend special programming, request information on how to duplicate the story time experience at home, or request tutoring resources. Staffers must be able to quickly address these questions while also being aware of the unique services offered within the children\u2019s department, such as our picture book bundle service, where customers may check out a group of books organized by a specific theme. Children\u2019s unique interests and needs must be understood by all staff, not just those librarians specializing in children\u2019s services.<\/p>\n This training helped staff members without a background in children\u2019s services to gain a better understanding of the interests and needs of our young patrons. Our goal is to prepare our colleagues to feel as comfortable and confident as they can when working with children and their families, instead of feeling caught like a deer in the headlights! What topics do you believe are important to introduce to staff members outside of your department if they were to staff your children\u2019s desk? How do you ensure staffers are most effectively able to reach out to your customers?\u00a0 Please share in the comments below!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Are staffers outside of youth services ever responsible for staffing your children\u2019s desk in a programming pinch?\u00a0 Would employees outside of your department feel comfortable and confident in providing this service or would they feel stunned like a deer caught in the headlights? At our community branch library, information services staff members also staff our children\u2019s services desk, and we receive a great number of children\u2019s reference questions at our adult information services desk.\u00a0 Staff members outside of youth services must be familiar with the needs of children and those that work with them. Being cross-trained to provide customer service to customers of all ages is a necessity, but how do we ensure that staffers receive the training necessary to handle the unique needs of our young customers? My colleague recently presented training for library staff outside of youth services. Not meant as a substitute for advanced youth services training…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":151,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":"","_members_access_role":[],"_members_access_error":""},"categories":[197,209],"tags":[803,229,560],"class_list":["post-9309","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blogger-meg-smith","category-research","tag-blogger-meg-smith","tag-cross-training","tag-reference-desk"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9309","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/151"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9309"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9309\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9309"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9309"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9309"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}