From nonprofits to libraries: information-gathering, communication, and relationship-building skills that transcend fields

Transcription

1 From nonprofits to ibraries: information-gathering, communication, and reationship-buiding skis that transcend fieds 4 Kimbery Fu-Jia Yang Grant writing and fundraising defined The nonprofit professiona who works in grant writing, fundraising, or administration acquires a pethora of information-gathering, communication, and reationshipbuiding skis transferabe to ibrarianship. Athough a grant writers can be described as fundraisers, not a fundraisers are grant writers. Fundraising is a broader term encompassing a mutitude of activities with the utimate goa of cutivating donors and contributions. Athough there are simiarities between a grant writer and a fundraiser (indeed, a grant writer is as a type of fundraiser) the differences between the roes, and responsibiities of a grant writer versus a fundraiser, create different ski sets that are assets to a career in ibrarianship in distinct ways. A discussion of these various roes and their corresponding skis wi iustrate how the skis transate into ibrarianship. In the nonprofit word, the term deveopment is often used to describe both grant writing and fundraising staff. Hence, arger nonprofits might have a chief deveopment officer or director of deveopment who oversees a deveopment department comprised of staff who write grant proposas ( grant writers ) and/or staff who fundraise in other ways. These other ways might incude soiciting individua donors, soiciting major donors or corporations, hoding specia event fundraisers, gaas, onine fundraising emais, and written, or ora requests to an individua for funding. A very arge nonprofit might even have staff dedicated to prospect research, a version of inteigence gathering on potentia donors ( prospects ), their capacity, and abiity to give money, and their ikeihood of giving. In a sma nonprofit, there might be ony one staff member dedicated to the entire consteation of grant writing, and fundraising activities described above. Skis to Make a Librarian. Copyright 2015 Esevier Ltd. A rights reserved.

2 36 Skis to Make a Librarian Information-gathering Information-seeking Whie ibrarians are presented with reference questions that require informationseeking skis, deveopment professionas are presented with questions about funding opportunities, and donor prospects that require information seeking skis. Grant writing, as used in this chapter, means writing and preparing written proposas requesting funding for a stated purpose. A grant writer must constanty be aert to new, and recurring funding opportunities and their submission deadines. The grant writer both activey seeks new funding opportunities by searching for them onine, and passivey stays tuned to new, and recurring funding opportunities by subscribing to reevant istservs, newsetters, and aerts. Simiary, a ibrarian activey seeks information when responding to specific-user inquiries, and stays tuned to trends in ibrarianship by subscribing to istservs, newsetters, RSS feeds, and monitoring bogs. Grant writing subject matter speciaization and expertise In the course of identifying potentia funders, and crafting persuasive funding proposas, grant writers become knowedgeabe about the subject matter of their organization s programs, and the focus area in which their nonprofit or institution operates. For exampe, a grant writer for a chidren s charity woud become famiiar the subject matter/focus area of the charity (such as chidren aged 0 5, eary education, chid abuse prevention). Such things incude data, statistics, and research about the charity s geographic service area, demographics of its popuation served, and the benefits of its programs and projects. In essence, a needs assessment, or probem statement supported by data and research, is necessary to demonstrate the need for the service or program provided by the nonprofit. Deveoping expertise in the subject matter is necessary for a grant writer to craft compeing grant proposas. Librarian subject matter speciaization and expertise In a simiar vein, an academic ibrarian, especiay a iaison to a university department or professiona schoo, might acquire information-seeking expertise reevant to a specific discipine, such as chemistry, aw, socia or heath sciences, to support their iaison activities. Academic ibrarians woud become famiiar with subject-specific information (information about ibrary resources, databases, and any toos reevant to that particuar discipine) in order to understand the information needs of users within that academic discipine. A ibrarian serving the chemistry department woud obviousy need to be famiiar with different resources, than the ibrarian serving the history department.

3 From nonprofits to ibraries: information-gathering 37 Knowing the audience/user Grant writers/fundraisers know their audience A grant writer understands who the audience is for their proposas. Athough the audience generay is the funder, funders come in a variety of forms: corporations, foundations, government agencies, individuas, groups of individuas, or other funding entities. One thing that a funders have in common is that the grant writer s proposa must persuade them that what they are to fund is both viabe, and reevant. The proposa must aign with the mission, interest, and agenda of the funder. At the same time, different types of funders have different expectations, and preferences for what they want to see in a funding proposa. A corporation might prefer proposas that specify how they impact communities where the corporation has ocations, whereas a government agency might require an evauation pan, or data management pan. A successfu grant writer acquires knowedge of the particuar interests, and submission requirements for each type of funder. Simiary, a fundraiser understands the interests of their individua donor prospects. Before making a pitch to a potentia donor, the fundraiser gathers information on that individua s degree of interest in the nonprofit s mission, the person s financia capacity to give, and whether the nonprofit has a contact with that potentia donor (either a direct reationship with the donor, or a connection with another person who has a reationship with and can broker an introduction to that donor). Librarians know their users Whie grant writers target audience are potentia funders, and fundraisers audience are prospective donors, academic ibrarians audience are their users, which might be facuty, staff, and students. Understanding which particuar audience they are addressing, ibrarians wi adapt their presentation of information, or instruction to the target audience. For exampe, knowing that facuty are interested: in promotion, tenure, and maximizing their research impact, ibrarians might market services reated to those topics (bibiometrics, strategic pubishing workshops, etc.) specificay for the benefit of facuty. Librarians woud acquire discipine-specific information about their user popuation (facuty research interests, curricuum, and student course assignments, etc.) to inform how to provide reevant ibrary services, and instruction to those users. Librarians might aso taior instructiona opportunities, and services to be discipine-specific. For exampe, providing patient communications workshops at the medica schoo, or offering instruction on discipine-specific databases, for exampe, the Cumuative Index to Nursing and Aied Heath (CINAHL) for nursing students, or SciFinder for chemistry researchers. Onine research skis Grant writers onine search skis A grant writer must constanty be aert to both new, and recurring funding opportunities; to opportunities to renew existing grants; and a corresponding submission deadines. The grant writer both activey seeks new funding opportunities by

4 38 Skis to Make a Librarian searching for them onine, and passivey stays tuned to funding opportunities by subscribing to reevant istservs, newsetters, and funding aerts. To search activey for funding opportunities, the grant writer might become proficient at searching databases such as Foundation Directory Onine from the Foundation Center, and grants.gov. Seeking funding opportunities requires exceent research skis, and exceent research skis are an asset for any ibrarian. Librarians onine research skis Whie grant writers research funding-reated resources onine, a ibrarian activey seeks information in databases, or resources that they determine are most ikey to hep them respond to user-inquiries. Academic ibrarians attempt to become expert searchers of these databases, and topica onine resources. Whereas grant writers might subscribe to istservs, newsetters, and funding aerts so funding opportunities are pushed to them, ibrarians subscribe to istservs, newsetters, and aerts (e.g. RSS feed, or other mechanisms), that contain updates about the onine resources they use, deveopments in their subject area of expertise, or topics in ibrarianship reevant to their work. Staying abreast of topics in ibrarianship might incude information iteracy, instructiona technoogy, schoary communication, open access, and a wide variety of topics. Professiona deveopment Staying current on funding trends Staying abreast of funding trends is criticay important to grant writers, so they can monitor the continued viabiity of existing funding opportunities as we as new ones. This incudes researching, and monitoring the funding practices and preferences of current, past, and potentia new funders. From time-to-time, funders change their focus areas of funding, deveop new strategic initiatives, discontinue past initiatives, or institute guideines imiting previousy-funded organizations from re-appying for funding. After incuding an evauation component became a more commonpace funding requirement, nonprofits have had to adjust their programs to incude evauation in order to even submit a proposa or grant appication. Staying current on trends in ibrarianship Staying abreast of subject-specific resources is reevant to ibrarians; in the same way as staying informed of current funding trends is to grant writers. Academic ibrarians monitor trends in instructiona techniques, deveopments in their subject discipines, issues reevant to schoars, and researchers (e.g. open access, research impact metrics, the fipped cassroom mode, massivey open onine courses (MOOCs), copyright, etc.). Whie grant writers adapt their proposas, and funding appications to the submission requirements of funders in accordance with funding trends, academic

5 From nonprofits to ibraries: information-gathering 39 ibrarians adapt to the demands/interests of their constituencies (facuty, students, staff) according to educationa, and research trends. For exampe, some ibraries provide instruction, and guidance to support facuty compiance with the NIH Pubic Access Poicy (Stimson, 2009). With increased facuty interest in demonstrating the vaue, and impact of research, academic ibrarians have aso provided instruction, and support to facuty on research impact (Drummond & Wartho, 2009; Sari, Dubinsky & Homes, 2010). The adaptive abiities of grant writers seeking funding are transferabe to ibrarianship; in that ibrarians must be simiary adaptive in serving their academic community. Evauating information Grant writers and fundraisers evauate funding opportunities When grant writers are presented with a potentia funding opportunity, they evauate that opportunity, and its submission guideines, to determine whether to invest the time, and resources to prepare, and submit a proposa. Nonprofit fundraisers who work with individua donors undergo a simiar process by evauating whether a prospective donor might have sufficient interest in the nonprofit s activities, whether that prospect has the capacity/abiity to donate at certain monetary eves, and whether the nonprofit has access to the prospective donor, i.e. whether the nonprofit has a reationship with the prospective donor, or has a reationship with an intermediary who wi introduce the prospective donor to the nonprofit. Librarians evauate information sources A nonprofit grant writer can transfer anaytica skis used to evauate the viabiity of funding opportunities or donor prospects to the ibrary profession. Librarians use simiar anaytica skis when evauating sources of information to answer research or informationa queries (see Tabe 4.1, beow). Information-gathering Program or project? Athough the terms program and project are sometimes used interchangeaby, or synonymousy by some nonprofits, others wi treat the two as distinct concepts with regard to funding: Program wi be used to describe a service, or custer of services, provided on an ongoing basis by the organization. Project wi be used to describe a service, or custer of services, to be provided for a finite period of time, with project start dates and end dates. Even if it does not yet have a fixed end date initiay, a project is typicay not considered a perpetua, ongoing part of an organization s services, and is not panned to exist for an indefinite period of time. Occasionay, successfu projects wi be made reguar, ongoing parts of an organization s services, or wi be converted into ongoing programs because of their success.

6 40 Skis to Make a Librarian Tabe 4.1 Comparison of anaytica questions used to evauate sources of funding by nonprofit grant writers, and sources of information by ibrarians Sampe questions used by grant writers to evauate funding source Sampe questions used by ibrarians to evauate information source Eigibiity: Does the grant writer s organization meet the eigibiity requirements for grant appicants to this particuar funder? Compatibiity: Does the nonprofit s activities, programs, or area of focus match the funder s interest and guideines? If the nonprofit is considering estabishing a new project/program/ activity to meet the funding guideines, is the new project/program/activity consistent with the nonprofit s mission? Feasibiity: Is it feasibe to prepare a grant proposa by the deadine? Is it feasibe to carry out the proposed activities? Can they be impemented within the prescribed grant period? Likeihood of award: Is there a reasonabe ikeihood that the grant writer s organization wi be funded? Reevance: Does this source (database, journa, etc.) contain information appertaining to my topic or question? Am I ikey to retrieve resuts for my research? Reiabiity: Is the source of information reiabe? Is the source of the information potentiay biased? Is the research methodoogicay sound? The distinction between a program versus a project is reevant in grant-seeking, because some funders wi ony fund discrete projects, new projects, or piot projects, as opposed to services that are part of the ongoing, or reguar operations of the nonprofit. Other funders are wiing to fund services ony if they fee confident that the nonprofit, or its services, are capabe of securing sufficient funds from other funders to continue to exist. In those cases, an ongoing program has the advantage of being abe to demonstrate a track record of having been funded in the past, and the ikeihood of sustained funding, or continued existence. The distinction between the terms program and project aso have a roe in ibraries. Academic ibraries wi aso have time-defined projects, such as aunching outreach projects, evauation projects, hoding conferences or symposia, or conducting interna projects. Rather than using the term program, the straight-forward term service is used to describe a function that academic ibraries provide on a reguar, ongoing basis to their users. Information-gathering for programs versus projects Grant writers who have gathered information to prepare funding proposas for both programs, and projects wi note some differences in approach to the two tasks. Due to the ongoing nature of a program, there is more ikey to be existing,

7 From nonprofits to ibraries: information-gathering 41 documented information, even past proposas, program budgets, evauation pans, or other prior grant proposa eements that can be reused in a new grant proposa or funding appication. The abiity to recyce parts of past written proposas is an immense timesaver. However, projects often invove a new or non-recurring service, assembing information on a project is often more time-consuming. Brainstorming sessions, and meetings of stakehoders, might be hed by the grant writer to obtain the panning detais reated to the startup of a new project. These detais and information gathered are key eements that a grant writer wi need to incude in a written proposa. Project information-gathering A nonprofit grant writer s information-gathering skis for new projects are transferabe to the academic ibrary setting. When a ibrary pans a project, the process of invoving stakehoders, hoding meetings, and assembing a pan to impement the project are a steps with which a grant writer is ikey to be famiiar. Identifying existing sources of information (individuas, documents, or materias) that are hepfu to the current project are aso tasks with which a grant writer wi aready be acquainted. Just as funders for nonprofits have become more insistent on funding proposas incuding an evauation pan, or component, the ibrary word has become more interested in demonstrating the vaue of ibrary services. Hence, ibraries have increasingy focused on incuding an evauative component to their services, or have even aunched projects focusing entirey on evauation. Nonprofit grant writers who have incuded evauation in their funding proposas, and evauation resuts in their grant reports can point to these experiences to boster their credentias in the area of evauation panning in the ibrary word. Information-gathering from coeagues at a nonprofit In order to prepare a grant proposa, a grant writer gathers information from various coeagues. At arger nonprofits, this can invove engaging staff from mutipe departments, such as the deveopment office, finance, human resources, information technoogy, and panning/evauation, and even executive eadership. If the nonprofit operates in mutipe ocations, or provides services off-site, information might be gathered from staff who work at various sites. Since program or project staff have roes or responsibiities deivering services to the nonprofit s cient popuation, or impementing a program or project, information is gathered from those staff to verify that what is written in the proposa is both accurate, and feasibe. Information gathered from coeagues for ibrary services A nonprofit grant writer who used information-gathering skis to prepare funding proposas can appy these information-gathering skis in the ibrary profession. A ibrarian takes comparabe steps when gathering information to pan a ibrary project, service, or activity (see Tabe 4.2, beow). Since ibraries aso appy for grant funding, in those instances, a professiona grant writer has the advantage of being abe

8 42 Skis to Make a Librarian Tabe 4.2 Comparison of information-gathering activities of grant writers and ibrarians Common information gathered by grant writers to prepare funding proposa (NB not a categories of information are required by every funder) Common information gathered by ibrarians to pan project, service or activity Project description/timeine: Information from program or project staff who have operationa responsibiities might be gathered to confirm proposed activities, and deiverabes that wi be described in the proposa. Project description/timeine: Information from program or project staff might be gathered about the appropriate time frames, and timeine, to assign to proposa activities, or deiverabes. Staffing/bios: Biographica sketches, resumes, or CVs might be gathered for staff who conduct activities described by the proposa, and staff whose positions wi be funded by the grant. Budget: Financia information about personne, equipment, technoogy, direct and indirect expenses, and other sources of funding for the proposed project or program might be obtained from the nonprofit s finance department, or staff. Evauation: Information about an evauation pan for the proposed project or program might be gathered from staff. Existing resources: Information from coeagues about existing and avaiabe resources (materias, documentation, in order to avoid re-inventing the whee). Evauation: Information about past evauation pans or evauation toos (e.g. SurveyMonkey) that can be used for the proposed project, or service. Grant proposa eements: Information commony gathered for nonprofit grant proposas woud simiary be gathered for ibrary grant proposas. to directy appy his or her grant writing experience towards preparing grant appications on behaf of their ibrary. Information-gathering for grant reports At some nonprofits, grant writers might aso be charged with grant reporting responsibiities. Those grant writers woud track deadines for the preparation of grant reports as we as information (content) required for those reports. Just as gathering information for the grant proposa requires contacting staff from various departments,

9 From nonprofits to ibraries: information-gathering 43 gathering information for grant reports requires requesting information from various departments (e.g. financia reports of grant expenditures; numbers of cients served, outcomes, etc.). Information curation A curator is defined as one who has the care and superintendence of something (Merriam-Webster n.d.). Thus, curating information means caring for and superintending information. Nonprofit fundraisers, and administrators, as we as fundraisers, and administrators in academic institutions: care for information reated to their grant appications. They aso guard their funder/donor/member/aumni information that make them curators of information comparabe to ibrarians who care for, and superintend digita repositories. Information curation for fundraisers Nonprofit fundraisers, and fundraisers at academic institutions, use databases to track donors and their contributions. At arger nonprofits or in the academic setting, there may be a separate administrator who is responsibe for maintaining the donor, membership, or aumni database. Whie fundraisers track donor names, gift amounts, and gift dates in their donor databases, grant writers track information reated to their grant proposas, such as date submitted, amount requested, proposed grant period, proposa topic, award outcome (awarded/decined). These fieds or data eements function ike metadata that describe the proposa, grant appication, or funder/donor. Regardess of whether such information (metadata) is maintained in a donor database, or a spreadsheet: they serve a vita function in heping fundraisers maintain consistent information about past, pending, current, or future (panned) funding requests, their outcomes, and faciitate retrieva of such data. Information curation for ibrarians Skis with databases are usefu in the ibrary setting where databases are used to track patron, and service interactions. Librarians aso become curators of information when they function as cataogers, indexing content that appears on information databases, or when they are charged with starting, or maintaining an institutiona repository. Both tasks might require famiiarity with setting-up, assigning, or appying metadata. Whie fundraisers might confront the chaenge of retrieving the information they need from a donor database where data entry was inconsistent, ibrarians might confront the chaenge of retrieving information from databases that are inconsistenty indexed. Both fundraisers and ibrarians have a vested interest in having their information databases set up, and maintained in a way that faciitates retrieva of data or information they need; to fufi their job responsibiities. Thus, essons earned by fundraisers who manage donor databases can be instructive in the fied of ibrarianship.

10 44 Skis to Make a Librarian Communication Nonprofit fundraisers taior communications As mentioned above, successfu grant writers acquire knowedge of the particuar interests, and submission requirements of various types of funders. Accordingy, their proposas are taiored to the specia interests, expectations, and requirements of each type of funder. The stye, tone, and content of their funding proposas, or grant reports wi vary according to the funder type. For exampe, a famiy foundation s grantmaking operations might be run by individua famiy members. These individua decision-makers might find proposas, or grant reports with human impact stories, or testimonias more compeing than a government agency. Government agencies, and arge foundations might require forma grant appication components, such as a needs assessment, an evauation pan, and program/project timeine. In addition to being abe to identify potentia funders, nonprofit grant writers shoud be abe to write convincing proposas expaining why their nonprofit is exceptionay suited to impement program/project/activities worthy of the funder s commitment of funds. The nonprofit fundraiser who asks individuas for monetary donations must be abe to communicate we both in writing and oray, sometimes making the ask face-to-face with prospective donors. Librarians taior communications Whereas grant writers taior their funding requests to the funder, ibrarians simiary taior their communications according to their target audience, and according to the media in which they communicate. Librarian communications through the ibrary s socia media channes (such as Facebook or Twitter) wi differ dramaticay from their communications in other sources, such as ibrary webpages, bog posts, or conference posters. The content, tone, and stye of their communications wi further change if the communication invoves pubishing an artice in an academic journa. A grant writer who is accompished at taioring communications according to various types of grant appications to foundations, corporations, government agencies, or other funding entities; can appy diverse communication styes skis in ibrarianship as we. Moreover, since grant writers are accustomed to writing compeing arguments to persuade funders to support their causes, those persuasive writing skis are transferabe to marketing, and evoking compeing reasons for ibrary-users to avai themseves of ibrary services. Grant writers and fundraisers accustomed to taioring their communications according to whether the prospective funder is an individua, group, foundation, corporation, or government agency can appy those skis in ibrarianship. Academic ibrarians adjust their ora presentations according to their audience. The foowing exampes iustrate the diversity of audiences that an academic ibrarian might communicate with: An introductory cass of freshman undergraduates in a basic ibrary orientation, and information iteracy cass/workshop.

11 From nonprofits to ibraries: information-gathering 45 A facuty department meeting presentation on a research database. A ibrary conference presentation, or poster session. A one-on-one research consutation with a student, facuty member, or research staff. The carity with which a nonprofit fundraiser must communicate can be appied in the context of ibrarianship. Librarians who have instructiona responsibiities may need to teach, and communicate ceary on topics ranging from: information iteracy (expaining to a user how to distinguish reiabe, from unreiabe information especiay in the context of onine information even more so, in the area of heath information on the internet); copyright; to onine research skis for specific research databases or resources. Communication skis are aso used by ibrarians to communicate internay with ibrary management and staff to deveop, and evauate new, or existing ibrary services. Reationship-buiding Reationship-buiding skis are critica for nonprofit deveopment professionas, because reationship success with coeagues within their organization, and with funders outside their organization are the basis of career success. Reationship-buiding skis are crucia to nonprofit fundraisers as they cutivate reationships with individua, and corporate donors to engage their support, and financia contributions. These same skis foster academic ibrarians outreach efforts to forge reationships with facuty, researchers, and students to support research efforts, buid coaborative reationships, and pubicize ibrary services. Grant writer reationships with coeagues Grant writers must buid strong reationships with a variety of staff, often from different departments, in order to gather information necessary for assembing a grant proposa. Since proposa budgets can require itemized staff saaries, otherwise confidentia personne information is discosed to them for the purposes of preparing a proposa budget. Grant writers must inspire the trust and confidence of finance, and human resources staff that they can keep information such as staff saaries confidentia. Grant writers rey on the timey provision of information from coeagues in order to compete a proposa in time for its submission deadine. Sometimes, notice of a funding opportunity arrives so ate that the grant writer has barey enough time to assembe a proposa. At arger nonprofits, assembing a proposa might invove engaging staff from mutipe departments, such as the deveopment office, finance, human resources, information technoogy, panning/evauation, and even executive eadership who might be required to, or wish to review, and sign-off on the proposa. If the nonprofit operates in mutipe ocations, or provides services off-site, information might be gathered from staff who work at various sites. Since program or project staff have roes, or responsibiities deivering services to the nonprofit s cient popuation, and impementing a program or project, meetings must be schedued, and information

12 46 Skis to Make a Librarian gathered from various staff to verify that what is written in the proposa is desirabe, accurate, and feasibe. Nonprofit fundraisers who raise money in specia events must aso maintain good reationships with coeagues. They might need to ask coeagues to assist in staffing fundraising events (e.g. gof tournaments, gaas, sient auctions, dinners, etc.) that take pace in the evenings, or on weekends. Grant writer reationships with funders Cutivating good reationships with funders, either prospective or existing funders, is vita to fundraisers, and their nonprofits success. For a grant writer, cordia reationships with prospective funders is the basis upon which the grant writer can make inquiries reated to preparing, and foowing up with a proposa, and grant appication. Once the grant writer s organization is funded, maintaining a good reationship, and open channes of communication with the funder is important if the nonprofit intends to ask for renewed funding. For exampe, cutivating good reationships with program officers from the Nationa Institutes of Heath (NIH) or foundation funders are beneficia strategies for funding recipients. Good reationships hep when grantees have issues, or questions arise, with their funded projects. When bad things happen to good projects, when a project fas short of enroing the proposed number of cients/patients/research subjects, a good grantee-funder reationship paves the way for the funder to work with the grantee (whether at a nonprofit, or academic institution) to mitigate funder dissatisfaction with the outcome of their funded project or program. This aso preserves the possibiity of appying for, and receiving future funding. Fundraisers who cutivate donations from individuas work in an area sometimes caed individua giving or major gifts. The term, major gifts, is used for contributions from donors at a significanty higher monetary eve than their usua contributions. Fundraisers who soicit gifts in face-to-face requests to individuas must be skied in buiding reationships, and rapport with these prospective donors in order to reach a point at the reationship where the donor is ikey to respond affirmativey to an ask for a specific donation amount. Librarian reationships with coeagues Appying good reationship-buiding skis forges success in ibrarianship aso. Academic ibrarians buid, and cutivate reationships with coeagues, and with ibrary users. Whereas grant writers rey on their coeagues to suppy information needed for their grant requests or reports; academic ibrarians rey on feow ibrarians to assist with teaching responsibiities. Especiay with information iteracy casses or ibrary orientations offered to each year s new cass of students, the number of casses/orientations might be so numerous at the beginning of the schoo year that each ibrarian reies on their feow ibrarians to hep teach the requested casses within the necessary time period. Academic ibrarians have committees, and projects on

13 From nonprofits to ibraries: information-gathering 47 which they serve. It behooves a ibrarian to deveop good reationships with their ibrary coeagues to smooth working coaborations on both committees, and projects. Another important avenue for reationship-buiding is participating in professiona organizations for ibrarians/information professionas. Professiona organization invovement is viewed as a service to the ibrary profession, and is a critica part of an academic ibrarian s portfoio when reviewed for promotion (or tenure, a possibiity at institutions that have tenure-track facuty ibrarian positions). Professiona organizations, and the advancement opportunities that they hod for both fundraising professionas, and ibrarians are discussed further, beow. Librarian reationships with users The reationship-buiding skis that fundraisers use to cutivate positive reationships with funders are equay appicabe in the ibrary profession. Academic ibrarians cutivate positive reationships with users of ibrary services to improve their abiity to serve those users. Librarians outreach efforts to facuty, researchers, and students aim to support their research efforts, buid coaborative reationships, and pubicize ibrary services. When ibrarians succeed in buiding trust, and confidence among users of the ibrarians skis, and abiity; these users are more ikey to refer their peers, staff, or students to consut with the ibrarian. By engendering confidence in users, especiay facuty, ibrarians might become partners in research projects by conducting iterature searches, and deveoping onine search strategies. The ibrarian might write the methods portion of research papers, and potentiay receive co-authorship credit. An exampe of a coaborative reationship emerging between ibrarians, and facuty members is the invovement of a ibrarian in a systematic review. The Institute of Medicine Standards for Systematic Reviews, Standard 3.1 states: Work with a ibrarian or other information speciaist trained in performing systematic reviews to pan the search strategy (Institute of Medicine, 2011). Nonprofit professiona organizations for deveopment professionas Grant writers and fundraisers have professiona organizations, and various certifications simiar to the professiona organizations, and certifications within the ibrary profession. Grant writers and fundraisers can become invoved with the American Fundraising Professionas (AFP) or the American Grant Writers Association (AGWA) or the Grant Professionas Association (GPA). The Certified Fund Raising Executive (CFRE) designation is a professiona designation, and credentia requiring, a written appication, a written examination, and agreement to uphod a code of ethics and Accountabiity Standards pus a recertification requirement every three years (CFRE Internationa, n.d.). Professiona certification, and engagement offer the potentia for career advancement through networking, buiding eadership skis, and demonstrating professiona service.

14 48 Skis to Make a Librarian Professiona organizations for ibrarians A nonprofit professiona who has activey participated in, or ed professiona organizations, can engage in simiar roes in professiona organizations for ibrarians. Severa professiona organizations exist for ibrarians, and each has committees, or specia interest groups within the organization taiored to areas of interest. The American Library Association (ALA), Specia Libraries Association (SLA) and the Medica Library Association (MLA) are a few professiona organizations for ibrarians. In the fied of heath sciences ibrarianship, the Academy of Heath Information Professionas (AHIP) designation is the MLA s peer-reviewed professiona deveopment and career recognition program (Medica Library Association n.d.). AHIP designation, invovement in professiona organizations, and assuming eadership roes in professiona organizations: are avenues to buid a network of reationships advancing the ibrarian/information professiona s career. Concusion Information-gathering, communication, and reationship-buiding skis gained from working as a nonprofit fundraiser or administrator are vauabe assets: transferabe to ibrarianship. Information-gathering expertise incudes ski in both informationseeking, and curating. In both academic, and community settings, seeking funding opportunities requires exceent research skis, as we as an abiity to curate, and track information on funding proposas submitted, awarded or decined. References Certified Fund Raising Executive (CFRE) Internationa. CFRE FAQs: What are the requirements for the CFRE Programme? Avaiabe from: Accessed 21 Apri Drummond, R., & Wartho, R. (2009). RIMS: The Research Impact Measurement Service at the University of New South Waes. Austraian Academic & Research Libraries, 40(2), Institute of Medicine (2011). Finding What Works in Heath Care: Standards for Systematic Reviews (Nationa Academies Press). Avaiabe from: /Finding-What-Works-in-Heath-Care-Standards-for-Systematic-Reviews/Standards. aspx, Accessed 21 Apri Medica Library Association (n.d.). Academy of Heath Information Professionas (AHIP). Avaiabe from: informationprofessionas, Accessed 21 Apri Merriam-Webster (n.d.). Curator definition. Avaiabe from: com/dictionary/curator, Accessed 21 Apri Sari, C. C., Dubinsky, E. K., & Homes, K. L. (2010). Beyond citation anaysis: A mode for assessment of research impact. Journa of the Medica Library Association, 98(1), Stimson, N. (2009). Nationa Institutes of Heath pubic access poicy assistance: One ibrary s approach. Journa of the Medica Library Association, 97(4),