Chapter 04: The Texas Health Science Library Consortium: Building Collaborations and Connections around the TMC Library

Chapter 04: The Texas Health Science Library Consortium: Building Collaborations and Connections around the TMC Library

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Description

Here Ms. Hoffman talks about her role and the challenges involved in setting up a the Texas Health Science Library Consortium, a system of shared services at the Texas Medical Center.

Next, she talks about her involvement in professional associations and explains why they are important to the progress of a librarian’s career.

She then talks about leadership lessons she learned through experiences at the TMC library and recounts an anecdote about her work on a credentialing committee.

Identifier

HoffmanKJ_01_20180319_C04

Publication Date

3-19-2018

City

Houston, Texas

Topics Covered

The Interview Subject's Story - Overview; Leadership; On Leadership; Professional Practice; The Professional at Work; Collaborations; Career and Accomplishments

Transcript

Tacey A. Rosolowski, PhD:

What are some things, when you look back on that time—what are some things that you were able to accomplish, that you say, yeah, I’m really, really happy I was able to do that? And what are some things—projects, initiatives—that were left undone that you’re kind of sad you weren’t able to push forward?

Kathryn Jones Hoffman, MSLS:

We’re talking about the TMC years? One of the really good accomplishments, I think, is the consortium that we had. We had a consortium here, in the Medical Center—if I remember right I think we called it the Texas Health Science Libraries Consortium—and it was all the libraries here in the Medical Center and Galveston. So it was the TMC library, Galveston Medical Library, and MD Anderson, the dental branch library, the School of Public Health, and the psychiatry library. So we formed a consortium, and we were able to leverage our dollars to share an online catalog. So we shared the online system that we have, and I was, I think, a leader in that part of what we were doing.

Tacey A. Rosolowski, PhD:

What year did that go active? Was that in response to the crisis in the ’80s?

Kathryn Jones Hoffman, MSLS:

I’m not sure it was the response to the crisis. There’d always been a little bit of cooperation with these libraries, but it really developed into something stronger than that when we began to share an online catalog.

Tacey A. Rosolowski, PhD:

Now, you said you were a leader in making that happen. How did you exert some leadership role there?

Kathryn Jones Hoffman, MSLS:

I think I was very instrumental in the decisions on which systems we would use, and managing the installation of the system. The TMC library housed the computer, and I was very involved in that part of the computer work with the online catalog. So we were able to leverage resources to make this happen, but the other really nice thing is that we shared our catalogs, so they were all one. And so it was very easy for users throughout the Medical Center to see what resources were available at all of the different institutions.

Tacey A. Rosolowski, PhD:

Were there any challenges that came up as you got into the nitty-gritty of putting together that collaboration? Were there certain kind of little rough edges in getting the systems to work together, and people together?

Kathryn Jones Hoffman, MSLS:

I guess the usual people problems. I’m trying to remember. We had to actually teach—I remember I had to teach the cataloguer here at MD Anderson to use OCLC to do her cataloguing there, and then transfer the records to our online catalog. They did not have those skills, so while it was second nature to me, it was new to the librarians who worked at this library, and the other libraries, for that matter.

Tacey A. Rosolowski, PhD:

So it was sort of finding the common library language that people could use. Interesting, yeah.

Kathryn Jones Hoffman, MSLS:

Yeah. Yeah. The other thing is we evolved this consortium in the Medical Center. We did—we shared online resources, and in the beginning it was a subscription to databases. It wasn’t full text at that time. It was databases, like Medline, and there were a number of others. And because we purchased them as a consortium, we were able to make these resources available to everybody in the TMC through those li—all these libraries. The smaller libraries never would have been able to do that on their own.

Tacey A. Rosolowski, PhD:

Yeah. Yeah, that’s pretty amazing. Yeah. And, I mean, I don’t know if you can recall numbers at this point, but is there a ballpark, like, what was this costing at that time?

Kathryn Jones Hoffman, MSLS:

Oh, goodness.

Tacey A. Rosolowski, PhD:

I mean, it’s fine if you—

Kathryn Jones Hoffman, MSLS:

I really don’t remember.

Tacey A. Rosolowski, PhD:

Yeah. I mean, it’s something that you can look at your transcript --if you can find it, you can pop it in or whatever. I was just curious how much we were talking about at that time. What about anything else of that kind that was something really—an accomplishment you were glad to be able to push forward? And then, on the other side, something that maybe didn’t work so well, or that you weren’t able to finish?

Kathryn Jones Hoffman, MSLS:

Nothing’s coming to mind at the moment.

Tacey A. Rosolowski, PhD:

Okay. Okay. Now, you had kind of mentioned in passing that you were starting to work a lot with associate—professional associations. And I was curious about that, because I know that’s—as Stephanie Fulton actually alerted me to the fact that was kind of a theme for you; you worked a lot with associations throughout your career. So tell me a bit about why and how you started getting involved with associations, and why you feel they’re very, very significant.

Kathryn Jones Hoffman, MSLS:

I think professional associations are important for librarians for a number of reasons. For one, it gives you—it gets—gives you a link to other librarians in your group, your profession. And it provides opportunities for continuing education, which is very, very important. But it also provides a way for individuals to develop. I’m thinking about a talk I gave one time to new librarians, and I feel like it was like a bell curve: you start off at this side of the bell, and you don’t really know a whole lot yet. You’re brand new to the profession. And then you start up the curve, and you start learning. You take. So you, through professional association work, you can learn. You can learn from others. You can learn by serving on committees, learning how to be a good team player, taking on more responsibility as a chair of a committee, or a unit within the organization. It helps you develop new skills and talents that you wouldn’t otherwise have an opportunity to experience. And then as you get to kind of the top of the bell curve, you’re at a point where you’re starting to give back, so you’re doing more. You participate in different ways of giving back—you start publishing, you teach, you chair, whatever—and then you come down the other side, and you’re sort of heading to retirement, but you don’t stop. You’re still giving back, but in different ways. And then you level out, but you never really stop. I like to say I retired from my job, not from my profession. And so you continue to be a professional. And I think the professional associations help foster that in an individual. I learned so much about management, and how to be a team player, and get things done, through my professional association work.

Tacey A. Rosolowski, PhD:

What are some of the big lessons that you learned, kind of the leadership wisdom that you picked up along the way?

Kathryn Jones Hoffman, MSLS:

(laughs) One of the toughest things was you can’t rush things when you’re working with a team. You have to build consensus, build collaboration, and that takes time, and it takes work. I was chair of the credentialing committee at the Medical Library Association, and we were introducing a whole new credentialing program for the association. I like to get things done quickly, and I learned the hard way that you can’t do that, especially in the association. It takes time. Most people don’t embrace change as quickly as I do. And we tried to roll out this new credentialing program in a year’s time, and hadn’t taken the time to really educate the people about what was coming. And it was a disaster. Now, eventually it happened, but not within the timeframe I’d hoped for. But that was one thing I learned the hard way. That was—I was devastated that the program didn’t go through with as much meat to it as I wanted, and it didn’t go through as quickly. But they do have it, and it’s a good program, I think.

Tacey A. Rosolowski, PhD:

I don’t know why, but the phrase “Hell is other people” is coming to me. (laughter)

Kathryn Jones Hoffman, MSLS:

Yeah, right.

Tacey A. Rosolowski, PhD:

I can’t remember what wise person said that. Frustrating. A funny side question, because it’s sort of a truism that librarianship attracts introverts, and yet—maybe you don’t agree—

Kathryn Jones Hoffman, MSLS:

It does, but you—yeah.

Tacey A. Rosolowski, PhD:

I mean, I’m just thinking about that kind of—

Kathryn Jones Hoffman, MSLS:

But I don’t see myself there, exactly. (laughs)

Tacey A. Rosolowski, PhD:

Yeah. I mean, I was thinking—I was wondering about that, because I’m thinking about that paradox of getting introverts to do teamwork and collaborate, and basically emerge from their offices, and if that posed a particular kind of challenge.

Kathryn Jones Hoffman, MSLS:

I don’t know if it was being an introvert that was the issue. I think it really—it’s getting people onboard, and buying in to what you’re trying to accomplish.

Tacey A. Rosolowski, PhD:

Well, certainly with issues of change.

Kathryn Jones Hoffman, MSLS:

Yeah, yeah. And I really am one to have always embraced change, and I guess that’s why I wanted to be the one in charge. I mean, I wanted to direct things, and make those changes happen.

Tacey A. Rosolowski, PhD:

Why do you think you’re so easy with change?

Kathryn Jones Hoffman, MSLS:

I don’t know. But I’ve always been that way.

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Chapter 04: The Texas Health Science Library Consortium: Building Collaborations and Connections around the TMC Library

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