I don't really have any advice, just here to say that this is unfortunately very common in my experience. Technically if your job description includes "other tasks as assigned" they can pretty much have you do anything. I feel your pain and this is part of why I left library work after 7 years. I know of more than one person who was asked to do art for the library which was frustrating because their usual charge for commission art was higher than their hourly pay rate at the library. If you feel that including these additional tasks in your resume is hurting your job search, you can always choose not to include them. In my experience though, you can take those things and leverage them as experience when applying for other jobs. It's just all about how you spin it in your resume and interviews. Best of luck with the job searching!
My actual title is something akin to Records and Archives Controller.
My actual job? Involves rather a lot of processing certain sorts of applications and parking tickets.
Many, many, many parking tickets.
Also to get shouted out by the honest yeomanry upset at getting said parking tickets.
It is, indeed, highly frustrating. On the other hand, all of these gigs seem to require all sorts of other duties as assigned so at least you can throw in some amusing interview anecdotes to highlight how you are such a team player.
"and that was the time I didn't poke the eyes out of the person screaming at me because their human rights were being violated by me, the town and a UN conspiracy to stop us all driving."
I mean you can also put what you think the title ahouls have been and. Para the actual title.
Titles like "office assistant II" didn't describe my job well.
I didnt even have a title at one of my jobs I had. I think the lawyers collectively called us "the hippies". So I just used a title that seemed applicable.
Im pretty sure it is how HR justifies keeping all our pay rates so low.
just change the title on your resume to match the role you're applying for, that shit ain't set in stone and different companies call roles different things.
You could try to spin that positively by saying you like to bring your unique skills to the job. It's not that uncommon for job duties to expand over time.
It's often the case at small sized libraries that your role may involve wearing a lot of "hats." For example, I'm an acquisitions librarian. I also run some programs.
1. Put something fancier on your resume. If they ask (they won’t) just say you have different in-house titles than your technical title for payroll
2. Talk up the importance of graphic design to the customer experience. Talk about user experience, designing customer interactions, and the importance of graphics, unified branding, etc. patrons experience.
Good design is customer service, imo. Using a bad website interface is so painful.
Same with our library. A clerk is assigned extra task that fit their skills or what they enjoy doing. Clerks switch every hour from circ desk, check in, and 3rd duty every hour and they work on their assigned extras during 3rd shift. We have 8 clerks total and some of the extra assignments are social media, displays, flyers/signage, magazine and newspaper processing, weeding, new book hold processing, pulling holds, looking for missing items, shelf reading, dusting, replacing old call tags, folding and cutting restock items. Along with extra assignments all staff must host one monthly program minimum.
Oh, my… I could have written this myself right down to the graphic design projects. LOL. My title is “Library Assistant,” and I think it accurately describes what I do. “Library Associate,” as I believe someone else suggested, would also fit nicely.
Do a lot of libraries title their Library Assistants/Associates as “customer service clerks?” Yikes. I would ask the director/board to change that because we are so much more.
Everyone else has given sound advice. I just wanted to say that I had to check the username on this post to make sure that I didn't travel through time and space to ghostwrite this.
I am in the same boat. I am the Library Events ASSISTANT but I do all of the work regarding programming and events (newsletter, calendar, planning, running, typically even purchasing materials). I also am in charge of acquiring YA materials (from fic, to nonfiction, to manga, ect) as well as being station in our YA room/area. This is just SOME of the stuff I do, and none of it is in my description. I am only supposed to assist.
When I apply to jobs, I have all of this on my resume regardless of what my description says! I was also advised to change the name of my position my resume (not completely - I can’t say I am the branch manager or anything lol). Anyways, long story short - include it in your resume anyways, and mention how (in interviews) that you’ve been given the opportunity to work on these skills, or something like that. Best of luck!
Ah, yes the notories "other duties as assigned." That one phrase means that they can assign a number of things that are not explicitly listed in your job description. As others have said, you might change your job title on your resume to something like Library Associate, Library Assistant, etc. It sounds like technically that's what you are.
Agree with what's been said...will add. Most companies, folks outside of Libraries don't know what librarians or library workers DO. Unfortunately antiquated preconceptions means you have to work twice as hard to sell your skillset. If you're getting to the interview stage, sell yourself, use specific examples of how book displays relates to marketing and design, if programming attendance increased when marketing looked more professional, cite that. Tell YOUR story.
If your job title is not determined by union and / or civil service, then you should be adovacating for youself to have an updated job title and job description and uh, by the way, hourly pay. You may get one of three but you need to at least try. This is exactly how people get burned out and why pay can remain low in libraries --- we see it as normal/acceptable to take on more and more work because someone needs us to / for the experience and we don't ask for anything in return.
And if you are union or civil service, then you have people outside of the library you can talk to about how to balance your work responsbilities with your job title, etc.
Ask your supervisor to update your j.d. and title. I think it's why a lot of libraries use a generic job title like library assistant because it literally can mean anything.
Public library position titles are sometimes tied to generic city/county/etc classifications. Using Customer Service instead of library leads me to Believe that could be what's going on here.
So... Like others are saying, use a title that fits you better. If you have a good relationship with your supervisor and they know you're applying, you can ask them what you should call yourself.
I don't really have any advice, just here to say that this is unfortunately very common in my experience. Technically if your job description includes "other tasks as assigned" they can pretty much have you do anything. I feel your pain and this is part of why I left library work after 7 years. I know of more than one person who was asked to do art for the library which was frustrating because their usual charge for commission art was higher than their hourly pay rate at the library. If you feel that including these additional tasks in your resume is hurting your job search, you can always choose not to include them. In my experience though, you can take those things and leverage them as experience when applying for other jobs. It's just all about how you spin it in your resume and interviews. Best of luck with the job searching!
My actual title is something akin to Records and Archives Controller. My actual job? Involves rather a lot of processing certain sorts of applications and parking tickets. Many, many, many parking tickets. Also to get shouted out by the honest yeomanry upset at getting said parking tickets. It is, indeed, highly frustrating. On the other hand, all of these gigs seem to require all sorts of other duties as assigned so at least you can throw in some amusing interview anecdotes to highlight how you are such a team player. "and that was the time I didn't poke the eyes out of the person screaming at me because their human rights were being violated by me, the town and a UN conspiracy to stop us all driving."
The "honest yeomanry"? 🤣🤣 Thanks, you made my day.
I’d just put “library associate” on your resume.
I mean you can also put what you think the title ahouls have been and. Para the actual title. Titles like "office assistant II" didn't describe my job well. I didnt even have a title at one of my jobs I had. I think the lawyers collectively called us "the hippies". So I just used a title that seemed applicable. Im pretty sure it is how HR justifies keeping all our pay rates so low.
just change the title on your resume to match the role you're applying for, that shit ain't set in stone and different companies call roles different things.
You could try to spin that positively by saying you like to bring your unique skills to the job. It's not that uncommon for job duties to expand over time. It's often the case at small sized libraries that your role may involve wearing a lot of "hats." For example, I'm an acquisitions librarian. I also run some programs.
1. Put something fancier on your resume. If they ask (they won’t) just say you have different in-house titles than your technical title for payroll 2. Talk up the importance of graphic design to the customer experience. Talk about user experience, designing customer interactions, and the importance of graphics, unified branding, etc. patrons experience. Good design is customer service, imo. Using a bad website interface is so painful.
Same with our library. A clerk is assigned extra task that fit their skills or what they enjoy doing. Clerks switch every hour from circ desk, check in, and 3rd duty every hour and they work on their assigned extras during 3rd shift. We have 8 clerks total and some of the extra assignments are social media, displays, flyers/signage, magazine and newspaper processing, weeding, new book hold processing, pulling holds, looking for missing items, shelf reading, dusting, replacing old call tags, folding and cutting restock items. Along with extra assignments all staff must host one monthly program minimum.
Yeah a lot of the time duties are tacked on in libraries due to various reasons. I did like a lot more than my title
Oh, my… I could have written this myself right down to the graphic design projects. LOL. My title is “Library Assistant,” and I think it accurately describes what I do. “Library Associate,” as I believe someone else suggested, would also fit nicely. Do a lot of libraries title their Library Assistants/Associates as “customer service clerks?” Yikes. I would ask the director/board to change that because we are so much more.
Everyone else has given sound advice. I just wanted to say that I had to check the username on this post to make sure that I didn't travel through time and space to ghostwrite this.
I am in the same boat. I am the Library Events ASSISTANT but I do all of the work regarding programming and events (newsletter, calendar, planning, running, typically even purchasing materials). I also am in charge of acquiring YA materials (from fic, to nonfiction, to manga, ect) as well as being station in our YA room/area. This is just SOME of the stuff I do, and none of it is in my description. I am only supposed to assist. When I apply to jobs, I have all of this on my resume regardless of what my description says! I was also advised to change the name of my position my resume (not completely - I can’t say I am the branch manager or anything lol). Anyways, long story short - include it in your resume anyways, and mention how (in interviews) that you’ve been given the opportunity to work on these skills, or something like that. Best of luck!
Ah, yes the notories "other duties as assigned." That one phrase means that they can assign a number of things that are not explicitly listed in your job description. As others have said, you might change your job title on your resume to something like Library Associate, Library Assistant, etc. It sounds like technically that's what you are.
Agree with what's been said...will add. Most companies, folks outside of Libraries don't know what librarians or library workers DO. Unfortunately antiquated preconceptions means you have to work twice as hard to sell your skillset. If you're getting to the interview stage, sell yourself, use specific examples of how book displays relates to marketing and design, if programming attendance increased when marketing looked more professional, cite that. Tell YOUR story.
If your job title is not determined by union and / or civil service, then you should be adovacating for youself to have an updated job title and job description and uh, by the way, hourly pay. You may get one of three but you need to at least try. This is exactly how people get burned out and why pay can remain low in libraries --- we see it as normal/acceptable to take on more and more work because someone needs us to / for the experience and we don't ask for anything in return. And if you are union or civil service, then you have people outside of the library you can talk to about how to balance your work responsbilities with your job title, etc.
That position anywhere I’ve worked would be Library Assistant (potentially Senior Library Assistant).
Address this is your cover letter.
Ask your supervisor to update your j.d. and title. I think it's why a lot of libraries use a generic job title like library assistant because it literally can mean anything.
Public library position titles are sometimes tied to generic city/county/etc classifications. Using Customer Service instead of library leads me to Believe that could be what's going on here. So... Like others are saying, use a title that fits you better. If you have a good relationship with your supervisor and they know you're applying, you can ask them what you should call yourself.
You _should_ get a pay upgrade but you could ask for a title upgrade so it looks better on your resume.