Minutes of the Second Dr. T.B. Rajashekar Memorial Lecture held on 9th June, 2007 at Choksi Hall, IISc, Bangalore.
Topic : “Librarians’ need for readiness for alternate careers that require Information Specialists”
Speaker : Ms. Vasumathi Sriganesh, Director, Q Med Services Pvt Ltd,
The program started with the welcome speech by Mr. Francis Jayakanth. He addressed the gathering about the memorial Lecture series and shared the achievements of Dr. TB Rajashekar.
Mr. IRN Goudar, Information Centre for Aerospace Science & Technology, NAL, Bangalore, shared his memories with Dr. TB Rajashekar and Presided over the lecture. He introduced the speaker Ms. Vasumathi Sriganesh.
Dr. Shalini Urs, University of Mysore shared some lighter moments with Dr. TB Rajashekar as his classmate.
Ms. Vasumathi Sriganesh, Director, Q Med Services Pvt Ltd, spoke on “Librarians’ need for readiness for alternate careers that require Information Specialists”. Her lecture manily focused on the growing challenges for the Librarians and Information professionals in the present era, and also the alternative skills and career opportunities to be
acquired.
She talked about the statements very frequently encountered by the LIS professionals like, “Librarians are a dying breed”. “We don’t need libraries everything is available on the Internet”. Whether these statements are true or not, but it’s the time for Library and Information Specialists to look for an alternate career too. She expressed that the only reality, which is constant, is the change and the Librarians and Information professionals
should better be prepared for it.
She listed out some of the options for LIS professionals, namely:
- Content management in websites
- Intranet management
- Research - conducting / coordinating
- Information consulting
- Literature searches
- Procurement of articles / related matter
- Copyright policies
- Marketing / selling Information Products (Informatics India Ltd)
- Domain Specific - Clinical librarian (US / UK)
The changes that should be incorporated by the LIS professionals like
- Knowledge
- Skills
- Desire
*Stephen Covey: The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People
Ms. Vasumathi also shared her experience in setting up and managing Qmed Services. She talked about the services offered by Q Med to various pharmaceutical companies like
- Document Delivery service
- Creating and updating Websites (only medical)
She concluded the lecture with few screenshots of effective searching using PUBMED and answering the questions posted by the audience. Mr.Anand thanked the gathering. The event ended with high tea and good thoughts.
About the Speaker :
Vasumathi Sriganesh got her B.Sc degree in Home-Science in 1977. Married immediately, she was a homemaker for 12 years after which she did her BLIS from the Bombay University in 1989-90. Later she did her MLIS through IGNOU in the years 1997-99.
She has worked in three libraries - Indian Institute of Geomagnetism, The Hinduja Hospital and HELP (Health Education Library for People), all in Mumbai. In both medical libraries she was instrumental in the entire computerization, as well as starting off literature search services and Internet based activities. Medicine was always her passion and she found
deep satisfaction in Medical Librarianship.
In April 1997, wanting to reach out to a much wider medical community of users, Vasumathi became a free-lance consultant and in 1999, she set up her own company Q Med, ( http://www.qmedin.com/) which will soon become
a registered Non-profit organization.