tfpl blog

Project Planning: back of an envelope to Prince 2

Author: Susanne Osterlund
TFPL Intelligent Resources, Consultant

Many thanks to John Davies, Senior Consultant, TFPL for delivering a very insightful temps training session; last night’s event covered project management/planning.

The one hour session started off with the definition of project management and took us through Prince 2, Project Management Institute (PMI), STP, Gannt charts, high-level project plans, task and activity plans and finished off with a reminder of change and how we should consider that attitudes to change are individual and personal.

“Change is not a thing to be managed, although we can create the conditions for change.  Our mental models of organisations condition the way we think change happens within organisations.”

Temps training is free to all registered temps.  We try to hold a session each month.  Our consultants are experts in their field and it is a great chance for temps to not only learn something new, but also to network with fellow professionals and exchange ideas.

Networking at SLA Europe

Author: Luisa Jefford
TFPL Intelligent Resources, Director - Public Sector Recruitment

As a Recruiter I have always understood the value of a network.  It's an essential part of my job, it's how I get to meet and greet the people I am working with, it's also how I build my own professional brand and that of my organisation.  We have an array of technical tools to help us network virtually these days, my preferred choices have always been and will always be Linked In for professional contacts and Facebook for friends.  However, meeting people face to face, particularly new contacts, is why I am a regular attendee at industry network events.

This week I have networked at the SLA European Chapter SLA(m) meeting.   The meeting was sponsored by SLA Europe, FreePint and TFPL and the venue was a funky bar in Blackfriars.  I was told it would be a great opportunity to build and cement existing relationships and indeed it lived up to expectations.
 
The evening kicked off in the usual fashion of being greeted by the SLA team.  I was presented with a badge which has space for me to pose two discussion points, one professional and one personal, was then handed a drink and off I went to work the room.
 
As a seasoned networker I find it relatively easy to approach old friends and colleagues at these events but the structure of this evening really did allow me to step outside my comfort zone and chat to new people.  There were certainly some common themes for the night, outsourcing and the future of the KIM profession and on a more personal note there was lots of discussion around the recent election, the ash cloud and holidays.
 
It was a great night, lively discussion, a great venue and many enthusiastic networkers so I am sure I wasn't alone in my enjoyment.

Join TFPL for the launch of SharePoint 2010

Author: Edward Taylor
Consultant, TFPL

At TFPL we are keenly awaiting the simultaneous UK launch of Microsoft Office 2010 and SharePoint 2010.  To increase the hype Microsoft are hosting a virtual launch event starting at 3pm on the 12th May and you can watch this online. Our consultants John Davies, Martin Sanderson, Edward Taylor and Colin Frankland will be tuning in and Tweeting the event as it happens. We’ll use the hashtag #sharepoint. We will be looking out for any interesting developments from the world of Records, Knowledge and Information Management and adding our thoughts. The launch will include a live keynote and Q&A Session which will be an excellent opportunity to hear about the latest advancements of this ever popular platform, first hand from the people who built it.

To coincide with the launch we have been working hard at TFPL in developing and learning the Beta version of SharePoint 2010 and what it has to offer. Over the coming weeks we will be providing a commentary on our findings about the various pieces of functionality available on SharePoint 2010. The first instalment will be posted soon on the TFPL blog and our Linked-In Group - TFPL SharePoint Interest Group.  We will be giving an overview of the key changes and improvements that have been made with SharePoint 2010, telling you about our hands-on experience and what we thought of it.

Please feel free to tell us your own experiences of the Beta version and if you would like us to investigate any particular area of functionality that you are interested in let us know.

UKSG Conference 2010, Edinburgh, 12-14th April – Concerns raised over future of the ‘Big Deal’

Author: David Thew
TFPL Intelligent Resources, Director

The annual conference of the UK Serials Group brings together scholarly publishers of journals and, increasingly, e-book and other digital content providers and their customer base in corporate, public and university libraries and buying consortia, and is seen by many publishers as an essential event. Combining a conference and an exhibition, it provides a valuable forum for discussing a wide range of issues affecting scholarly journal publishing, from impact factors to pricing and the impact of social media.

As a provider of recruitment services to the publishing market, my main focus is the exhibition, a ‘captive audience’ of publishers and information providers which includes many of the top providers of information services to the academic, library and government markets and which is therefore a useful barometer of market sentiment. This year the mood was mixed; some publishers had enjoyed a fairly healthy 2009 and were predicting a similar outlook for 2010, whereas others had been harder hit by downturn in specific geographical markets (e.g. Eastern Europe) and fluctuations in exchange rates which had significantly raised subscription costs for many of their clients (one major publisher who prices in Euros mentioned a client whose annual subscription cost had risen by the equivalent of some £200k purely as a result of currency fluctuation).

One of the main topics of discussion was the future of the ‘Big Deal’, typically a multi-year deal to license a publisher’s entire journal output or a significant part of it. Here the uncertainty was about academic budgets post-Election; with public sector spending facing drastic reductions whatever the flavour of the next UK government, the scholarly market will have to make cuts somewhere and two likely areas are staffing and collections, the latter with obvious implications for subscription revenues even where institutions are technically tied into multi-year deals. Clearly this could be a serious issue for small and large publishers alike and publishers may need to be creative even with deals which are technically already in place.

From a recruitment perspective, the conference suggested clear signs of green shoots, albeit with a lot of caution and some organisations not predicting any new hiring before the second half of the year at the earliest. There is also (again, cautious) growing interest from candidates; there is a still a lot of risk aversion, but also signs of people beginning to consider their next career move, an indication of growing confidence in the market.

David Thew is Director, Publisher and Content Provider Recruitment at TFPL Intelligent Resources (david.thew@tfpl.com; tel: +44 (0) 207 332 6076)