Crunch Time!

Posted on March 14, 2013 by Kim Stymest

Sophie Bury, Business Librarian & Head Bronfman Business Library

Published Thursday Mar. 14, 2013

As assignment deadlines approach, remember the BBL (Bronfman Business Library) reference team is available to help you out!

Need help finding more articles on your assignment topic? Could you do with a hand identifying more sources of information on the industry you are researching for an assignment? Need help with gathering financial data on a company you need to investigate for a project you are working on? Need guidance on citing the information you’ve found correctly?

These are the types of queries that our qualified business information experts at the Bronfman Business Library can help you with. We are very happy to point you to a rich range of e-resources or print information available at the Bronfman Business Library (BBL) that can play a crucial role in notching your assignment up to a higher level! So if getting your hands on relevant information for an assignment is a source of stress, stress no more, our BBL reference team are at hand to help you out! We look forward to helping you! Continue reading →

Breaking the Mould

Posted on November 23, 2012 by Kim Stymest

Image Source: http://www.librarian-image.net

Sophie Bury, Business Librarian & Head Bronfman Business Library

Published Friday Nov. 23, 2012

My name is Sophie Bury and I’ve been at York University since May 2003 and boy has time flown since then! My role at York during the past nine years or so has primarily been one of business librarian. I love being a librarian, even though I was not impressed when my late mother suggested to me, as a final-year undergraduate in 1992, that I might think of becoming one in my future career! I think I suffered from the influence of stereotypical images a bit like this one shown here. Ah, but didn’t she know me so well! And heck, if one of my favourite vocal artists, Tori Amos, can title a whole album “Tales of a Librarian” and classify the songs in it with Dewey Decimal call numbers, there must be something cool going on with this profession! And so my current image of what it is to be a librarian has changed dramatically and I now like to think we’re really “A Hipper Crowd of Shushers”, as a quite recent New York Times article explains. Check it out!

The role of business librarian at York is quite varied and my favourite part of the job is undoubtedly the public service element including helping students with their research, as well as teaching sessions about how to find, use, evaluate and cite business information sources as part of workshops and classes. Librarians like to describe this as “information literacy” – often non-librarians don’t know what we are talking about which is, admittedly, an issue – but it’s an important life-long learning skill and if you’ve got it there’s research to show it translates in to academic success, while being a transferable skill that employers often value.

In early July 2012 my role at the Bronfman Business Library changed when I assumed the role of Head of the library for a five-year term. I feel lucky to have learned so much from senior colleagues, especially Elizabeth Watson (founding Head of the Bronfman Business Library) and Toni Olshen (former business librarian and Associate University Librarian). I feel privileged to have been given the opportunity to take on this new role and every day is varied and stimulating and brings new opportunities and challenges. In academic librarianship we experience an information world that is rapidly changing and where technology is constantly evolving and so we are always kept on our toes and never bored! Indeed, in my experience, it’s very rare to find an academic librarian who doesn’t love their job. So, not surprisingly, a big part of the joy of this position is that I work alongside very talented and motivated librarians and staff, some of whom have already introduced themselves to you on this blog. More introductions will follow, so stay tuned…

In terms of other things to share with you, I’ll just mention that I have a number of research and professional interests and if you are interested you can read more about them on my professional web site (http://sophiebury.ca). A bonus of being an academic librarian at many universities in Canada is that you are basically expected to attend and present at professional conferences and to engage in some research.

Let me conclude by expressing my sincere hope that you’ll feel comfortable approaching me if you have any suggestions or concerns about library services or resources at the Bronfman Business Library. We want students and other patrons to feel welcome in our space and comfortable approaching us for help at our reference desk or circulation/reserve desk and through other means including our online reference chat service. If you see a librarian’s office door open and you have a library-related or research question, please feel free to approach us. My office is the second door on the left when you enter the Bronfman Business Library.

We’re aware assignment deadlines are looming, so remember we are here to help and we hope you enjoy our quiet study atmosphere as you prepare for assignment deadlines and get ready for end-of term exams. Remember the holiday season will be upon us before long and then we all get to take a well-earned break!

Confessions of a recovering journalist

Posted on November 16, 2012 by Kim Stymest

Carey Toane, Business Reference Librarian

Published Friday, Nov. 16, 2012

My name is Carey, and I have database envy. Or rather, I did, before I started working as a reference librarian at Bronfman.

I haven’t always been a librarian, you know. In my past life, I was a journalist. Aside from the occasional freelance newspaper piece and one very fun gig as a web columnist on business etiquette (think “How to shake hands in 10 different languages”), I worked at magazines. Magazines are ideal for chatty people like me: why say in 500 words what you can say in 1,500?

More specifically, I worked in trade magazines, covering the Canadian marketing industry. I like to think of it as “business lite.” The typical story contained a few numbers and a LOT of pictures.

I didn’t choose the field as much as it chose me. My first job out of j-school (that’s journalism school to you) was as a staff writer at Marketing Magazine, where I wrote about homegrown advertising campaigns, interviewed bombastic creative directors, and tried to wrap my head around media buys. This thing called the internet was just taking off then, and there were loft parties featuring DJs and trampolines and rooms carpeted with real live grass thrown by dot-com companies whose names I can’t remember, which is okay because none of them exist anymore, anyway. This was called “research.” But I digress.

After an extended stint as a web copywriter and a pause for a master’s degree, I came back to journalism and got a job as an editor at strategy magazine, the direct competitor to Marketing. At strategy I interviewed dozens of VPs marketing and CEOs of major Canadian brands, from LG to Ford to Lululemon to McDonald’s. To prepare for an interview, I would trawl the company website for annual reports and press releases, and read every profile and article I could find online. I was Facebook friends with more corporations than I care to admit. Depending on the company, there was either a rushing river of information or, in many cases, a trickle.

If only I’d had access then to the kind of databases we have at Bronfman. Sometimes I walk into the library and resist the urge to skip and frolic like Veruca Salt in Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Room. Market share? Child’s play! Industry forecasts? Sustainability reports? Supply chain? Check, check, check. The research tools we have are so tantalizing, I’m surprised that more business journalists don’t pose as Schulich students at the reference desk. (Be warned: I will spot you if you try.)

I can honestly say that my motivation to become a librarian had much to do with finding a cure for this database envy. There’s nothing more satisfying than finding the answer to your question. I’m the kind of person who likes to have it all at her fingertips. And now, relatively speaking, I do.

Getting to know you…

Posted on November 7, 2012 by Kim Stymest

: Handshake by Aidan Jones, via Flickr

It’s a very ancient saying,
But a true and honest thought,
That if you become a teacher,
By your pupils you’ll be taught.

Anyone? Anyone? No? Le sigh. Okay, well that was from The King and I. Wait… how about this?

♪ ♫Getting to know you,
Getting to know all about you.
Getting to like you,
Getting to hope you like me.♫ ♪

Any better? You’re supposed to be singing this in your head… Maybe? I thought so.

So, yes, I am a giant geek. But I am also a new librarian here at the Bronfman Library. And yes, I would like to get to know you.

But why would you like to get to know me??? An excellent question; thank you for asking.

I come to you from positions with the federal and provincial governments, where I had been working as a Research Specialist. I like to think myself pretty good with company, industry and economic information and generally, a creative researcher. Before all that, I worked as the Business Librarian at UOIT and worked primarily with students in Accounting and Finance (but we have a Finance Librarian here, Xuemei – she’s pretty awesome and I suggest you try working with her!). Now that I’m at Bronfman, I will be working in the areas of Accounting & Audit, Taxation, Corporate Governance and a few others. I’m also responsible for Bronfman’s social media presence, like this here blog, our tweetertweeter and Facebook.

Hmmm…. Let me think. What else can I tell you… My educational background is not in business, but Women’s Studies and Social & Political Thought here at York. I did my Master’s in Information Studies (what we need to become full-fledged librarians) at the University of Toronto. What else, what else, what else? I’m learning to knit, enjoy cooking, recently got married, and I grew up on a farm. It’s true. We even still have a donkey.

Stop by my office or while I’m at the Reference Desk and we can chat some more if
you like. And I’d be really happy to help you out with any of the research that you’ll be working on or hear any comments or ideas that you might have for our social media endeavours!