by Sarah Statz Cords

And welcome to our fourth installment on how to help managers and trainers assess their staff members’ RA skills and knowledge.

Previously we looked at questions to assess advisors’ familiarity with titles and genres; today we look at the flip side of the equation, and how to assess how we work with readers. What kinds of questions can be asked here?

Please help us answer this question in the comments; our suggestions below are just that–suggestions, and (hopefully) jumping-off points for further discussion.

Questions to Ask Staff

Another point to ponder: would you have staff answer these questions as essay questions, or would you give them a scale (if possible)? For example: On a scale of 1 to 10, with 1 being not comfortable and 10 being quite comfortable, how comfortable are you answering readers’ advisory questions?

Activities
1. RA “Speed Dating.” Call a staff meeting, and ask people to interview each other on reading tastes (and have them rotate partners periodically). How comfortable does your staff seem with this exercise?

2. As a manager, take the time to work a desk shift with your staff members. You won’t always get the chance, but you may be able to observe them working with readers.

3. Ask your staff members to interview you on your reading tastes and have them suggest a few titles; return the favor for them. Then, look at the books suggested, and discuss how both of you feel about the suggestions that were made.

Do any of these ideas work for you? Let us know your opinions (and your ideas) in the comments!

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by Sarah Statz Cords

One of the more basic competencies we found for the practice of reader’s advisory was the idea that RAs should have some level of familiarity with an array of fiction and nonfiction authors and titles. But what is the best way to determine staff members’ skills in this area? Listed below are just a few ideas for assessing this skill. What do you think? Would these suggestions take too long? Make your staff uncomfortable? Not properly assess their knowledge? Please help us continue this discussion in the comments!

Possible Ways to Assess Title Familiarity:

1. If giving a written assessment, simply ask staff to write authors’ names under representative genres including romance, mystery, thriller, literary fiction, biography, memoir, or true crime (just to name a few). How many can they name?

2. Along similar lines, ask staff to submit a list of authors they like to read. (Actually, they could probably do this anonymously, you could still assess staff knowledge as a whole) Could you broaden this list to include magazines or newspapers regularly read, or favorite movies?

3. Combine assessment and training: ask staff members to volunteer to give a short demo at a regular staff meeting about a specific genre, whether one they enjoy or want to learn more about, perhaps talking about a few representative authors and making a list of resources about that genre?

4. Make it a game: make a list of current hot bestseller titles to read aloud, asking participants to write down the corresponding author (give a bonus point for naming another title by the same author!).

5. For a more extensive evaluation, purchase the ARRT Popular Fiction List questionnaire: it’s a little out of date, but has very extensive questions in 14 genre categories.

What are your ideas for assessing this area of knowledge? Let us know!

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