Information Management, Databases & Libraries

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I keep making missteps in my career, but now, after finishing two degrees and being generally unhappy with the career options available to me (mostly administrative, managerial, soft skills blah) I'm starting to think I should do something more technical. Problem is I need to go back to get that technical skill.

One idea that keeps coming up to me is this idea of "information management" - which sounds mostly like some buzzword I'm not entrely sure the meaning of. I think of that sort of as organizing information, data, resources, mainly online. I imagine this would be a decent-paying job with lots of independence but also the opportunity to work collaboratively with others. Sounds good to me.

My problem is I'm not entirely sure how to get into this field. One thought is to get training in computer science around database management. Surprisingly, there aren't a lot of computer science programs geared to second-entry students - basically I'd have to do a whole new BSc degree or a 2 or 3 year college programming course that doesn't cover a lot of database stuff. I did find one continuing education certificate in database technology that looks decent, but because of the timing of the courses and the prerequisites it would take at least 3 years, probably longer, to complete, and there's no guarantee it would be that useful in finding a job to have a "continuing education certificate in database technology".

Another thing I'm considering is to do a masters degree in library science. This is a 2-yr professional program so the timing is a little better. Most students in the program aim to work in public or academic libraries after graduating, but there are also opportunities in the private sector for people with this degree (for example, I've seen job postings at law firms, accounting companies, and banks looking for people with this specific degree). This program doesn't teach as much about the technical/programming skills, but it's more about information "management" - tradeoff being that the jobs might require more interaction/management kind of activities that might not be what I'm looking for. Also, having to go back to school full-time is a huge financial strain for me, and I already owe way too much in student loans.

Does anyone know anything about the field of information management? Any suggestions on what would be a good direction for someone in their late 20s who just wants to get out there and working... but working in a technical area that doesn't demand so much on the "soft skills" (communication, leadership, project/people management, ugh ugh ugh)? Any thoughts on whether I should do the grad program or the more technical part-time continuing ed program? Or something else???

I know heaps about information management, having done an applied science degree in information science.

Really though, you've stated that you've already got two degrees. That's enough.

More isn't necessarily better, it doesn't look good on your resume, it simply makes you look like a professional student.

Instead, forget the degrees and look for a low-tech computing startup job. (if that's what you want). BTW: Information Management is nothing like computer science.

I know a bit about information management too, having made my living from writing software for the last thirty years.

But, like the man said, don't bother with another degree process. Just go out there and do it. Find an open source project that's doing something close to your heart, and help it. You don't have to be a gun programmer - testing and choosing which way to go next are always the biggest parts of the job. Testing, and choosing what's good and what's not is the biggest contributor to the success or failure of anything.

For example, Mifos is helping third world nations build social infrastructure. If I wasn't flat out, nose to the grindstone, gotta make something of this on my day job, that's what I'd be doing.

There are thousands of other candidates there - across the sciences, across administrative stuff, across the web and its children - the list is endless. Nearly...

Yeah, that's what some people tell me. But the problem is no oe will hire me to do information management.. or much of anything, really, other than admin work, with the degrees I have. And there are a lot of jobs that are looking specifically to hire someone with a library science masters....

Not sure if it's because I'm in Canada, and not on the west coast, but I keep bumping my head up against lack of opportunities for people with my background here. I see all these biotech and health services jobs in the U.S. that just don't exist here... because we just hire the U.S. companies to do them (for example with a lot of R&D and consulting) or because it's all done by our government (I'd rather pay off student loans for the rest of my life than ever work for the government again). I don't want to move right now, so right now my only options look like: go back to the government if I can ever get them to hire me, so I can die a long, miserable death of the soul, get a job as an admin assistant somewhere and hope for a promotion to some soft-skill-based people-oriented blah, or go back to school to actually get some technical skills. Sigh.

Don't know if this will be helpful, but here goes:

I recently became an administrator for a Learning Management System for a state government agency. Some of the duties involved are: db management, network administration, content management, etc. But there is also a creative element with web design, material development and such. It affords me great schedule flexibility (teleworking) and I am pretty much left alone as long as the system is up and running, since my Director is technically-challenged, to put it kindly. You might look into the field and see if it interests you, as it incorporates many of the areas you mentioned.

Anyway, what I wanted to get across was, I have no degree or certifications whatsoever. I began with the agency around 6 years ago as an admin. assistant. Eventually, I became known as the person in the office who could troubleshoot PC issues, saving the hassle of calling the IT help desk. Our division is small (about 10 people), so when the LMS administrator position became available because the incumbent left to work in the private sector, I was literally the only candidate among the 4500 employees in our agency, simply due to my familiarity with the system and the ability to acquire some of the other skills needed as I went along. Now, different training divisions come to me with requests on creating this or deploying that, and I make it happen for them.

I've also figured out that if there is a specific area that I want to expand my job to include, I just start doing it and it eventually ends up on my list of job duties. My Director even offers to pay for the training as long as I convince her it's a needed skillset. I could probably make more money in the private sector, but I cherish the job security I have right now - one of the benefits of working for the govt.

I will admit that I am quite fortunate to be where I am now, but at the same time, I basically got my foot in the door and was able to work my way up through a willingness to learn as well as pay attention to what the agency's long-term strategies were and anticipate what would be required to achieve them - essentially hold a position that literally didn't exist a year ago.

Good luck!

Ahh.. that sounds like a great job. I think I'll definitely keep looking out for any kind of admin position where I have the potential to move into a role more like the one I want, but I still feel like I need to be proactive about it. There are certain companies that I'd love to work at because I can sense that potential there, but so far none of them have invited me for an interview. So... I can explore it wherever I finally do get a job, but at the same time I need to be proactive in the sense that I also work on my own time to make myself more attractive to be given those opportunities.

You had a lot of technical skill that helped your organization recognize your potential. I dont' have those technical skills and I really don't see how I'll pick them up on my own.. aside from if I can find a position where I'm working with databases. So if I'm not working in that situation I'll have to create that situation for myself where I get exposed to those learning opportunities. Right now I'm thinking I'll at least take the database programming night courses, because that can't hurt.

To be brutally honest, if you don't already have most of the technical skills before you've left school, then you're probably chasing the wrong career path.

As an aspie, (I'm presuming that you are one because you're on WP), there is one thing that is solidly in your favour as far as employment goes. Your special interest.

Determine what that is and follow a career path where you can use it.

My two school mates and I all followed computing.
- I followed computing because I'd always been interested in it. (I started out doing Civil Engineering because my father thought I should do that but I changed to Information Science after 6 months)
- Mate 1 followed computing because although he hated computing, he didn't feel like stockbroking (btw: He did Electrical Engineering)
- Mate 2 went into computing because his father was in it and said there was money to be made there. (he started off doing Civil Engineering, then Management, then Biotechnology).

I'm still in computing and doing very well.
Mate 1 was doing quite well as a programmer but the stress got to him and he's now unable to work.
Mate 2 is still doing computing but he's in hardware maintenance. He understands now that he missed his chance to be a vet - which was really what he was best at (and would have enjoyed). He just assumed that since he didn't have the marks to get into vetinary science at university that his career as a vet was stalled. It's only been recently when a friend got in as a mature age student (ie: 2 years after leaving school without the right marks) that he realised he could have done it.

My point is that you don't really seem to be that interested in computing.

What are you really interested in? What do you enjoy doing? and what do you do in your spare time?

Sadly, my passion is writing, and the only way I can do that in a way that makes me happy is to do it on my terms, i.e. as a hobby, rather than bastardizing it into a job. The parts of my job I have hated most in the past are the parts that involve writing and reading. So there is no way I could be happy as a technical writer or editor.

Which is why I want to tap into my other skill, ie, the logical/mathematical/analytical side of me. I have a strong aptitude in that field, and even if I became a bestselling novelist I'd feel like I needed to exercise that skill in some area of my life. Which is why I long to find a job that satisfies my logical side, makes me if not happy then at least not want to kill myself rather than go to work each day. Still not sure how to find this though. The only things I can think of are to go into information/data management, which could make use of my previous education and also provide me a niche in a growing area (maybe not so strongly on the technical side of things, but still working to some decent extent with databases for example), or something else that makes less use of my previous education, but trains me well for jobs, like becoming an accountant. Which I have a pretty strong notion that I don't really want to do...

Yeah it sounds like a sure fire way to get into that career would be a degree in library sciences. Although thats another 2 years and a boatload of money...

Maybe just apply around for any job matching the description and hope for the best. If anything after a few of those you'll know the qualifications you'd need to further pursue that career.

I've been considering this career path myself so if you do start doing it tell me how you like it. I'm just about to graduate so I'm in a pretty good position to pursue this if I get good feedback.

I'm in library school. I like it fine. There are tonnes of opportunities once you've got the degree. Over 90% of the people in my program have jobs lined up before they graduate; employers pretty much fight over them.

I took up "Information Management" as a collateral duty to my current job, because I got tired of being the only person that knew how our equipment works around here. It took a couple of years, but I finally filled two book-cases with binders on all of our current equipment, as well as past successes and failures.

Now I'm the "Go-To Guy" for such questions as, "What does this blue screen mean?" and "Batteries? What batteries?"

If you actually do want to do the management of information, check out SQL. Chances are, you'll have to either run programs with SQL, or write some of it yourself.

That is IT, not IM/KM.