Episode 603: The Library Attrition Tracker

Hey. Hey. Where is everybody?

You are listening to WREK Atlanta, and this is Lost in the Stacks, the research library rock and roll radio show. I'm Lyla Bennett, and I'm in the studio with everybody. Dad, do you want to take over?

I would be happy to. I'm Charlie Bennett in the studio with Lila, Juniper, Atticus, Marlee, Fred and Cody. And there's probably someone under the desk somewhere.

The gremlins.

The headphone gremlins. Each week on Lost in the Stacks, we pick a theme and then use it to create a mix of music and library talk and reflection and chaos. Whichever you're here for, we hope you dig it.

Our show today is called the Library Attrition Tracker. And that's attrition as in reduction, not attrition as in sorrow or damage through constant pummeling. CHARLIE BENNETT: That's my favorite.

The Georgia Tech Library has changed a lot over the past dozen years or so. And one of us-- I'm looking at you, Fred-- has been keeping meticulous track of one aspect of those changes.

Yep, we're specifically talking about workforce numbers, who's here, how many of them, who's gone, how many of them, and how often the ones who go are or are not replaced.

So I'm laughing because it's funny but also because this could go downhill so fast and just evil.

Definitely.

You're supposed to keep things optimistic, Fred. You think you're able to do that?

If you had asked me five years ago--

I did.

Yeah, we talked about this. We've talked about this over the years. But five years ago, I don't know how optimistic I would have been. But with the darker days behind us, now it's a time to reflect on that arc of change.

Wow.

Our songs today are about pressure and stress in our profession, how we respond to that pressure, and remembering folks who used to be co-workers. In the years that the three of us have worked here, we've seen a lot of people come and go. So let's start with a song about wondering just where everybody's gone. This is "Where is Everybody" by Lunar Vacation right here on Lost in the Stacks.

That was "Where is Everybody" by Lunar Vacation. And today's show is called the Library Attrition Tracker. And so I guess Charlie, Marlee, you're wondering what is the Library Attrition Tracker.

Well, I've heard about this thing, and--

Yeah, I guess I've told you about it.

--this is a little more formal, though, than I pictured when you talked about it.

Yeah, because I gave you a copy of the spreadsheet. The Library Attrition Tracker is a spreadsheet that I keep for myself just for personal reasons.

Can I call you out gently--

Sure. CHARLIE BENNETT: --and affectionately for just a moment? Uh-huh.

You keep having new spreadsheets.

[LAUGHS]

There's always something else, whether it's the music that's been played on Lost in the Stacks or your Spotify recommendations from weird source songs--

Right. Yeah.

--or something else I can't remember.

It's because spreadsheets are fun. MARLEE GIVENS: This is very Fred. Right.

When he handed it to me, I was like, oh, yeah. CHARLIE BENNETT: Everyone heard that when Fred said spreadsheets are fun

So--

--because that's our friend.

Well, this, this spreadsheet maybe is not exactly fun because it documents the level of employment of librarians at the Georgia Tech Library really starting in 2012. And I really began tracking in earnest in 2019.

What happened in-- was it 2012 when you came?

Yeah, I started in 2012. And around 2019, there was maybe a level of professional maybe low morale in the library.

I like how you're trying to say it nicely. But no there's low morale.

And I noticed-- there was chaos and sadness. There are fewer librarians here. And I happened to look at some old emails, and I found a list of all the faculty librarians who were here when I started in 2012. I did not have a comparable list of all the staff because they're classified at the library between faculty and staff. But I had all the list of every librarian faculty. And I compared that to where it was at the time, which was late 2018, early 2019.

Yeah.

And that certainly matches our understanding of the library as an organization, as a morale boosting or deadening-- I'll just say organization again so I don't have to say administration. And we've seen this kind of retreat and then a regrouping. But I haven't seen it classified like this or qualified like this before.

Yeah, I guess it was a sense that I just wanted to-- I wanted to prove to myself, yeah, this is really happening. And so I counted up-- there were 35 librarian faculty here in 2012 when I started. And by January of 2022, there were only 22 librarian faculty. There's 29 today. So, I mean, the trends have reversed, which is one of the reasons I feel better talking about this now.

Is that because the trends have reversed or is there more to this?

Yeah, I don't think I would come on the radio and just talk about how the Georgia Tech Library is spiraling into an abyss. We've pulled out. Things have changed.

This is a therapeutic discussion that we have on the radio about all kinds of things.

Yeah.

Yeah, absolutely. And I'm kind of looking at-- I mean, if you turn the spreadsheet upside down, you would-- or I guess leave it right side up. There's a curve. So we have seen-- there was a dip, and now we seem to be going back up.

Oh, there's a bell curve--

There's a bit of a bell curve.

But it does match the changes in the library, well, physically. I mean, it's been totally remodeled. The vision of the library has been totally changed. And let's be frank, administration has changed. Yes, yes. And this is a real-time reflection of that. Maybe not a direct consequence-- I'm not saying that everybody that left was because of a low morale situation. But--

I think we're talking about too bureaucratic here.

Yeah.

Well, OK.

We have seen the library get pretty bad internally with arguments and displays of resistance and frustration. It's been a difficult place to work. A lot of people left, and that doesn't seem to be the way it is now.

Yes.

Right. Yeah.

And that's why you're bringing this up because it didn't just happen. It's been getting better this whole time.

It has been getting--

This conversation that we're having here sort of bureaucratically-- but it's one that we've had in very real terms many times, starting seven, eight years ago and then going on.

A completely different vocabulary for those conversations in private--

Yes.

Do you know why you did this now that you've done it? It sounded like you just fell into doing it. But when you look back, what were you trying to do?

I think it really was to get a tangible-- I don't know why I started doing it. But once I started doing it, I realized it was a tangible thing that I could look at and document like, oh, this change is real. And it did correspond to negative feelings that folks had in the library.

This is Lost in the Stacks. We'll be back to talk more about attrition at the GT Library after a music set.

File this set under Z675.U5.D6.

Thanks for the dots, Atticus.

Excellent.

(SINGING) Now that you're picture's in the paper being rhythmically admired and you can have anyone that you have ever desired

That was "A Stitch in Time" by Anthony Moore. And before that "We Gotta Get Out of This Place" by the Animals. And we started with "Welcome to the Working Week" by Elvis Costello songs about different ways of dealing with a difficult work culture, either embracing it, leaving it, or doing whatever you can to make the situation better.

This is Lost in the Stacks. And today's show is called the Library Attrition Tracker, which sounds like a tool that's given to libraries. But it's really just Fred's spreadsheet.

It should be. It should be. CHARLIE BENNETT: You'd expect that. Every library should keep track of who left and how long they were here and how often they are replaced.

I'm glad you said that, because when we were talking about what the subject of this show-- what it would be-- I kept thinking about data-driven decisions and how this is data. This is a lot of data, or these are a lot of data. And they might be useful in some way. But I don't know how to translate this spreadsheet into any action or even understanding. It's an accurate representation. But I don't know how to use it.

I'm not sure that it's actionable. Maybe it will inform a decision. Maybe you will see a trend. If you're an administrative person, you will see a trend that you don't like, and you want to change it. And in such a case, that might make it actionable.

I feel like that did happen. I mean, that's certainly some of the talk in admin that we're trying to do retention. We've had a lot of folks leave.

Yeah. I mean, I didn't share this with admin, but I'm sure they had their own data.

There's probably this exact spreadsheet somewhere else.

It's important to note that-- I mentioned that I just kept track of librarian faculty. And that's because I had a list of who was here in an old email when I started. If I had been able to find out all the staff that were here back in 2012 and compare that to 2019, I think we would have found a similar level of attrition. CHARLIE BENNETT: Anecdotally, we totally had staff leave at the same increasing rate and then decreasing rate until now. And then we seem to be hiring a lot.

Yeah. You pulled out a gone list, which is a list of people who have been here since 2012 but are no longer. And it operates for me like a memory trigger or a prompt. Each name that I look at, I can come up with some memory of, oh, yeah, that person very much did not like working here at the end or, oh, yeah, that person got a great opportunity--

Sure.

--or, oh, yeah, that person had a much better deal than private sector, things like that. And, and that's useful to anecdotally remember how things were going. But I think what you just said, what are the literal numbers and maybe what's the what's the money made available and then not available anymore-- that's what a library organization could use.

Right. And I do remember hearing about that. I mean, I remember that coming up in some all staff meeting or more than one about, yes, we realize that there are a lot of vacancies. And we're holding on to them for this reason. And then suddenly they were opened up. And the thing that I've noticed over time is thinking of my own mental version of this spreadsheet is thinking of people as lines in the budget.

Yeah,

Because that's how it's often referred to in conversations. It's like, well, we, we lost this position because that line got moved to someone else's budget.

Yeah. Ranks and salaries attached to this attrition, that's also more actionable data. And I'm not saying in any way that we have to have some purpose for this. It's what it makes me think of because I've been told so often that if you gather a bunch of data, you should use it. I think Matt was talking about that in a recent show. But when I look at this, it's like I could use this just to feel bad. That would be a really effective tool.

Yeah, and obviously, I'm not in any sort of administration or budget position in the library. So I suppose for me, the action was-- as I've mentioned, it's the therapeutic nature of it. Here's evidence that this thing that I was experiencing-- there's some data points that might support that. It's just something I can look to.

I think we should-- I think we should really look at that like what was the feeling, not talking around it. But what was the feeling that you were having that this somehow validates.

That people were lines on a budget-- Marlee has documented in academic literature how an entire security team that worked at the library was eliminated as a line item budget. People's jobs were being reclassified at the staff level. And they were afraid that the same thing was going to happen to them at the time, 2018, 2019. And so that permeated library wide, and it certainly didn't spare me feeling worried about it. I never worried that I would lose my job.

And I just proofread someone's article manuscript talking about some other thing that in the Georgia Tech Library over the years. And during the previous administration said, these folks were treated as cogs in a machine. And so it is nice to be able to see in a quantitative way. We seem to be doing better now because we have more people.

And what was the situation that led to more friends, less friends, reflecting on the whole thing--

That brings up a lot of emotion in me. I'm in a place personally now where I can think of who's missing. And it's a much longer list than I would ever want it to be. I'm getting maudlin. We should probably end this segment. Juniper, will you take us out?

You are listening to Lost in the Stacks. And we'll talk more about the changing numbers of library employees over time. On the left side of the hour.

Perfect.

Hi, I'm Wendy Hagenmaier. And I'm passionate about digital archives, emulation, and how research and memory organizations can step even more into their collective power. I'm also a Lost in the Stacks alum and forever fan. Speaking of which, you are listening to Lost in the Stacks on WREK Atlanta.

Today's show is called The Library Attrition Tracker. And I do keep thinking about how attrition can be defined as the loss created by constant pummeling. Fred named a spreadsheet, the Library Attrition Tracker. He's been keeping it since he got here, it sounds like. This spreadsheet tracks the librarians and archivists who have joined and departed the library since 2012. There are currently 27 librarians and archivists at GT.

(SINGING) So I'm woken I'm woken by noises, neighbors stamping, laughing, voices

That was "High Time" by Heart. Before that, it was "I'm in a Strain" by Barbara George. And we started our set with "Woken by Noises" by Ultimate Painting, songs about responding to stress and pressure.

This is Lost in the Stacks. And today we're talking about the Library Attrition Tracker, coming to a spec kit near you.

I don't know about that.

And if you don't know what a spec kit is, there's a kind of publication that we sometimes end up doing, which is a survey that we then get a bunch of results for, crunch them, and make certain recommendations and summations but then also offer up that survey data and possibilities for other people to do things. So, yeah, we've been imagining a printable spreadsheet to track attrition.

Right.

And we have 27 in the faculty organization in here now.

Yeah.

That seems like too much. And it seems like-- it seems like it should mean something. I don't know what it means, though.

I'm going to go back to a point that I made in the last segment. I think it has to do with the rate at which folks were replaced because--

Because it was a slow rate. FRED RASCOE: --people would leave. For every three people that would leave, two would be hired and-- Or zero.

Or zero, yeah.

And as you pointed out, off air, Marlee, it wasn't like we stopped a department or reduced services or had some streamlining.

Yeah, we weren't all replaced by a robot or something. So--

Although that seems to be coming.

In 2012, when I counted up, what was it? 35 faculty librarians. And then--

In fact, we were doing less as a library at that point, right. We hadn't even redone--

We expanded services.

--the librarian, expanded services, and all of that. Yeah.

From 2012 to 2022 because we had opened up the new library by then but were doing it with less, fewer librarians--

Less librarianship, fewer librarians.

Coming to a spec kit near you.

There you go.

Yeah.

There you go.

Yeah. CHARLIE BENNETT: As I said earlier, it makes me sad to see this because there are friends who've gone. And there's also hidden inside this administrative mistakes and failures of support by peers. And I don't know. I keep circling, just wanting to say, oh-- There were real budget crises too. When I first started in 2010, everyone was doing furloughs. CHARLIE BENNETT: Gosh, that's right. Yeah, so, I mean, we've had some trauma from the outside as well.

Right. And if you had started keeping a spreadsheet like this in 2010, I think the numbers would have been even greater.

I think so. I think I would have seen them go up the first couple of years.

Yeah, I would have been an addition to LFO.

And Fred and Lizzy--

We started from 2010.

And Wendy, yeah.

But I started in 2012, which is a very particular moment in time budgetarily for the university but also for the library and a very particular time strategically for the library because that is right when we embarked on a re-evaluation of resources and services to go along with the renovation of the actual physical space. CHARLIE BENNETT: I joke sometimes that the Georgia Tech Library is very jazzy in that people just improvise. They just do what they like in the structure of the song.

Well, I used to think that it was freedom. I used to think it was something that was good, like, oh, yeah, we can do whatever we want. We can experiment. But now, especially in this sort of new department system that we're doing, I can see how structure and priorities and strategies are really effective. And, yeah, I wonder how many people left not because they didn't like it but because they didn't know what they were doing.

I'm sure that happened.

Yeah, actually, I can think of a few specific examples.

I do feel like we have all avoided saying a name and a very particular reason for leaving at one point or another in the whole show.

Well, I was thinking about-- there was one wave of folks leaving. And it was when this whole Library Next endeavor was announced. There was a wave of people who left-- and I'm being very flip when I say-- because they were going to be forced to innovate. And then to fill the gaps, we hired a bunch of people who came here to innovate and then-- CHARLIE BENNETT: And nothing else. And nothing else. And then when they were done innovating, there was nothing else for them to do.

So there's a narrative. There's a story that lives in these names that can tell you broadly what was the library doing, what was it concentrating on, what did it think was important, or what did it say was important and what did it actually find important.

One example that I think of, again, not using names but just thinking of a particular service, which we've talked about here on Lost in the Stacks in previous years, was the Roving Service. They--

Oh my goodness.

--decided that with our reduced staff and reduced librarians that we would have folks wander around the building asking people if they needed help or offering help where they were.

Explicitly like a retail sales situation?

Right. And there were people that were hired specifically to do that. And they built it from the ground up. It didn't work. And so what did those people do? Well, they go on to different positions.

--and succeed. Some of those hired for roving folks now are rocks in the public services department and rock stars too.

They had excellent management through that whole process. I'll just point that out.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It wasn't for lack of excellent management just the--

Are you going to break this out into department and division?

My spreadsheets?

Yeah.

Who left by what department-- I'm going to leave that to ARL to incorporate that into a framework that they distribute to libraries.

I feel like there's a lot of infographic possibilities here, visualizations.

This spreadsheet is just a personal way for me to keep track. And so I'll just leave it at that. CHARLIE BENNETT: Marlee, we've left you out a little bit of this despite you being the momentary expert. Hey, Fred, will you turn the mics off for just a moment please, all of them? Sit and be quiet.

ATTICUS BENNETT: Junie's touching that. CHARLIE BENNETT: There's some busted--

Dad--

The curtain-- ATTICUS BENNETT: Junie's touching that.

Kids' shenanigans in the studio.

Marlee, I was trying to talk to you, and it really just was so distracting that I said nothing sensible. Do you have a last thought on this as we get out of this segment?

I do, and we're going to go off into outer space for a minute.

Yes.

I started to feel really like the place that I worked was just so much like a family when we were going through trauma in 2017. And I said it felt like our parents were getting divorced, and we didn't know why, and we couldn't see our way out of it. And now I feel like, well, when we interview people for a position, it's like we're going on a blind date. They're looking at us as much as we're looking at them.

This is just a family therapy session. MARLEE GIVENS: Yeah, it really was.

Well--

Signifying--

--I know, but I have--

--maybe not much else.

--no control over your family.

This is Lost in the Stacks. And today we've been talking about a spreadsheet that Fred keeps to track Georgia Tech librarian turnover, which he calls the Library Attrition Tracker. Maybe he needs a better name. I like that name, though.

Yeah. I can think of a few better names, but I don't think any of them would go on the radio. So I'm just going to say, Atty, will you file this set?

File this set under CT782.B35.

Masterful.

My name is Maggie. The story you're about to hear is true. (SINGING) Maggie

"Where Are You Now, My Love" by Jackie Trent. Not going to lie, that's one of my favorite songs of all time.

I knew it.

"Yesterday's Faces" by Rays, and we started off with "Maggie Doesn't Work Here Anymore" by the Platters. Those are songs about missing people we used to know.

This is Lost in the Stacks. Today's show was called the Library Attrition Tracker. We've talked about people that we miss from the last 12 years or more. So I think it's time for a quick lightning round. What else do we miss? There's lots of cool spaces and services that have been added. But what's gone that you remember fondly? Marlee.

I miss the break room.

Wow.

Yeah.

Fred?

I miss the rotunda structure that used to be in front of--

Oh my goodness.

It used to be the main entrance.

It had a giant chandelier.

Yeah. It was ugly. It did not match the rest of the building. But when they renovated, they tore it down. And I wish it was still there.

Wow.

How about you, Charlie?

I have to be selfish. My first office, it no longer exists. There's not even a floor where my office used to be.

Right. It's just vacant space.

Yeah, you can just leap into the air.

Right. CHARLIE BENNETT: And I shouldn't. Hey, Lila, is there anything you miss from the library? Yeah, it's just us. OK, roll the credits.

Lost in the Stacks is a collaboration between WREK Atlanta and the Georgia Tech Library, written and produced by Alex McGee, Charlie Bennett, Fred Rascoe, and Marlee Givens.

Legal counsel and an AI powered Library Attrition Tracker, just for--

Oh gosh.

--Fred, provided by the Burrus Intellectual Property Law Group in Atlanta, Georgia.

That sounds great. CHARLIE BENNETT: Sounds terrible. Special thanks to the current Georgia Tech Library admin team for leading us out of the Toxic Valley, to all our co-workers, past and present, and future too. I'm sure you'll be great. And thanks, as always, to each and every one of you for listening.

Our webpage is library.gatech.e du/lostinthestacks, and you'll find our most recent episode, a link to our podcast feed, and a web form there if you want to get in touch with us.

Next week on the show, things get medieval, and I have to just grit my teeth and not say the rest of that line.

It's time for our last song today. Well, the three of us here have made it through many years, seen good times and bad and probably more of both ahead in the coming years. So let's close with a song about making it through. This is a cover of the song by Dez's Tiny Child-- I'm sorry-- Destiny's Child, called Survivor as performed by Caroline Alves right here on Lost in the Stacks.

Have a summer show, everybody.

Have a great weekend, everybody. Dez's Tiny Child.

(SINGING) Now that you are out of my life, I'm so much better You thought that I'd be weak without you But I'm stronger you thought that I'd be broke without you But I'm richer You thought that I'd be sad without you