Over-Professional Skills and Professional Knowledge of Library Specialist: Demands of the Time

Abstract

Library specialists having competencies in the field of modern information technologies and knowledge of information resources, capable to analyse and synthesize heterogeneous information, process data, solve non-standard tasks, are able to develop innovative trends, increase the importance and competitiveness of libraries in the information space. The purpose of this study is to determine the most important skills and knowledge of librarians for the development of new forms and trends in the activities of research libraries: assistant services to scientists, work with research data, creation of intellectual centres, centres of intellectual leisure, organization of communication platforms, etc. The author highlights the key knowledge necessary for librarian: knowledge of modern and advanced information technologies (social networks, cloud, mobile technologies, new generation analytics, etc.), knowledge of the world market of information resources, as well as technologies of collection and processing of information/data. The article presents competences of librarians in the research data management, who provide consulting and assistant services to scientists in the life cycle of research. It is determined that the research data management librarian should know the methods of data management plan preparation, management methods, categories, metadata standards and schemes, data classifications and identifiers, data citation requirements, copyright, data repositories, long-term data preservation technologies, etc. The author concludes that the possession of non-specialized over-professional (“soft”) skills (communication skills, emotional intelligence, thinking by “results” and “processes”, etc.) along with the complex of professional knowledge is the key to the improvement of efficiency and demand of libraries in the conditions of intensively developing environment.