Reckoning with Our Employment and Staff Development Processes
Library and Museum employees are called to continuously recognize, contemplate, and dismantle the ways in which systemic racism operates in our lives and in our work.
Among the expectations set for this work is that staff will support and learn from one another.
The Library’s hiring and retention process will be more equitable and inclusive at all levels. Before staff openings are posted online, job descriptions will be reviewed by a Library IDEA subcommittee to ensure that the most inclusive language possible is used. Further, all full-time staff search committees include a member of the IDEA Committee, and all committee members are required to go through Unconscious Bias Training. As stated on the Library’s employment pages, before the search committee members review any applications and resumes, all names and addresses, some dates and some other identifying information will be removed from materials to remove opportunities for bias. Search committees will only know the relevant education and work experience.
The Library has also committed to structuring itself to be more inclusive and more equitable. The Library’s Management Team has changed and expanded to become the Library Council, a decision-making and deliberative body that will be broader and more inclusive.
As part of this work, the Library and Museum have started readings, in which we can learn and discuss these difficult concepts in a safe environment. Among the readings, we have selected We can't talk about that at work! : how to talk about race, religion, politics, and other polarizing topics and Inclusive Conversations, both by Mary-Frances Winters, to help us establish a framework and a way to approach these difficult topics. We will be including other works in the near future, and those will be included in our Anti-Racism Libguide and any other relevant Libguides as we work our way through them.