Scout the road ahead: The early-career librarian's guide to using the academic calendar to manage your workload

Abstract

Committee volunteer opportunities, calls for proposals, instruction requests, and collection development deadlines can all sneak up on the early-career librarian, leaving them feeling overwhelmed at certain points during the academic year. This poster for early-career academic librarians will use graphics, charts, and bullet points to map out specific "crunch points" and important deadlines according to where they fall in the academic calendar. We will also have a handout that early-career librarians can use to remember questions to ask at their current or new institutions about specific deadlines and points in the academic calendar, such as the end of the fiscal year. This planning guide and poster will help early-career librarians recognize times each year when their workload is likely to increase or when they need to be prepared to submit proposals for conferences so that they can capitalize on opportunities, better organize their time and plan ahead to minimize stress and anxiety.