#leveragingdata

From the Emerging Technologies Committee, by Qaddafi Sabree

As librarians and information professionals, we tend to spend a large amount of time working with data. Whether we work in a traditional library, a research center, or a technology firm, data has become an intricate part of our lives.

The Internet has produced mass amounts of digital data in recent years, and with each year, the amount of data online multiplies exponentially. Unfortunately, with all of the data being produced, it’s becoming harder to collate it in a way that makes sense for researchers. The amount of data being produced dwarfs the amount of professionals that will be able to manage it in the coming years. However, as information professionals, we are considered the thought leaders when it comes to managing data. As time goes on, we will be expected to manage excessive amounts of data, and leverage that data in a way that is beneficial to our respective organizations.

On November 5, 2015 the Special Libraries Association (SLA) MD organized a workshop titled “Leveraging Data to Lead.” The workshop was held at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, MD. The one-day workshop consisted of a keynote address, 12 panels, and several opportunities to interact with corporate sponsors including LAC Group, Zimmerman Associates, Inc., LexisNexis, IEEE and many others.

According to Keynote Speaker Nancy Faget, “The idea of Leveraging Data to Lead came from SLA MD’s co-sponsorship with the FEDLINK Technology Working Group during a workshop in Spring 2015 called Bibliometrics and Research Assessment. That event was created by Informationist Chris Belter, from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) library.  This event drew 150 participants from 4 countries. It was the type of event that NIH had been hosting intermittently, so we understood there was a growing interest in the topic.”

“Leveraging Data to Lead” had international appeal as well, attracting people from abroad as well as from across the country.  Many of the participants had varied backgrounds such as data scientists, programmers, as well as those in risk management.

One of the panels in session #1 was titled “Jobs in Data Analytics.” Organizations from the federal government to academia and the private sector are all clamoring for data analysts. Karen White of LAC Group mentioned the numerous opportunities that are available for those who wish to pursue data analytics as a career. With all of the unstructured data such as video, social media, photographs, etc., there is a need for data wranglers in every organization.

Traditional libraries have always had a need for data managers whether it’s academic libraries that are primarily interested in the scholarly publishing process, benchmarking statistics and measuring research impact. Law libraries, who regularly analyze usage and produce metrics to benefit their organizations, as well as public libraries, which are systematically involved in analyzing demographics to design services for patrons. However, as innovators in the field, the panelists introduced unique and innovative ways to analyze data.  

“The only gap that appears between the traditional uses for data and the types of presentations from the Leveraging Data event might be the many emerging ways that libraries and librarians are applying technologies to the analytical process or visualizing data to enhance understanding of the data,” says Nancy Faget.

In Session #2 there was a panel called “Impact Metrics and Data Visualization.” In this particular session, Susan Makar and Amanda Malanowski from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) as well as Dr. Mark Livingston from the Naval Research Laboratory demonstrated interesting ways data visualization can be used to analyze data and present information in a unique and creative way that tells a story, thus allowing the user to make strategic decisions that will affect the foreseeable future. This can be used to predict things such as climate change, population growth, sales statistics, etc.

The Leveraging Data to Lead workshop was followed by the Leveraging Thomson-Reuters Data webinar on December 11th. The webinar continued where the workshop left off, allowing the presenters to go in depth about methodology, results, and the impact of data analytics.