Questions to Ask Librarians

The questions

Open any question to see why it works.

1. 1

   What can I ask you that people do not realise they can ask?

   Librarians are asked for directions and printer help all day and are trained for far more: research consultations, obtaining articles from other institutions, digitisation, local records. This question reliably produces a list you did not know existed.

2. 2

   If I am starting from nothing on this topic, where would you start?

   Watch what they do rather than only listening. Most will start with a reference source or a subject guide to learn the vocabulary before searching anything, and that sequence is the single most useful research habit to copy.

3. 3

   Which databases does the library pay for that I cannot reach from an ordinary web search?

   Subscriptions differ wildly between libraries and are the main thing your card buys. Ask which ones cover your topic specifically, since a list of thirty names is useless and two relevant ones will change your afternoon.

4. 4

   What can I use from home with my card?

   Remote access often includes newspaper archives, genealogy services, language tools, and streaming collections that people pay for separately without realising. Ask how the login works, because that is where most people give up.

5. 5

   Can you get me something you do not own?

   Interlibrary loan reaches most published material and many libraries will also buy an article or scan a chapter for you. Ask about the usual wait and whether there is a cost, since both vary and neither is advertised.

6. 6

   How do I search for something when I do not know the right words for it?

   This is the core skill of the profession. Ask them to show you the subject headings attached to one relevant record, then search those. It is the difference between guessing keywords and using the vocabulary the catalogue was built with.

7. 7

   How can I tell whether a source is worth citing?

   You will get practical tests rather than a lecture: who published it, whether it was reviewed, whether anyone has cited it since, whether the data is available. Ask which test they apply first when they are short of time.

8. 8

   What is in the local history or special collections here?

   Local collections often hold newspapers, photographs, maps, deeds, and oral histories that exist nowhere else and are not in the online catalogue. Ask what has never been digitised, because that is the material nobody else is using.

9. 9

   Is there anything here that needs an appointment or identification to see?

   Restricted material is usually available to anyone who asks correctly, but the asking has rules: advance notice, no bags, pencils only. Finding out the procedure now saves a wasted trip later.

10. 10

    Do you keep anything that is not in the catalogue?

    Uncatalogued backlogs, vertical files of clippings, staff-maintained indexes, and donated collections awaiting processing are common. This material is invisible to search and often exactly what a local researcher needs.

11. 11

    Can you help me with citations or a reference manager?

    Many libraries run workshops or one-to-one sessions on this and they are consistently undersubscribed. Ask which tool they support, since institutional licences mean one option is usually far better maintained than the others.

12. 12

    What is a service here that almost nobody uses?

    Answers range from equipment lending to meeting rooms to research appointments to museum passes. Underused services are the ones with no waiting list, and librarians are visibly pleased when someone finally asks about them.

13. 13

    What is the most common mistake you see people make when researching?

    Expect answers about stopping at the first page of results, searching only full text, or not saving the search that worked. These are concrete habits you can change today rather than general advice about critical thinking.

14. 14

    What do you do when someone asks for something you cannot find?

    The interesting part is what happens after the obvious searches fail: reaching out to other institutions, checking print indexes, working backwards from a citation. This is also the point at which a good librarian will ask what you actually need it for.

15. 15

    How do you decide what to buy?

    Selection involves budget lines, community requests, review sources, and hard trade-offs between formats. Ask whether patron requests get bought, because at many libraries they do and hardly anyone submits one.

16. 16

    How do you decide what to remove from the collection?

    Withdrawing material is the least understood part of the job and the part that most upsets the public. Ask what happens to the withdrawn items and what they wish they had kept, which usually produces a genuinely rueful answer.

17. 17

    What happens when someone challenges a book here?

    There is generally a formal process: a written form, a review, a decision that can be appealed. Ask how often it happens and what the outcomes have been, which is a factual question rather than a political one.

18. 18

    What has changed most about this job in the last ten years?

    Answers often cover public computing, social services delivered across the desk, licensing costs for digital material, and the shift in what people expect a library to be. It reframes the profession from stacks to infrastructure.

19. 19

    What is the strangest question anyone has brought you?

    Every librarian has three of these ready and they will happily give you all three. It is also a genuine window into reference work, which is mostly translating an odd request into something searchable.

20. 20

    If I wanted to do this job, what would it actually take?

    Expect a candid answer about qualifications, part-time and casual hiring, and the difference between the job people imagine and the job it is. Ask what they would want a new colleague to be good at, which is rarely reading.