Nine months and nine tips to prepare your organization to survive your time away Shhh. The secret is out. Librarians have sex. Some of them even get pregnant. Sure, while many librarians are nearing retirement age, many new young librarians will be replacing the retirees. As this happens, we will see a drop in the average age of librarians, which means a larger percentage of potential parents will be in the workplace. Indeed, recent demographic projections show that within the next ten years more than a third of academic librarians will be under the age of 40. Because of this shift, libraries will soon face an intensified staffing challenge, with a significant number of librarians and employees with maternity leave on the horizon. Michigan State University (MSU), with a library faculty of 64 librarians serving a campus of more than 45,000 students, has been on the early edge of this shift. Since 2004, eight librarians (both female and male) have taken leave for the birth of a child. These leaves have varied in length between six weeks and several months, depending on medical conditions. Such a large number of leaves in a relatively short time could have hurt the organization in terms of work disruption and productivity, but in most cases these leaves went very smoothly, and in a number of cases those who took the leave felt that preparation for the leave made them more productive both before and after their time away. Until recently, MSU had little experience handling parental leave among librarians because the library staff has included very few pregnant full-time librarians in the past 20 years. No precedent was in place to prepare or manage such a leave; the human resources staff were unsure of what leave benefits were available. Each librarian since has carved out his/her own way of preparing for and handling his/her own leave. In sharing our positive and negative experiences, we were able to produce collectively a list of tips for librarians anticipating a leave. 1. Investigate the nature of parental leave policy at your institution. The Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) of 1993 guarantees holding open a job for 12 weeks but does not provide for any salary during the leave. Librarians who are pregnant may need to concoct a creative blend of vacation, sick, and paid parental leave (if it’s available) to make ends meet. Mothers will most likely have access to some short-term disability, while fathers are likely to have to rely on nonmedical-based leave. Different work environments will have different attitudes toward parental leave. Some attitudes stem from generational differences: younger people might expect parental leave to be a normal part of the career path, while older colleagues may think of it as an unsettling innovation. In the past, many librarians had their children before beginning their career, or left their positions to care for their young children. Other attitudes may stem from prior positive or negative experiences with maternity leave. The suggestions in this article are intended to help you maximize the legally entitled time off, while minimizing or even eliminating a negative impact on the workplace. 2. There is no perfect time to tell your supervisor or coworkers that you are pregnant. Tradition recommends making a grand announcement when you are 12–16 weeks along, but some may wait until prenatal testing is complete, or until they have come to a personal comfort and confidence with the pregnancy. However, it is difficult to hide daily morning sickness, and you should not have to hide it. It’s also problematic disguising questions to administrative staff about parental leave benefits. It is therefore better to make the announcements at the best time for the smooth operation of the workplace. Early notification to key groups may be best, followed by a wide announcement. It is important to put forth the news of your pregnancy hand-in-hand with your plan (presented as broad strokes or in detail depending on the person) for covering your responsibilities. You must be proactive about planning for your leave. Don’t leave it up to your administration to handle decisions you can and should make. You should learn how much time off you have earned, decide how much in total you want to negotiate for (if you want to add more unpaid leave, for instance, or tie the leave to a sabbatical), and prepare a proposed plan of action for how your workload will be managed while you are away. You can request that people keep the news discreet if you wish, but the needs of the workplace should have priority over traditional propriety. Important annual workplace cycles must be taken into consideration depending on your responsibilities, such as a conference planning calendar, periodical editing calendar, staff budget calendar, or student staff training. In summer months, your department liaison faculty might be off-campus, necessitating a late disclosure at the beginning of the semester. Making your announcements this way may end up in an awkward sequence, like your editorial committee knowing before your mother-in-law, but it is for the best. Once you have shared the good news with your colleagues, you may need to deal with some unsettling concerns, especially if your workplace has little experience with pregnant librarians. One librarian remarked that “one of the things that surprised me was that the people around me were more nervous about me being pregnant than I was.” You may need to reassure your coworkers that you are fine, even if you are having morning sickness every day. On the other hand, some colleagues may opt to have less contact with you, assume that you are less capable of handling your work, or that you will have less time to spend on some aspects of your job. Make sure that your work remains of high quality and continue to contribute to high visibility projects where you can. 3. Create a maternity manual. Documentation is key when preparing for maternity leave. Write out procedures for major tasks, such as reference, instruction, and collections. If you are a subject specialist, for instance, document your most commonly asked reference questions and where to find the answers. Be sure to include emergency information, such as whom to contact in case of unit disaster or likely problems on the horizon. For example, one branch manager made sure her staff knew what to do if the ceiling leaked. Include pertinent computer passwords in your manual as well. Share this manual with everyone who will be covering for you while you are gone, as well as with your supervisor. Don’t assume the people taking over your duties have the same knowledge you do. The manual can be in the form of a paper document, a wiki site, or a content management system. The documentation will increase the confidence of replacement staff, and when you return from leave, you may be surprised to discover how useful the documentation is in your future work. For example, one librarian created many lesson plans for instruction sessions others were likely to cover if she had to leave early. Once she returned to work, she was able to use those same lesson plans for her own future instruction sessions. 4. Keep an updated checklist of the preparation process. Because maternity leave can begin before you expect it, maintaining an ongoing list will keep supervisors and staff up-to-date on your preparations. Posting this list electronically in a wiki or course management software system will keep the information editing centralized and its distribution controlled. If the items on your list are high priority and need to be completed in your absence, you may want to designate a follow-up person in case your leave starts before the task is finished. This will reassure everyone that a smooth transition can be made at any time. Creating a checklist will help keep you organized and on time and assist you in prioritizing remaining tasks while keeping communication open. 5. Prepare for more than just your scheduled leave. Plan for contingencies covering several weeks on either side of your expected leave. There are a variety of reasons that you might need more time off: doctor-ordered bed rest, premature birth, or difficulties resulting in longer recovery time. Make sure that all of your arrangements are completed at least one month before your due date. Additionally, ensure that your plans are adequate for at least a month after you are supposed to be back at work. If there is a change to your proposed return date, keep your supervisor informed as well as the coworkers who are taking on your job duties. Also, a gradual return to work will smooth out the transition. Work half-days, if possible, for a week or two. Slowly transitioning back into a full-time schedule also helps reduce the anxiety of starting day care. 6. Prioritize your job duties. Make sure the most pressing and time-sensitive tasks are covered. Some tasks are more easily set aside than others, and some can wait until your return. Spending an annual collection budget, for instance, can accommodate a three-month pause in activity. Ongoing duties, such as cataloging new materials or maintaining electronic resources, are more pressing. Staffing a public service point is of especially immediate and unending concern and cannot be pushed aside. If you believe hiring additional student staff or temporarily reassigning support staff will be necessary, present your case to administration. Be cautious of new projects that will require great attention late in your pregnancy or during your leave. If possible, finish work ahead of schedule so as not to drag into your final weeks. Overall, it is better to prioritize a few things to do well rather than do many things poorly. By being selective, you will show your administration and coworkers that you are capable of prioritizing and are able to delegate and that they can trust your work will be done well. 7. Train others to do portions of your job. This is the perfect opportunity to cross-train coworkers, staff, and student assistants. We found that people were particularly attentive during our training sessions because they knew that they would soon be on their own for several weeks. Instruct multiple people to do small portions of your job and then no one will feel overwhelmed that they have to take over all of your duties. Even if replacement people already have similar duties, they may not be familiar with your procedures. Cross-training can also bring lasting benefits to the organization. One librarian realized in the course of cross-training how poorly her branch library was organized and eventually reorganized its physical layout to be more understandable to patrons and new staff. To aid in training, you can build digital tutorials using packages such as Camtasia Studio or Adobe Acrobat Connect Pro (formerly Macromedia Breeze) and create web pages with links to important resources. Finally, there will be features of your job that no one may be able to replicate—perhaps a specialized subject or language expertise. In these cases, it is often a good idea to contact a colleague with similar proficiency at another institution who can act as a referral. 8. Do not take work home with you while you are on leave, and resist the urge to check your email often. You may think that you will be able to work on publications, write evaluations, or prepare grant proposals while your baby is sleeping in those first few weeks, but the reality is that you will be too exhausted and overwhelmed by motherhood to even think about work. If you have made all of the preparations suggested in this article, your coworkers will feel empowered and will be able to make decisions on their own. Anything that absolutely has to be done by you (such as performance evaluations) should be completed before your leave or wait until you return. Before you go on leave, unsubscribe from noncritical email lists. Also make sure that you indicate a contact person on voicemail and email “out of office” messages. As you adjust to life with your new baby, gradually go back to reading email, but try to respond only a few times a week. This will help you ease back into work, and you won’t have 5000 emails waiting for you when you return. 9. When you return to work, make it clear that you are committed to your role as librarian. There will probably be people who will question your priorities once you have had a child. Be realistic by only taking on work that you will be able to complete, to ensure that you will be able to do your work well. Be sure to volunteer for some committees and projects, and maintain your high-quality standards, even if you do arrive at work with baby drool on your shoulder or bleary-eyed from lack of sleep. When your colleagues ask you how your new baby is doing, tell them, but remember that not everyone will want to hear every detail of your child's life. One librarian came to feel that motherhood helped her in her supervisory duties. She discovered striking similarities between directing her own children in a calm and clear way and with dealing with her student employees.

The benefits of being proactive

An overarching theme here is the need for the person planning to go on leave to take the initiative in planning that leave. We believe supervisors will greatly appreciate the efforts; they may simply accept your plans with little comment, or respond with further suggestions and negotiation. When you are proactive in your planning, maternity leave can be an empowering experience for librarians and staff and an exceptional way to build teamwork. Each person who is given a small portion of your job has an opportunity to expand his/her own skills. They may need to interact with new people and work on projects outside their comfort zones, but knowing that you will return in a few weeks allows them the reassurance that the new duties are only temporary. Maternity leave also gives supervisors the opportunity to identify hidden talents of librarians and staff for future use in the organization. Staff members who are able to step up and take on additional duties can now be counted on for similar roles in the future. Creating documentation such as a maternity manual is an enormously valuable project that will remain useful long after your leave. Parts of the text can be lifted and reused in annual reports, policy and procedure manuals, staff training, and even on your library’s public web site. Your thoughtful preparation and documentation can also serve as an example for colleagues who wish to have children in the future. Your groundwork in creating a well-planned leave may reassure other supervisors and coworkers that a maternity leave can occur with a minimal amount of disruption. Finally, the process of prioritizing your job duties and cross-training your coworkers can give you new insights and a new perspective on your own career. It can be used as an opportunity to examine your role within the library, showcase your strengths, organize and document your job information, and share knowledge while building team spirit. All of the organization, training, and reflection that goes into a good maternity leave plan can make you better prepared to return to work and give you ideas of where improvements can be made. It can truly be a springboard for personal renewal and organizational change that will not only help your library survive your leave but help it and you thrive once you return.

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Holly Flynn is Mathematics Librarian, Terri Miller is Slavic Librarian and International Documents Librarian, Kathleen Weessies is Geosciences and Planning Librarian, and Melissa Yostis Kellogg Biological Station Library Manager, Michigan State University, East Lansing