To meet increasing demands for tools that address lack of diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility, and mounting budgetary concerns and hiring freezes for the GLAMs environment, the two organizations are collaborating to improve access and affordability to modern talent management infrastructure.

ATLANTA, GEORGIA and BATON ROUGE, LOUISIANA - September 2, 2020 - LYRASIS, a global non-profit membership organization providing technology and content services for galleries, libraries, archives, museums (GLAMs), and research communities, and Skilltype, a software platform for information professionals and their teams to analyze, grow and share expertise, today announce a new partnership for professional development and talent management in the global GLAM sector.

“We have entered a new era in the information profession. COVID-19 has ripped the tape off of a 150-year old model for managing talent, forcing us to alter how we grow as information professionals,” says Tony Zanders, founder and CEO of Skilltype. “Before the pandemic, we began collaborating with academic libraries to reimagine our reconstruction-era techniques through the lenses of modern technology, policy and design.” After two years of research and development, Skilltype is making its platform available to the global GLAM sector through an exclusive distribution partnership with LYRASIS.

“Our research and innovation division was launched this summer with forums to listen to our community discuss leadership during crisis, and DEIA (diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility),” says Robert Miller, CEO of LYRASIS. “After hearing Tony’s perspectives on these issues, and understanding how Skilltype is supporting the community during this crisis, it became clear that this is exactly the type of organization we want to support and partner with.”

As a trusted technology and training provider, LYRASIS is uniquely positioned to support Skilltype in their next chapter. One example is through the integration of the LYRASIS Learning professional development offering and the Skilltype platform. Just as the Skilltype partnership was born at a Leaders Forum, LYRASIS Learning itself was a response to conversations with the LYRASIS member community around the rising costs and scalability of professional development models. Skilltype and the LYRASIS Learning platform create a unique model for learning in libraries.

“In recent years we’ve heard an increasing need for resources that help our members overcome the traditional barriers to DEIA, and that give them content and tools to keep their staff highly trained and ready to effectively manage the challenges of the day...and the future. We always say we want to solve the problems of today with the tools of tomorrow, and this partnership lets us do that. It’s a great opportunity for all of us.” says Lisa Larson, Sr. Director of Outreach & Engagement at LYRASIS.

“At URI, we joined Skilltype at its inception because of its novel approach to professional development,” commented Karim Boughida, Dean of Libraries at University of Rhode Island. “We have long sought a way to help raise social awareness among staff and prepare us for the future of work, and Skilltype is the only product in the market helping libraries with these issues in a scalable and affordable way. Now being in the midst of two pandemics, Social Justice and COVID-19, it has gone from a nice to have to a must-have for our community. We welcome wholeheartedly the partnership of LYRASIS and Skilltype. It will enhance the access and affordability of the platform for collections-holding institutions of all types.”

Through its free offering, Skilltype provides one-stop access to professional development opportunities and resources from around the world through a WCAG 2.0 compliant platform. This design-centric approach levels the playing field by removing many of the barriers to accessing quality training opportunities, including those who rely on assistive technology. Anyone can get access for free at skilltype.com.

Skilltype for Teams, the firm’s enterprise offering, enables organizations to analyze, develop and share expertise. This paid subscription platform is now available exclusively through LYRASIS, with a discounted rate for LYRASIS members. Organizations can contact membersupport@lyrasis.org for more information.

Gonzaga University’s Foley Library, a LYRASIS member and LYRASIS Learning subscriber, was one of nine development partners in the Skilltype community. “I think the synergy between Skilltype and LYRASIS Learning will improve our employees’ experiences with each service,” says Paul Bracke, Dean of Libraries at Gonzaga University. “The content from LYRASIS Learning will provide a wider range of professional development opportunities within Skilltype, and the personalized interface of Skilltype will help employees find the right LYRASIS Learning resources for them. And in a time of resource constraints, anything we can do to streamline business processes, through combined billing for example, is a positive.”

About LYRASIS
LYRASIS (www.lyrasis.org), a non-profit membership organization, partners with member libraries, archives, and museums to create, access, preserve and manage information, with an emphasis on digital content, while building and sustaining collaboration, enhancing operations and technology, and increasing buying power.

About Skilltype
Skilltype is an American human resources and software-as-a-service (SaaS) company headquartered in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, United States. Founded in 2018, the company primarily offers talent management software and application programming interfaces (APIs) for information professionals and their teams to analyze, develop and share expertise.

Gale Presents: Peterson’s Career Prep Provides Job Planning and Guidance Resources to Help Users Discover New Employment Paths

FARMINGTON HILLS, Mich. – September 1, 2020 – Gale, a Cengage company, today announced the launch of Gale Presents: Peterson’s Career Prep, a new innovative online career assessment platform for libraries – powered by Peterson’s® – that gives patrons access to career development tools. Now libraries can provide job seekers with career planning and guidance resources to explore new paths that align with their interests and skills to achieve their professional goals in today’s job market. Read Gale’s blog about the new platform, here: https://bit.ly/2QG5XD1.

According to a recent study conducted by the American Library Association, 60% of libraries anticipate that their patrons most urgent needs in the next six months will include job search support[i]. Gale Presents: Peterson’s Career Prep helps users learn about job paths, receive personalized career and college recommendations, create resumes and cover letters, search for positions, explore schools and training programs and obtain advice on both finding a job or advancing an existing career.

“In today’s economic uncertainty, finding a job can be quite challenging. The increase in unemployment rates coupled with library closures makes it essential that libraries offer job-seeking and career development tools that can be easily accessed online at anytime, from anywhere,” said Paul Gazzolo, senior vice president and general manager at Gale. “Gale Presents: Peterson’s Career Prep helps job seekers navigate the current economy with personalized career assistance that helps them realize their unique talents and skills to compete in today’s job market, improving lives and enabling economic mobility.”

Gale Presents: Peterson’s Career Prep includes:

• VisualCV Resume Writing tool: Allows users to create visually interesting resumes and cover letters. Users also gain access to an external library of resume samples from 5,000 industries and can even create free websites to share their resumes externally with prospective employers.

• PathwayU Career Assessments: Contains four in-depth assessments aligned around a user’s interests, values, personality and workplace preferences, driving personalized career recommendations. The tool also presents users with colleges recommendations. The connect tool provides an easy way for users to request additional information directly from the colleges.

• Career Database: Contains career information that utilizes the most recent data available from O*NET and the U.S. Department of Labor. Potential career matches are suggested based on a user’s assessment results; users can view these suggestions by job title or subject area. Military crosswalks are included to help individuals transitioning out of the military translate their skills to civilian occupations.

• Job Search: Job listings are sourced from Indeed.com and are updated daily. Users can also limit results to employment type (i.e., internship, part-time, full-time) and look for job listings that align with their assessment results.

• Career Advice: Includes a content library with helpful articles and tips focused on writing resumes and cover letters, networking and interview. Content is written in a friendly, conversational tone. Bonus worksheets and workbooks can also be downloaded for patrons who want to dig deeper into career exploration or their assessment results.

• Improved Mobile Experience: Allows users to strengthen their career development and pursue employment opportunities from any location, on any device.

• Simplified Homepage Design: Helps users spend less time navigating the resource and more time focusing on building their career skills.

Gale Presents: Peterson’s Career Prep is available now at participating public, academic and K-12 school libraries. Coming later this fall, Gale’s Testing & Education Reference Center will be renamed Gale Presents: Peterson’s Test Prep. Gale also offers Gale Presents: Peterson’s Test and Career Prep, a combination of the two products.
For more information or to request a demonstration on Gale Presents: Peterson’s Career Prep, visit: https://www.gale.com/careerprep.

About Cengage and Gale
Cengage is the education and technology company built for learners. The company serves the higher education, K-12, professional, library and workforce training markets worldwide. Gale, a Cengage company, provides libraries with original and curated content, as well as modern research tools and technology that are crucial in connecting libraries to learning, and learners to libraries. For more than 60 years, Gale has partnered with libraries around the world to empower the discovery of knowledge and insights – where, when and how people need it. Gale has 500 employees globally with its main operations in Farmington Hills, Michigan. For more information, please visit www.gale.com.

Follow Gale on:
• Twitter - @galecengage
• Gale blog - https://blog.gale.com/
• Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/GaleCengage
• LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/showcase/gale

About Peterson’s
From culinary school to medical school--and everything in-between--Peterson’s helps you discover, prepare for and fund your education journey. As a trusted educational services company for over 50 years, we continue to provide the most accurate, dependable, high-quality education content in the field. With the most up-to-date college search and career discovery tools, expert test prep and scholarship database, Petersons.com is the one-stop-shop for everything you need to achieve your educational goals.

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[i] Libraries Respond: COVID-19 Survey Results, American Library Association, May 2020
https://bit.ly/3jzWyJH