The International Information & Library Review (2011) 43, 169e175

ava i lab le at www.sc iencedi rec t .com

journa l homepage: www.e lsev ier . com/ locate / i i l r

Continuing professional development for RMITInternational University Vietnam library staff:Adding value through an international partnership:A case study

Julia Leong a,*, Loc Huu Nguyen b

aUniversity Library, RMIT University, AustraliabBeanland Library, RMIT International University Vietnam, Vietnam

KEYWORDSContinuing education;Professionaldevelopment;Staff development;Blended learning;Academic libraries;Australia;Vietnam

* Corresponding author.E-mail addresses: julia.leong@rmit

1057-2317/$ - see front matter ª 201doi:10.1016/j.iilr.2011.07.008

Abstract The aim of this study was to explore the effectiveness of blended learning e thefusion of face-to-face and online learning experiences e to implement an effective and cultur-ally sensitive program of professional development in an Australian university working ina developing country. It sought insight into pertinent pedagogical approaches for staff devel-opment across multiple locations including across national boundaries. The project demon-strated how learners can develop new capabilities and approaches by building on existingskills and knowledge as they interact in communities of practice. The immediate purposewas to design and deliver a continuing professional education program to meet the needs oflibrarians working at RMIT International University Vietnam in the context of the demands ofthe academic community and in the light of the challenge library staff experienced in seekingto meet explicit and tacit expectations. The project ran from late January to mid December2010. The research questions were: ‘Is blended learning effective as an approach to continuingprofessional development when working across cultures in a multinational organization?’ and‘What contribution do face-to-face and online components make to learning outcomes?’ Themethodology used was an action learning approach. A 2009 consultant’s report into the RMITVietnam Library established professional developmental needs which were further detailed inFebruary 2010 by the project leader from RMIT University, Melbourne using a skills audit. Work-shops in Vietnam, visits to Melbourne by several Vietnam staff members, and an online forumwere then delivered. Reflective practice and ongoing input from staff were utilized to forma feedback loop to modify the project timing and approaches as needed. Evaluation includedparticipant feedback on workshops, tracking changes in Library services, a customer survey,a project-end survey of participants’ behavioral changes against learning topics as self-reported, and discussion with participants. The authors were actively involved in the project:Julia Leong as project leader and Loc Nguyen as project champion at the Saigon South Campus.Blended learning was found to be effective in meeting continuing professional developmental

.edu.au (J. Leong), loc.nguyen@rmit.edu.vn (L.H. Nguyen).

1 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

170 J. Leong, L.H. Nguyen

needs and in promoting positive changes in library service provision. Online discussions wereeffective for extending existing knowledge, gaining practical hints, and examining attitudes.Face-to-face workshops and visits were more effective for learning new material in a system-atic way. It is recommended that consideration be given to applying the blended learningmodel used in this project to continuing professional developmental work in similar contexts.ª 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Introduction

International partnerships present organizations with newchallenges, but also with great opportunities. Continuingprofessional education is an area which can be significantlyenhanced by harnessing the know-how of staff in otherorganizations and by engaging in interactive learningactivities. This article reports on a successful program ofcontinuing professional development involving RMITUniversity library staff in Vietnam and Australia.

In 2010, a year-long project engaged library staff inMelbourne, Australia and Vietnam in a series of interactionsand learning activities. RMIT International University Viet-nam (RMIT Vietnam) has two campuses: the Hanoi Campusand the Saigon South Campus in Ho Chi Minh City. InAustralia, the university is based in Melbourne and haslibraries at six sites. While the project had benefits for thelibraries in both Australia and Vietnam, the primary focuswas to assist the Vietnam library staff to meet theircustomers’ service delivery expectations of a modernacademic library. This article focuses on the need forprofessional development, the effectiveness of the imple-mented blended learning approach, and the outcomes ofthe project in Vietnam. It also includes consideration of thefactors believed to have contributed to the positiveoutcomes.

Methodology

An action learning approach was taken with this projectwhich delivered a blend of face-to-face and online learningexperiences. A consultant’s report into the RMIT VietnamLibrary identified a need for professional development. Aninitial visit by the project leader from RMIT University,Melbourne, comprising workshops, a skills audit and discus-sion, increased understanding of the needs. After this initialstage, the activities and timelines were developed. Ongoinginput from staff and reflective practice formed a feedbackloop to modify timing and approaches as needed. Projectcomponents were workshops in Vietnam conducted by Mel-bourne staff, visits by several Vietnam staff to RMITUniversity in Melbourne, an online community of practice,and informal coaching. Interaction between library staff inMelbourne and Vietnam was a key element. The authorsfilled the roles of project leader and project champion atthe Saigon South Campus and were in a position to influenceoutcomes. Evaluation included participant feedback onworkshops, tracking changes in Library services, a customersurvey, a project-end survey of participants’ behavioralchanges against learning topics as self-reported, anddiscussion with participants.

The need: the situation in Vietnam

RMIT library customers

Customers of RMIT Vietnam Library are a diverse interna-tional community of students, lecturers and staff. Startingwith just 30 students in 2001, RMIT Vietnam reacheda student body of more than 5000 in 2009. About 10% ofstudents come from countries other than Vietnam, such asAustralia, Britain, United States, France, Russia, Singapore,Korea, and Taiwan (RMIT University Vietnam, 2011). Thegrowth in student numbers continues, as does the appoint-ment of new teaching staff. Since academics also come fromall over the world, they have brought to RMIT Vietnama broad range of knowledge, teaching experiences andapproaches. As one of the key departments whose resourcesand services strongly contribute to the quality of teachingand learning, the library must understand the varied infor-mation needs of the groups it serves.

Students are enrolled in undergraduate, postgraduateand English courses at the two campuses of RMIT Vietnam.Studying with international standard curricula, all studentsare required not only to be present in the classrooms forlectures, but also to engage in academic activities such asproducing assignments independently, working on assign-ments in groups, preparing and delivering presentations,examining case-studies, and participating in industrialprojects. To be successful in these activities, students needto become information literate; that is to be able to clarifytheir own needs and create search strategies to findanswers for their assignment questions. Hence, librariansare not only expected to be information professionals whocan give answers to reference questions, but also educatorswho can design and facilitate information literacy classesfor students. To offer good customer service, it is importantto provide a friendly and comfortable atmosphere wherestudents can easily express their problems and ask for help.This is especially needed when students are experiencingstress such as in response to assignment deadlines orlooming examinations.

Most RMIT Vietnam teaching staff members are fromEnglish speaking countries, some are from Asian countries,and a small number are from Vietnam. All are required tohold an internationally recognized Masters degree or higherqualifications together with in-depth professional knowl-edge and teaching experience. Apart from teaching, manyacademics also pursue higher study and are engaged inresearch. All of these activities require them to explorea wide range of high quality and specialized informationsources. As many lecturers have good information researchskills, they only occasionally request help to locate

Continuing professional development for RMIT International University Vietnam library staff 171

information. Interaction between academics and librarystaff does occur regularly in relation to the acquisition ofbooks and other items for the collection. These items aresubject to thorough customs checks in Vietnam and this cancause delays. Robinson (2007, p. 257) referred to clear-ances required to import books into Vietnam, noting thatforeigners do not always realize the extent of the influenceof politics and government in day to day business. At times,lecturers were frustrated by the slowness in acquiringlibrary resources and library staff struggled to deal confi-dently and empathically with their reactions and questions.

RMIT Vietnam Library

The primary function of RMIT Vietnam Library is to supportthe teaching, learning, research and other scholarly activ-ities of academics, students and staff of the university. Itcan be considered a small academic library with a collec-tion of over 30,000 titles of books and other learningmaterials. The library also provides access to a largenumber of online databases through RMIT University Libraryin Melbourne. As of 2009, services offered to librarycustomers included circulation, reference, and interlibraryloan. There were also orientation and library tours held fornew students, as well as general training sessions on how touse the library catalog and online databases.

Library staff

At the time of the project, the total number of library staffworking in the Saigon and Hanoi campuses was 17. Amongthem, the library manager graduated from the Mastersprogram of the Graduate School of Library and InformationScience of Simmons College in Boston, Massachusetts, USA,another librarian also held a Masters degree, and 12 othershad a Bachelor degree in library and information scienceprograms offered by top universities in Vietnam. They werea group of well qualified, mostly young, staff who wereconfident, enthusiastic, friendly and strongly committed todeveloping the range and quality of library services andresources.

Library staff were very comfortable working withstudents as age barriers were minimal. However, as manystaff members were recent graduates, they lacked sufficientexperience in dealing with customers who are dissatisfiedand in handling difficult reference questions. For severalreasons, most staff members were under-confident, andtherefore sometimes awkward, in approaching and buildingup working relationships with the academics. One of thereasons was that formal intercultural training courses,which are necessary for people working in a multiculturalworkplace such as RMIT Vietnam, had not been establishedfor Vietnamese staff. At times cultural differences wouldlead to misunderstandings and undermine harmony andrespect.

Continued improvements in the library and its collectionover time were resulting in improved customer satisfactionratings in the annual customer survey, but results were stillbelow a desirable level. At the invitation of RMIT Vietnam,a senior member of RMIT University Library visited Vietnamin 2009 to assess how well the learning support needs of the

students and academic staff were being met. Her reportidentified developmental needs in the areas of customerfocus, reference, liaison with academics, and support forinformation literacy development. As lecturers andstudents held high expectations of good customer service,training for library staff needed to cover issues such asdealing with ‘difficult’ customers, answering advancedqueries, and handling challenging situations. In the area ofinformation literacy, library staff needed to develop moreadvanced skills in designing and developing informationliteracy lessons, presenting classes, preparing trainingmaterials, and promoting information literacy classes.There was also a need to better understand how to applya customer focus to planning, how to manage expectations,and how to build an understanding of the value the librarycould offer in support of teaching and learning.

The learning project

As evidenced in the previous section, there was a clearneed for continuing professional development (CPD) inseveral areas. The importance of CPD for library andinformation professionals is widely affirmed (IFLA, 2010;Maesaroh & Genoni, 2010), however in the context ofRMIT Vietnam, training and development were not readilyavailable locally to match the need. Despite this, RMITVietnam did have significant opportunities in its interna-tional connection with RMIT University and internal fundingwas provided jointly in 2010 to address the CPD need.

The project leader visited the Saigon South Campus inearly 2010 to clarify developmental needs through use ofa self-rating competency audit and discussion with librarystaff. She also delivered introductory workshops oncustomer service and marketing. A blended learningapproach was chosen to address the situation and wasdelivered throughout 2010 with evaluation in December2010. It involved face-to-face workshops, visits to Mel-bourne by several staff, online discussions, and informalcoaching. While face-to-face workshops are a traditionalapproach which allowed experts to impart new content, itwas important not to be prescriptive, but rather to allowtime and opportunity for participants to see how ideaswould fit with their existing understandings and apply intheir own cultural and organizational contexts. The intentto apply a constructivist approach came from recognitionon the part of the project leader that: she was not familiarwith the Vietnam context; authority and responsibility laywith the RMIT Vietnam Library Manager; and people aremore likely to apply new approaches if they determinethem for themselves. There was a desire to avoid one-offworkshops and impractical instructions from an uninformedoutsider and the likely failure that would result (Robinson,2007, p. 258; Sward & Leong, 2010).

Workshops

Face-to-face workshops were crucial to meet the culturallearning preferences of the Vietnamese staff and providedan opportunity to build mutual trust and respect. In mostcases, PowerPoints or outlines of the session were providedto participants one or two weeks in advance to improve

172 J. Leong, L.H. Nguyen

understanding as English proficiency varied. In the work-shops, discussion and work in small groups were usedregularly to promote active learning and to ensure materialwas understood. Four librarians from Melbourne wereinvolved in delivering workshops over different visits. Theearlier visit to Saigon South, which covered customerservice and services marketing, was condensed for a Mayvisit to Hanoi. In May, a Melbourne library manager also ledworkshops at both Vietnam campuses on the topics ofdealing with difficult queries and the reference interview.The focus in October was on information literacy, withleadership from the manager of the Business Liaison Teamand a reference librarian, both from Melbourne. Addition-ally the project leader ran workshops on EndNote andengineering resources for interested Saigon South staff andwork planning training for all staff.

Participation in the workshops was higher than in otherproject components with almost all staff in attendance. InSaigon South, each workshop was held twice to avoidservice disruption. In the smaller Hanoi Library, the enquirydesk was staffed by a member of another area who wouldcall a librarian out of the workshop for help if needed.Evaluation forms provided very positive feedback on thevalue of workshops, although it was clear that some foundit challenging to interact in English and needed leaders tospeak slowly and clearly.

Visits to Melbourne

The Vietnam Library Manager visited RMIT University inMelbourne for two weeks in April. A schedule was developedto meet her expressed needs and interests and she benefitedgreatly from time spent with a variety of colleagues, gainingideas which were quickly put into practice (A. T. T. Hoang,personal communication, December 10, 2010). InSeptember, the Information Services Coordinators from bothcampuses and a reference librarian visited Melbourne wherethey focused on reference and information literacy work andmanagement issues. The visits were a good opportunity tobuild understanding of one Western model of service provi-sion and to gain insight into how liaison librarians work withacademics. When reflecting on their experiences later, theInformation Services Coordinators spoke of the value ofgaining an understanding of the liaison librarian role,observing the friendly attitudes of staff toward students,and noting managers’ proactive approach to problem solving(T. B. Leu & V. T. T. Pham, personal communication,December 10, 2010). The visits also provided a valuableopportunity for Vietnamese staff to interact and formprofessional bounds with Australian staff which will supportongoing networking.

Online forum

In addition to face-to-face interactions, an online site wasdeveloped to provide resources and facilitate developmentof a community of practice. The online site was titledEquip: Equipping Librarians to Provide Effective LearningSupport and was generally referred to as the Equip forumor simply Equip. It was developed with the Drupal ContentManagement System and used a combination of core Drupal

modules, contributed modules, and modules specificallydeveloped for the project. It was integrated with the NovellDirectory Services of the university which allowed staff toutilize their usual work login and password. The Equip sitewas used to reinforce and extend workshop material, andcontained resources and a space for discussion. Onlinediscussions provided an opportunity for a larger number ofMelbourne staff to participate and benefit from theproject. The major forum topics were customer service(May), reference work (June), and information literacy(November). Days and times were pre-arranged to holdreal-time discussions. Although posts could be made at anytime, the majority of participants utilized the site only atdesignated times. Total staff at the end of the projectnumbered 12 at Saigon South and five in Hanoi. Participa-tion rates in Vietnam were variable with a number of staffgaining great benefit and others less involved. FourteenVietnam staff completed a project-end evaluation withnine reporting that they had posted on the Equip forum.One read posts actively, but did not post, three did notparticipate in the forum and one did not answer thisquestion. The level of involvement generally reflected thestaff members’ duties with acquisitions/cataloging staffless active in the forum where discussion was centered oninformation services issues. Part-time staff were also lessable to participate than full-time staff.

When a sizeable number of participants were onlinetogether, the fast pace of the posts made it challenging forsome staff to process the incoming ideas in time to postcomments of their own, but they were able to look backover the material later as it was well categorized on thesite. While 12 of the 14 Vietnam respondents to the finalsurvey affirmed that they would recommend the mix oflearning approaches used in the project, there was somefeedback that the Equip discussions were potentially a littleintimidating, and use of chat, such as Skype, with a smallernumber of participants, may have been preferable, ora useful addition.

Action learning

After each phase of the project, reflection and feedbackwere used to adjust the future phases to suit needs of staff.Content adjustments were the easiest to make. Dates forstaff visits had to fit within the academic calendars andhence were relatively inflexible. One example of anadjustment implemented was the abandonment of a plan toteach selection processes through the forum. Instead timewas provided during the September visit to Melbourne forstaff to develop greater skills in this area, equipping themto train their colleagues at a later date. This changereflected our observation that the forum worked well forexchange of ideas, but was less effective for teaching andlearning new skills.

Outcomes

The project had very positive and substantial impact.Outcomes were measured in a number of ways including:participants’ evaluations of workshops; reports from thosewho visited Melbourne; a project-end online survey of

Continuing professional development for RMIT International University Vietnam library staff 173

participants; observation and reflection; conversationswith library staff and others; and a Library (Customer)Survey. A blended learning approach to continuingprofessional development of library staff was found to behighly effective in our context. In the survey at theconclusion of the project in December 2010, in answer tothe statement, “For me, the project has been worth-while”, the average of all participants’ ratings was 4.7 outof a possible best of 5, with 5 meaning Strongly Agree and 4meaning Agree. For the rating by Information Servicesstaff, the average was 4.8.

Increased networking between library staff

With the establishment of the Equip online forum, librar-ians in Melbourne, Saigon and Hanoi had a very significantplace to share their ideas and examples of best practice.After the launch of the forum in May, a variety of issueswere raised for discussion and there were also a number ofspecific queries and answers. As library staff members onall campuses were involved in contributing and gainingideas, the forum became an effective place for everyone tobuild up new connections, strengthen mutual under-standing and improve practice.

One of the notable features of the forum was thecategorization of discussion topics. There were four maingroups of topics consisting of 45 smaller topics that drewhundreds of posts from participants. Since the number ofsmaller topics rose tremendously, individuals could choosejust the ones related to their interests. Topic categoriza-tion was valuable as it enabled librarians to identify othercolleagues who shared the same interests. This allowed formore productive interactions both on- and off-line.Participants became more familiar with each other overtime, and thus became more confident in raising questionsand expressing ideas. In addition, several means ofcommunication outside the online forum were deployed forfurther conversations between Melbourne and Vietnamstaff. Some Information Services staff in Vietnam began toapproach their Australian colleagues by email, chat refer-ence, Skype and even Facebook to gain additional input onspecialized issues such as dealing with ‘difficult’ customers,collection development for new academic programs, libraryservices marketing, and social media applications inpromoting library services. Also, social network accountssuch as Twitter, LinkedIn, and Delicious were exchanged asa convenient way to keep in touch. Although the projecthas now concluded, the online forum is still available foruse and a number of professional buddy pairs have beenestablished between librarians in Vietnam and Melbourneto continue networking.

In addition to increased interactions between Australianand Vietnamese staff, the utilization of the forum alsoinspired more in-depth collaboration between librarians inthe Saigon South and Hanoi campuses. For example,immediately after the October series of workshops inVietnam specializing in information literacy, a remarkablenumber of further conversations were held to prepare forcollaborative work on designing and delivering librarytraining classes for students. One of the methods used toconnect was the internal phone network of RMIT Vietnam as

it is suitable for long synchronous conversations betweencampuses. The practical outcome was that InformationServices staff at both campuses successfully discussed andagreed on the design of the initial lesson plan for generalonline databases training workshops which could be modi-fied to apply to course-tailored workshops. An interestingtool, introduced by Australian librarians, was Yammer.Library staff in Vietnam found Yammer especially beneficialwhen they created discussion groups to share ideas witheach other over a four week period at the same time asthey were delivering information literacy workshops. Thisallowed them to keep improving the quality of theirtraining materials as well as the effectiveness of theirteaching methods.

New working relationships between the Vietnamlibrary and other areas of the university

One of the areas of high interest to the Vietnam librarystaff was how to best build supportive, effective, andrespectful relationships between librarians and academics.This was discussed in all stages of the project and progresshas been good. The project changed some negativeperceptions which had been held about the library andresulted in increased and improved interaction with otherorganizational units in Vietnam. More productive workingrelationships were established with academics and withother support areas working to build students’ informationliteracy competency.

Prior to the project, information literacy training waspredominantly offered by the Learning Skills Unit which isresponsible for teaching essential study skills. The libraryoffered general training workshops on using the librarycatalog and searching online databases, but attendancewas low. A small number of subject specific informationliteracy classes were presented by an educational tech-nologist in response to requests from lecturers. Apprised ofthe situation, the project leader arranged for a meeting ofall support units involved in information literacy training toavoid duplication in efforts. Open discussions betweenstakeholders clarified and agreed on boundaries, whichresulted in the transfer of some responsibilities to thelibrary. In preparing new lesson plans and training materialssince then, the library has benefited greatly from adviceoffered by staff members of the Learning Skills Unit andEducational Technology. These units have also beensupportive in referring lecturers to the library when there isa need for tailored information literacy classes.

After attending workshops focused on informationliteracy in October, Vietnamese librarians were more activeand confident in approaching the academics to offerworkshops relevant to the course needs of their students.By emails and direct conversations, new contacts withseveral academics were created. The new connectionswere strengthened when lecturers observed that studentswho participated in the workshops showed noticeableimprovement in the quality of the information and sourcesused and cited in their assignments. All lecturers whoarranged for librarians to present tailored workshopsexpressed their satisfaction and agreed to continue workingtogether in the following semesters.

174 J. Leong, L.H. Nguyen

Changed library practices and improved services

There have been a number of changes in the way theVietnam library seeks to support learning and teaching asa result of the project. Primarily these relate to: buildingstaff expertise in discipline areas taught; approaches toliaison with academics; information literacy activities; andpromotion of library services. One of the challenges facedby staff in Vietnam is how to build adequate expertiseacross the increasing number of disciplines taught. Whenthe Vietnam Library Manager visited Melbourne, sheobserved the liaison librarian model in operation and thenintroduced a contextualized approach in Saigon South byallocating subject responsibilities to staff. This promotessome specialization and provides the opportunity for staffto build up expertise and support each other, such as byoffering database training in their allocated area in thefuture.

There has been significant progress in the area ofinformation literary training. The library in the Saigon SouthCampus now regularly offers classes tailored to students’course needs. Also, newly recruited librarians in HanoiLibrary were greatly helped by timely workshops on thisarea as tailored workshops were being requested at thetime of the Melbourne librarian visit. Additional changesinclude the introduction of a common template for lessonplanning and the inclusion of student learning activities toimprove understanding of class content.

In discussing customer service at the start of theproject, a services marketing approach underpinned topicssuch as library planning and working with students andacademics. This resonated well with Vietnam staff and anincreased marketing focus has been evident. Use of socialmedia for marketing library services was already beingactively explored and since then discussions have takenplace to seek to integrate promotion opportunities into theuniversity student portal. An idea raised by staff indiscussions, which came to fruition quickly, was a Book Fairorganized by the Vietnam Library on July 22e23, 2010 atwhich three book distributors displayed thousands of titlesand offered a discount to staff and students wishing topurchase items.

Growth in confidence and improved individualpractice

RMIT Vietnam is distinctive in offering a Western style ofeducation in the English language within Vietnam. There isan intention that RMIT Vietnam operates in close alignmentto RMIT University providing an equivalent educationalexperience and the library is expected to operate asa modern academic library. Library staff members are allVietnamese and academics and senior executives arepredominantly Westerners. Incoming academics areprovided with cultural awareness briefings; however, at thetime of this project, the equivalent training was notavailable to Vietnamese staff. This situation, in addition torestrictions and delays on the importation of books, made itdifficult for the library to meet the expectations of theacademic community fully. Melbourne librarians offeredexplicit information on the likely assumptions and

expectations of the academic community. They also tookadvantage of occasional opportunities to build support forthe library from academics and other staff they met.Library staff members who visited Melbourne were able toobserve cultural differences and library practices firsthand, and the workshop in Vietnam on dealing with difficultqueries was helpful. In a feedback survey conducted by theVietnam Library Manager one to two weeks after theworkshop, participants reported their knowledge on thistopic as having improved from an average of 3.6 up to 4.4out a possible best of 5. Library marketing activities haveincreased to promote better understanding of the servicesand of the growth in the library collection. Anecdotalevidence is strong that relationships with library customersare now more positive and harmonious and InformationServices staff report increased interaction with academicstaff. Additionally, there has been an increase in numbersof staff delivering workshops and those involved reportgrowing confidence in this work.

As part of the final participants’ survey, library staffwere asked to rate their knowledge, attitudes and activitiesbefore, and after, the project on a 1e5 scale for 17 itemswhich related to the learning topics. The results werepleasing. The best possible score was 5 and across all itemsand all Vietnam survey respondents the average movedfrom a baseline of 3.6 up to 4.3, showing an overallimprovement of 17%.

Customer opinions

A December 2010 survey provided clear evidence ofa positive trend from the customers’ viewpoint. Customerswere asked to rate library performance on a number ofitems using a 1 to 4 scale (1 Not good, 2 Fair, 3 Good, 4Excellent). There were four questions about library staffwhich were highly relevant as a measure of the effec-tiveness of the learning project when 2010 responses werecompared with 2009 data. They were ‘Knowledge inanswering your questions’, ‘Friendliness’, ‘Helpfulness’,and ‘Availability’. In 2010, Hanoi Campus students’ opin-ions showed improvements of 5.91%, 4.75%, 3.34%, and0.4% respectively. Saigon Campus students’ ratingsimproved by 3.41%, 1%, 7.36%, and 6.04% respectively.Average ratings by academic and other staff were higherthan those of students.

Drivers of success

A number of factors contributed to the success of thisproject. These factors were not specifically studied, butincluded:

� the enthusiasm of staff to be involved and openness tolearn from each other;

� the availability of an enthusiastic project leader,detailed planning, and ongoing interaction to keep theproject on track;

� the support of senior university and library staff;� funding provided by the university;� the work of project champions in Saigon South, Hanoi,and some Melbourne campuses;

Continuing professional development for RMIT International University Vietnam library staff 175

� the expertise, availability, and willingness of severalMelbourne librarians to prepare and present workshopsin Vietnam;

� the willingness of a number of Melbourne librarians tofacilitate online discussion on allocated days;

� careful scheduling which took account of the universitycalendars to schedule interaction in the less busyperiods;

� the expert support from the RMIT University Melbourneeducational technology group in developing an onlinesite;

� cooperation, support and advice from other depart-ments in Vietnam such as the Learning Skills Unit andEducational Technology;

� attention to communication and promoting involve-ment; and

� time zones which are close enough for synchronousonline discussion to be possible.

With any successful project, a number of factorsunderpin the positive outcomes. Being strong at one factor,while weak at another, will lessen the quality of theoutcomes. In this project we were fortunate that theneeded drivers of success were present. Perhaps the listabove can be summarized as having the required resources,organizational skill, and motivation and openness tochange.

Resources include financial backing, time to participate,and talent. The project could not have gone ahead withoutthe financial backing of RMIT University and RMIT Vietnam.The Vice President (Academic) in Vietnam provided highlevel support as did the University Librarian in Melbourne.With their support, the project leader applied for fundingthrough the RMIT University Learning and Teaching Inno-vations Program. This was granted with matching fundingfrom RMIT Vietnam which has finances separate from theUniversity in Melbourne. In addition to finance, a keyresource was provision of time to complete the project.The financial grant included provision for three months ofstaff replacement time for the project leader to enable herto develop resources, coordinate the project, liaise withthe Vietnam Library, and lead workshops. It is estimatedthat the University Library in Melbourne provided anotherthree months of staff time in total for the project leaderand three other librarians who delivered workshops inVietnam. In addition, libraries in both countries providedtime within working hours for staff to participate inlearning activities. Another major success factor was theavailability of a pool of talented and committed trainers.RMIT University Library is a large academic library withmany talented managers and librarians who are wellequipped to offer excellent training.

Organizational skill is a major driver of success in projectmanagement. The organization and coordination of thisproject rested largely with the project leader who hasa strong record as a project leader, expertise in staffdevelopment, and relevant experience in library manage-ment. The Library Manager in Vietnam worked with theproject leader to coordinate content and delivery and topromote staff interest and involvement. In this she was ably

assisted by the Information Services Coordinators in SaigonSouth and Hanoi.

Motivation and openness to change can make or breaka professional developmental project. The Vietnam Librarystaff members are to be complemented on their enthusiasmin this area. The reasons for their positive attitudes werenot explored, but may include: the leadership of theLibrary Manager who had been educated overseas; thenatural exuberance of youth as many of the staff are in theearly stages of their career; the excitement generated byan opportunity to engage with international colleagues; andthe deliberate focus of an early workshop on a known areaof concern, or use of a learning ‘hook’ to heighten learningmotivation.

Conclusion

Blended learning was found to be a highly effectiveapproach for continuing professional development oflibrary staff in our multinational university. Each of themajor components of the project e face-to-face work-shops, overseas visits, and online forums e was highly ratedby those involved. The inclusion of face-to-face contact isvital to establish effective working relationships based ontrust and respect. Such relationships break down barriers tolearning by reducing any sense of intimidation or fear ofspeaking up with opinions or questions. Multiple times andpoints of contact are important to build motivation and toprovide time for people to absorb, consolidate and applynew ideas. The online forum was most suitable forextending existing knowledge, gaining practical hints, andexamining attitudes. The face-to-face workshops and visitswere more effective for learning new material ina systematic way.

This action research involved one case study ofcontinuing professional development of library staff in twocountries. As each situation is unique, the results may varyin other contexts where personalities, resources, chal-lenges and learning needs are different. Nevertheless, themix of learning approaches used in this project resulted inclear gains in staff competence and confidence and inimproved customer satisfaction and thus the model isworthy of consideration as a strategy for application inother contexts.

References

IFLA. (2010). About the Continuing Professional Development andWorkplace Learning Section. Retrieved 10 January, 2011, from.http://www.ifla.org/en/cpdwl.

Maesaroh, I., & Genoni, P. (2010). An investigation of thecontinuing professional development practices of Indonesianacademic libraries. Library Management, 34(8/9), 621e634.

RMIT University Vietnam. (2011). Programs. Retrieved 12 January,2011, from. http://www.rmit.edu.vn/663_ENG_HTML.htm.

Robinson, M. (2007). Consulting across cultures: librarians andproject management in Vietnam. Library Management,28(4e5), 252e261.

Sward, B., & Leong, J. (2010). The Vietnam connection. [news].inCite, 31(12), 15.