The Journey from Corporate to Academic Librarian

Approximately 3 years ago, I unexpectedly found myself wearing the hat of an academic business librarian. I was a die-hard corporate librarian before starting this new chapter of my life-always had been, always was going to be, no question but that I would retire with my eye on that bottom line. Within a year of receiving my M.L.S., I was living my dream job as director of Arthur Andersen's Business Information Center. I loved every minute of it and never, ever considered working in any other type of environment. Then came Enron. On July 3, 2002, I closed the door of the last remaining Andersen library and on my career as a corporate librarian.

In late December 2002, I started my new job at Emory University's Goizueta Business Library. I was thrilled to be back working closely with accounting and finance resources and research, a natural fit given my years at Andersen, but wondered how I would fit into academia. To be perfectly honest, unemployment was no fun; in fact, it was downright frightening. I was excited to get up every morning and go to work; the fact that it was such a good job working with great people in an intellectually challenging environment was icing on the cake. I have to admit, though, that serendipity rather than strategy played its hand in deciding my fate.