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A new beginning

  • 5th July 2012

The Hive opened its doors for the first time on Monday and since then we have been welcoming a whole host of users, new and existing, into our service. It has been really enjoyable to see how people are reacting to the service and to hear the positive comments that people have about The Hive and the opportunities it provides.

Here’s what has been happening over the last few days:

Above: The building on the morning of the opening

 Above: Crowds gathered outside to witness the opening. A brass band played a fanfare written for the occasion.

Above: The doors opening for the first time, with staff waiting inside to greet the visitors.

Below: Visitors arriving at our enquiry desk for the first time.

Some familiar faces came to see us.

Above and below: some regular users visiting for the first time.

To ensure all of our users can find their way around the new service, and to make sure they get the most out of their visit, we are now conducting New User Inductions for everyone who visits. We’ve had extra staff working in the searchroom to help conduct these. Comments so far have shown that users are finding these very useful.

 Above and below: staff conducting New User Inductions

Our staff have found the last few days to be a steep learning curve. We are familiarising ourselves with lots of new processes to make sure we can provide advice to all customers. As a joint service building we are also providing advice and services to public and university library users, so we are getting to understand their processes too.

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Above: Lisa issuing her first library card to a customer 

We’ve also had some groups looking around the service for the first time. Here are some students from Birmingham University who were visiting the Archaeology Service:

We hope those of you that have visited us have enjoyed the experience so far. We are confident our service will keep improving over the coming weeks as staff and customers alike become familiar with the new processes.

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