Library Directors and Change (It’s All Good)

This is an important one…one to ponder…

http://scanblog.blogspot.com/2005/04/does-non-dynamic-library-have-future.html

But it’s not just about giving people what they want. Leadership is about creating a vision that you can share with the board, with elected officials and business people, with the library’s clients, and most of all, with the library staff. (One of our side discussions during this meeting was about the importance of not blaming the staff for not being willing to change. If the leaders cannot explain the change and provide a reason for it, the problem lies not with the staff, but with their leaders.)

Thus, the importance of staff buy-in for projects, initiatives and change (with technology or otherwise). Pardon me, but adminstrators must be able to make the case for changes and COMMUNICATE them. We discussed this during the “Reinventing Libraries” workshop. One director told me he wanted to be as open and honest with his staff as possible, would ask them to change with him and would stand up for each and everyone of them and “take the blame” if something didn’t work out. Nice.

Am I a broken record? In our planning meetings, are we asking the right questions? How does it serve our users? How does it improve services? Are we sending the right message to the staff ij the right ways?

Watch blogs like “It’s All Good” — this is good stuff and cannot be ignored.