Author: nathanieljrasmussen

Delighting our Patrons: Computers in Libraries 2015

The first Keynote speaker of the conference, Steve Denning, can be credited with striking the tone for the whole conference. An author of several economic/management books, Denning challenged libraries to reinvent their model for management–suggesting that failing to do so as Creative Economy reaches the final phases of its emergence would relegate us to the same fate as Blockbuster, Kodak, and the like. He definitely spoke in broad strokes when it came to libraries, but I think it might be useful to ruminate on what his definitions of the old and new model look like in public libraries today.

The Old Model

  • Core Goal: Produce outputs
  • Role of Management: Control individuals
  • Coordination of Work: Vertical bureaucracy
  • Core Value(s): Efficiency (do more with less)
  • Communication Strategy: Managers tell people what to do

The New Model

  • Core Goal: Delighting customers
  • Role of Management: Support/enable dynamic teams
  • Coordination of Work: Agile/Scrum, and lifelong learning
  • Core Value(s): Continuous improvement/Transparency
  • Communication Strategy: Horizontal storytelling

We certainly are very comfortable with outputs; who hasn’t advocated for library funding by quoting circulation numbers and program attendance. I suspect that, in our heart of hearts, these numbers are not of deep personal importance to librarians. We get that our work transforms lives, and that’s most likely the reason most of us come to work in the morning. But I think our record is mixed in the delighting customers end: while we relish the opportunity to do this with reader’s advisory, going the extra mile on the desk, etc., much of our vocabulary, infrastructure, and even the services we provide value internal expediency over pleasant user-centered design.

Maybe I’m fortunate, but I haven’t had many managers that deeply embraced a strict ‘control the workforce’ methodology. Systemically though, we have problems here too. Performance reviews focus on efficiency and outputs. We give lip service to innovation, but workflows are often structured to avoid it.  Too often, great ideas from front-line staff hide in obscurity while management is busy focusing on outputs and scarcity.

The vertical bureaucracy is alive and well in our institutions. Boards set vision and accompanying strategy, administrators establish practices, staff follow policies and inertia.  Resources are pinched, and the opportunities for staff to truly elevate their game via a culture of lifelong-learning is stunted coming out of the gates.  Similarly, the ability to iterate and adapt is often short-circuited by bureaucratic inertia, disenfranchised staff, and too many sacred cows with not enough supporting data.

I think the work we must do to adapt to the new model most squarely lands in the “core values” department.  Precisely at a time where we feel the most pressure for efficiency, we are tasked with reinventing ourselves into a swiftly iterative, constantly improving, and horizontally transparent organization.  This is the core of our trouble:  how do we find a model that soothes our (typically bureaucratic) funders while simultaneously empowering our staff to recreate our work in this manner?

The communication strategy is a key piece of the “how.”  Our staff must be empowered to have access to deep data so they can effectively communicate our rapidly evolving story to our customers.  Everyone needs to be a data analyst, and everyone a storyteller.  At least our profession typically recruits folks with strengths for each: our task is to make it both, and to create the necessary tools, policies, and culture that systemically supports this endeavor.

 

A Manifesto of sorts

“As much as I want to support our local libraries, I do not have the time to allocate to visiting the library in search of books. Unfortunately, I have found your website so tedious to use that it became easier for me to pay the Amazon price for electronic books than to waste my time trying to use your site any longer. I hope that one day this will not be the case.”
~Recent feedback on schlowlibrary.org

Public Libraries are poised to benefit from a deep existential crisis. Our value is implied, but our worth is in question.

As both defenders and embodiments of democratic ideals, we enjoy a rich reputation for simultaneously representing our patrons’ best interests and meeting their real-word demands for education and entertainment. With the internet scaling to encompass so much of our patrons’ lives, this duality feeds our current struggle for identity.

There is hope. We may never have the resources to provide the kind of consumer services Amazon accomodates their users. What we can do is remind our patrons what we stand for, how that can be interpreted locally through an online planet, and then show them how it is more important than ever. We were never great at warehousing information to begin with; what we must bring to families and individuals throughout the Centre Region is a culture of discovery. Even today, within our walls, our users feed their passions; they connect with their peers; they even contribute to our local knowledge economy. Even today, with online requests, demand for eBooks, and WiFi sessions at all time highs, we must boldly step out of our comfort zone (transactions) to support these new modes of facilitation (transformations). What the end result looks like has yet to be determined: Digital Publishing Platforms? Open Data Stores? Makerspaces? Coworking? Micro-performances? Online community classrooms? We have a lot to explore with our peers in the library world.

Necessarily, IT services will be the fulcrum of this critical transformation. Simply providing stable IT service in a typical office environment is not enough for the same reasons simply checking books out to people is not enough. Serving both our library staff and the general public, we have to embody the difference we want to make in our library and in our community. We have to soothe fear, coax collaboration, and inspire discovery. To do this, we must coordinate several important elements:

  1. We must become masters of our resources. What is essential? What is distraction? Where does efficiency intersect with efficacy? Project management must be well organized. Meetings have to mean something, and every interaction matters. We have to constantly define, assess, analyze, and document both our successes and failures. Communication has to be more transparent, more horizontal, and more effective.
  2. We must empower our users to catch their own fish. With every support ticket, training request, and major project, we need to ask: “What barriers exist between our users and their ability to self-identify, self-educate, and self-resolve their technology needs?” It doesn’t matter if the barrier is poor ergonomics, learning disability, inadequate training, or low self esteem–we have to play our part to remove them.
  3. We have to provide an inclusive and approachable vocabulary for what we do. This means easily understandable presentations of meaningful data. It means creating and curating content that tells our story and broadcasts our vision.  What is trending? What is the counter argument to the trend? When is it appropriate to react, when to lead?
  4. We have to always be looking to learn. We have to be humble. While it can seem luxurious to be the “expert in the room,” we should aspire to slaughter all sacred cows in our pen. Collaboration must be as much give as it is take, and it must have integrity.
  5. We have to cultivate lasting partnerships that are both radical and much bigger than the sum of their parts. We must identify and maintain relationships with leaders in our community, the library IT world, and beyond.

We can do this. We will do this, because we have to.

Knight Foundation News Challenge: One Button Studio

As one of their focus communities, we’ve received generous IT-related grants and support from the Knight Foundation before. Their new paradigm (elevator speech/twitteresque) for applying for grants is taking some getting used-to. We were not awarded this one, but it’s still a great idea we’d like to pursue.

Published: Implementing VuFind: A Public Library Improves Electronic Search Quality and Saves Searcher Time

Published in Public Library Quarterly

co-authored with Maria Burchill

Abstract

Web-scale discovery services (WSDs) are a widespread phenomenon sweeping university libraries across the world. In this article the authors discuss this trend and their experience working on a test server with the open source discovery layer VuFind. Developed by Demian Katz of Villanova University, VuFind’s potential to index not only the library’s catalog but also proprietary databases through the integration of application program interfaces (APIs) offers public libraries the opportunity to develop a seamless website-to-catalog experience, thereby building a true virtual branch for their patrons.

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/01616846.2014.877718

Schlow’s Digital Branch: A Love Story

It’s already 6:30 am, and Mary Beth isn’t quite sure how she’s going to do it.  She is due early on campus for a day-long faculty meeting, and her to-do list at home isn’t getting any shorter.  Today is the first day to sign up for “Paint like an Artist” at Schlow, and her Mom (an artist herself) is driving up from Columbus on Dec 14 to take Jake (2) and Hillary (9) for some bonding time together.  Jeremy has just reminded her that he wants to review Consumer Reports’ dishwasher ratings before he heads to the one-day sale at Sears on his way to work.  The library gremlins are conspiring, it seems, because she’s been waiting FOREVER to be able to download Notorious Nineteen to her iPad, and wouldn’t you know it, she got the email last night telling her it was ready, but will only be available for 3 days.

Realistically, she has just ten minutes to prove once again that she’s Super Mom/Daughter/Wife, and, with luck, get something enjoyable for herself in the process.  Mary Beth pulls out her iPad, and taps on the schlow.org launcher saved to her homescreen.  To her relief, without even scrolling, she sees exactly what she needs to do:

  1. Right at the top of the screen, she’s astonished to see under “On Order–Request Today!” that Evanovich’s Takedown Twenty appears to already be in the library system.  She’ll remember that and come back to it if she has time.
  2. In the library announcements area, is a clear graphic advertising the art program–there is a link to “Register Today!”  She clicks that and enters her Library Card# and PIN.  With a few taps, she chooses December 14, a time slot that will work for her family nap schedule, etc.  She didn’t have to enter her contact info or anything.  It was easy.
  3. Back on the home page, Mary Beth taps on the search bar–maybe the “Research” button on the clean menu bar across the top can help with Consumer Reports, but she’s hoping to save some time.  Glancing at Jeremy slurping his cereal (I wish he would’ve done this last night…),  she keys “dishwasher reviews” into the search box taps “search.”  There’s only a couple of related books in the library collection, but she is delighted to see “Research” results just below that section.  Five relevant articles are listed (with a link to “more”), and one is labeled, “Consumer Reports 2013,” which she taps on. “I’m just going to email this article to your phone.” Using the “Share this search” feature, with 2 taps, the email is on its way.  It was easy.
  4. She glances at her watch. Seven minutes left!  She taps her name under “My account” at the top of the page, and sees all the books they have checked out–one is due tomorrow!  She taps “Renew” before heading over to “My Requests”.  A single list displays the Eric Carle book for Jake that hasn’t come in yet, and there it is: Notorious Nineteen and a “Download Now” button.  She taps it, and her Overdrive app launches and downloads the book!  It was easy.
  5. With five minutes to spare, she knows she has time to get on the list for Takedown Twenty.  Back on her browser, Mary Beth taps “Home,” sees the title, and with 2 more taps, adds her name to the waiting list.  It was easy.
  6. Mary Beth is feeling really good about her Supermom powers right now.  She has a few minutes before having to pile everyone in the car.  She decides today is the day to click the “Donate” button on the site, and use some family funds to show Schlow how important they are to her family.  She pulls out her wallet.  In just 3 minutes, her $50 is on its way.  It was easy.

In 10 short minutes, Mary Beth registered for a program, shared research on a purchase, renewed a book, downloaded an eBook, requested another, and made a donation.  It was easy!