The PLA Blog | Official Blog of the Public Library Association
I’m a Leader, I’m a Follower: Middle Management Theory and Practice
Beverly Lynch (UCLA) moderated this panel discussion of managing up and down. The panelists discussed shared leadership and the fact that top level managers need leaders at all levels of their organizations. It is possible (and desirable) to manage up, down and across the organization. This may mean that you facilitate, coax, and/or cajole. As [...]
Leadership Development in Transition: Steering the Ship from Helm and Deck
This program offered specific, realistic suggestions about how people at all levels of the organization can be leaders in an appropriate, constructive way. Jill Canono, Leadership Consultant at State Library and Archives of Florida, began by stating that shared leadership means shared vision, values, responsibilities, and accountability. It also means asking a lot of questions [...]
ALA 2009 Unconference
Greetings! I’m Anne Heidemann, Children’s, Tween, and Teen Services Department Head for the Canton Public Library in Canton, Michigan. I’ve posted here a few times before. I was lucky enough to be one of the 75 attendees at Friday’s ALA Unconference, which was created as part of ALA President Jim Rettig’s Creating Connections initiatives. As [...]
signage
The Cleveland Heights-University Heights Public Library has an amazing range of very appealing signage, most of which doesn’t look very typical of libraries.
the Heights
Several of us took the opportunity to check out the Cleveland Heights-University Heights Public Library while we were in the area. They’re doing some really innovative things with reference, such as replacing the reference desks with these small stations and replacing lengthy reference shifts with a variety of short shifts spent at these small stations, [...]
Boot Camp Friday
It’s over! This week has been simultaneously very long and quick as a whirlwind. As with most intense experiences, it’s going to take me some time to process. Sandra and June summed up a lot of things for us today: Before you can get started, you need to convince your board and staff that it [...]
Boot Camp Thursday
Whew! It’s Thursday! Hard to believe there’s only one day left. Today was just as informative and useful as the past three days have been. Sandra and June have been stressing many important points, most of which (as they have reminded us more than once) is not rocket science. Many of the things they’re teaching [...]
gorgeousness
The Cleveland Public Library is filled with gorgeous artwork, much of which is functional. A few of us were noting while taking the tour that it is a shame that buildings like this have about zero chance of being created today. The people who planned and built this building were in for the long haul, [...]
boot campers admiring the displays
The Cleveland Public Library has a room filled with these beautifully ornate display cases. One of the topics we’ve discussed during boot camp is that we all need to consider whether things like displays (and puppets and bulletin boards) fit into our service responses. Most libraries spend at least a little (and for some, a [...]
spine labels
I was surprised to learn that the Cleveland Public Library uses the Library of Congress classification system.
