We just went to the Minnesota Library Association annual conference, here in St. Cloud. It was great!! Thanks so much to everyone involved in all the work to set up this conference – it was fun and educational for everyone!
As a shameless plug, we gave a presentation about our podcast: Linking Our Libraries, and leadership training. It also was great! We had a good group of people who participated in our discussion – thanks to everyone who was there.
But it was the discussion I had with people outside of this session that made me pause to ponder a little more. Several people said they didn’t need leadership skills, or that their colleagues/staff would not be interested in learning about leadership skills.
I wanted to wave my hands enthusiastically (as is my way), and say “EVERYONE needs more leadership skills! EVERYONE can improve their skills! It DOES NOT MATTER AT ALL what job people have in a library – developing leadership skills will help them to connect to the mission of the library and to deliver better services!”
(Yeah, I get all excited when I talk about libraries!)
But I didn’t do this. I didn’t wave with enthusiasm. I didn’t happily exclaim over the joys of improving skills.
Partly: it wasn’t the right venue. We were having short conversations, and it’s important to listen and to take in what people have to say.
Partly: I don’t want to seem bratty – like I’m insisting on my view of libraries, and how wonderful we can be.
And partly: I’m kind of flabbergasted at the need to say any of this.
So now I’m back in the office (yay!), typing away, and ready to say the good stuff I was thinking about the last few days.
You need good leadership skills.
Your job title may, or may not, have the words manager, director, head, or executive. That’s almost completely irrelevant.
Sure, those people definitely need to spend time honing their leadership skills – it’s a requirement to be good at what they are doing.
But a lot of our members – and most people who work in all types of libraries, everywhere – are not in charge. They don’t have library degrees. They don’t have a ton of experience with the professional culture of libraries.
And all of that is completely okay! We could not care less about any of that.
“Leading From Any Position” is a nearly-clichéd thing to say when you talk about leadership. But it’s absolutely true. You can lead from any position. You can lead being part-time, being untrained in library ethics and skills, being on the lowest level of your library’s organization chart.
Leadership does not (necessarily) mean being in charge and taking your library in new directions. Sometimes it does. But sometimes it means understanding how the strategic plan works because you are part of the team. Sometimes it means understanding the value of vision because you want to be part of improving the library. It means understanding good decision making because you are on the front lines of dealing with your patrons and that requires a lot of quick-but-good decisions to make them happy.
Many of our members are solo library people or working only with a couple of others. It can be lonely. And it means you really need to be a leader, to be sure your library gets the resources and recognition it needs to be successful!
In Seasons Three and Four (that one is going on right now) of Linking Our Libraries, we talk about a new leadership skill each week. This is available to anyone in a library, at no cost. We share ideas and talk with Guest Hosts. You won’t get overwhelmed, because it’s only about 20 minutes long – and we keep it all pretty light and fun!
Leadership is not a mysterious topic. It’s not reserved for only SOME people out there.
It’s for everyone! It’s definitely for you!!
Join us! You know that we would love to have you as part of the learning team!!
You can check out our episode line up for Season Four right here. We will drop a new episode every Thursday, so you can subscribe on your podcast app – or just go to our website and listen there.
Take these skills – and many others – and lead your library in a great direction!!
