Leadership Reflections: Leadership Paradoxes

Leadership faces a number of paradoxes that can be challenging and confusing, particularly as individuals take on new leadership roles. Employees want leaders to be decisive but participatory in decision making, focused on big pictures but contribute to detailed discussions, and engage but not micromanage. It is confusing as mixed messages are given to leaders and the opinions of employees vary, creating a situation in which it is difficult for leaders to fully understand employee expectations. Leaders not only need to understand these paradoxes but develop methods to balance employee expectations and communication strategies that help employees appreciate the balancing act that each leader must develop.     

Leadership Reflections: Leadership Skills for Knowledge Management

Knowledge management is a process that infuses knowledge and decision making across an organization. It not only encourages decision making based on data but also fosters communication among personnel for informed practices and processes. The social connections within an organization facilitate the formal structure and encourage personnel to share expertise, insights, and past experiences to inform decision making. Such a highly interactive organization requires leadership that supports and encourages knowledge management practices. A successful knowledge management organization depends on certain leadership characteristics in order to foster interactions that contribute to the processes. A variety of characteristics and patterns will offer leaders understanding on how to lead within a knowledge management library.     

咨询客户的特征及其与咨询机构的关系

信息咨询客户就是指要求信息咨询机构提供信息咨询服务的组织或个人。对信息咨询机构而言，咨询客户群体的存在是咨询产业的价值所在，咨询客户的咨询需求是咨询活动的原动力，咨询客户的社会活动是咨询人员的用武之地，咨询客户的咨询行为是咨询战略的制约因素，咨询客户的满意度是咨询服务的检验尺度，咨询客户的社会反响是咨询政策的制定依据。咨询客户与咨询机构之间的关系主要体现在服务的提供与接受、变革的内因与外因、经济的互利与互惠、工作的协调与协同、人际的交流与理解、发展的同盟与共赢等方面。     

Leadership Reflections: Resiliency in Library Organizations

Similar to individuals, organizations display characteristics that speak to qualities and abilities. Our guest writer, Lisa Bodenheimer, discusses a trait that is critical for library organizations during this period of constant change and transformation. Resiliency is the ability to rebound and flex as circumstances shift enabling an organization to thrive and adjust during difficult times. This skill is typically developed through experiences, but, as Ms. Bodenheimer outlines, organizations are able to strategize in order to build employee and organizational resilience. Such a proactive approach will enable a library organization to better weather challenging situations and times as difficulties will enviably occur. The following article provides practical suggestions for library organizations that will enable them to be more successful while leading and managing in a changing environment.     

Leadership Reflections: Extrovert and Introvert Leaders

Leadership calls for the ability to work well with people, communicate with stakeholders, participate in and lead meetings, and often public speaking. As a leader advances within an organization, expectations increase for the individual to engage with others as leaders spend more time working with colleagues and stakeholders to advance the organization. These expectations tend to favor extroverts in leadership roles but organizations may overlook the strengths of introverts as leaders losing out on the potential for effective management. An understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of personality types will help individuals as well as organizations in developing leadership in order to achieve organizational goals.     

Leadership Reflections: Parent Leadership

Abstract

There are many types of leadership but little known is parent leadership – how parental skills are applied to the workplace. Libraries depend more on soft skills that facilitate work and advance an organization. How individuals work together in an organization is just as critical as the work they accomplish. This depends on the ability of employees to develop and utilize their soft skills complementing their technical skills and expertise. As leaders focus more on behavior, they may tap into their parenting techniques in order to coach, guide, direct, and resolve conflicts. While a leader may not be able to ground an employee or take away their TV watching privileges, they might find themselves resorting to similar techniques in their management.     

Leadership Reflections: It is Not About the Perks

Abstract

Our guest columnist is Karl Bridges who has served in a variety of leadership roles in academic libraries. I have gotten to know Karl over the past few years as he was asked to serve in an interim dean role and then hired into the permanent dean positions. At the time, I was at the University of Wyoming and serving as a leader in sparsely populated state where everyone knows your name. Western leaders have to form a tight bond – there are fewer of us and the distances are great. But regardless of geographical situations, leaders need and depend on peer networks that provide a safe space for frank conversations and sharing ideas that help all libraries achieve their goals. Karl has dealt with changing university leadership, library transformations, and dire budget situations. Well, pretty much what every library leader must face. Despite these challenges, library leaders have an opportunity to make a real difference. Karl draws upon his years of experience to provide a thought piece about library leadership noting the complexity, the importance of leadership, and the real joy of making a difference in someone’s life. I hope you enjoy this raw look at leadership and that it reminds you of the purpose of leadership.     

Leadership Reflections: Organizational Culture

Abstract

Organizations function as small societies with their unique behaviors, patterns, and communication. Organizational culture describes how individuals work within libraries and the patterns, assumptions, values, attitudes, and behavior that help an organization to operate within its environment and achieve, or not achieve, its mission. Effective leaders must understand the operational framework of their libraries in order to be successful in managing or to change the culture in support of strategic goals. Changing the culture of an organization is difficult and a long-term process with a realistic understanding of the current behaviors and a determined vision for how an organization should work. There are some specific strategies that may aid leaders in transforming a library culture into a productive and effective set of behaviors that will contribute to a library’s success.     

Leadership Reflections: Organizational Language

Leadership language communicates more than words. Leaders are able to use the power of language to not only articulate an organizational vision but to create excitement and support around that vision. Library leaders can model organizational values through speech strengthening a written policy into practice. Organizational culture is difficult to change but leaders can counter negative and deceptive messages into productive statements that help employees move forward to understand and embrace library strategic goals. How a leader chooses to use language to articulate a vision, advance organizational values, and to change organizational culture is critical. Ignoring language opportunities will hinder not only leader success but organizational success as well.     

Leadership in Libraries

A summary of recent articles on leadership in library and information science literature.     

现代图书馆的信息管理与信息咨询个性化服务

分析了网络化条件下的现代图书馆信息管理与信息咨询的种种关系,论述了网络化条件下图书馆开展信息咨询个性化服务的内涵及其方法,探讨了图书馆信息服务创新的种种途径与方法.     

Interim Leadership

ABSTRACT

Leadership training tends to focus on development and performance of leadership skills with the implied understanding that the position is permanent or the appointment is formalized. Yet organizations require temporary leaders during leadership gaps but there is limited information on serving in an acting role or for a short period of time. Serving as an interim leader has unique challenges and opportunities but several considerations should be made to make this a positive experience providing smooth transitions for an organization.     

论图书馆参考咨询功能的现代化

在信息化、市场化的环境下，参考咨询有可能成为图书馆主导业务；其形式将从被动地回答读者询问过渡到主动推广甚至推销文献信息资源。图书馆业应当顺应时代潮流，开拓发展，积极推动这场变革，从而提高自身的素质和现代化水平。     

Perceptions of Transformational Leadership in Academic Libraries

ABSTRACT

Transformational leadership is highly correlated with effective organizations and successful change, yet few studies of this leadership style exist in the library literature. This study examined perceptions of transformational traits in academic library leaders. The study asked academic librarians at 4 year institutions to rate their library's leadership using the Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire. While the librarians perceived their library leaders to be more transformational than transactional, the mean score for transformational leadership was middling, as were the scores for each of the transformational components. This could indicate a lack of change readiness in these libraries.     

Fast-Paced,Romantic, Set in Savannah: A Comparison of Results from Readers' Advisory Databases in the Public Library

Readers' advisory databases are used by public librarians to assist patrons in finding books based on the facts of the plot, the factors used to describe the appeal of the book, or read titles similar to another book they have read. Librarians depend on these databases to give a complete view of the titles available given these limiters, and may assume that identical searches in each database would give similar results. This study compares search results from four databases to see the extent of crossover within those results, using fact-based searches, appeal factor searches, and read-alike searches.     

图书馆实行“内部导师制”的可行性分析

内部导师制可以提高馆员群体素质,完善人才储备机制,也可以增强职工归属感,稳定职工队伍。图书馆建立内部导师制应把握好人员组合、帮扶指导和考核评价3个环节。     

Young and in Charge: Early-Career Community College Library Leadership

Although young leaders and entrepreneurs have become prevalent in the business and technology industries, academic libraries remain much more traditional. Library administrator job advertisements often require seven to ten years of library experience in progressively responsible roles as well as supervisory experience. This article shares the experiences of an early-career community college library administrator working with different generations, provides suggestions to become a manager through intentional leadership, and explores how managers learn to lead. Additionally, the author encourages community colleges to consider younger and/or newer librarians that bring a different perspective to addressing the critical issues facing community college libraries today.     

Collaborative Leadership at Ripon College

ABSTRACT

Lane Library's director left in 2002 during a time of financial uncertainty and administrative change at Ripon College. A temporary recommendation to utilize the talents of the remaining librarians to oversee the library until a new administration was in place was accepted by the librarians and the interim administration. After a great deal of research and discussion, the library implemented a permanent rotating chair model based on collaborative leadership to replace the position of Library Director.     

Leadership or Management

Abstract

This paper considers leadership and management issues affecting libraries in general. Specific attention is devoted to academic libraries and their reference departments. It focuses on the dynamics of leadership and management of academic library reference services and what is expected of the reference department head of the 21st century. It explores the changing roles of reference librarians and those of their leaders or department heads. It examines the leadership skills, traits, and competencies and attributes expected of the department head of reference in the new millennium. The paper also examines the paradox of leadership and management and draws distinction between the two terms. It finally looks into whether it is appropriate to have a manager from outside the library profession to be the head of an academic library reference department.