Pre-Kickoff Meeting NotesThis is a featured page

Wednesday, August 11, 2010
At today's pre-kickoff meeting, the SPIT conducted an exercise with the intent of getting all of us "on the same page" and collectively aware of our expectations for the outcomes of this project. We spent some time brainstorming answers to these questions (with answers from the meeting immediately following each question):
1. What is the one thing we must get right to make this project worth undertaking?
  • "finish it!"
  • Establish and prove relevance of the project to staff
  • Generate buy-in from staff
  • Create tangible mechanisms for tracking progress
  • Be realistic about what we can achieve
  • The plan must be relevant to the community - must be truly customer focused
  • We have to have the appropriate resources to carry out what we plan to do
  • Plan has to be flexible, continually evaluated, and branches should have autonomy to achieve system objectives in a way that makes sense on a branch-by-branch basis
  • We have to share our successes with everyone on a regular basis
2. How do you (the SPIT members) define success?
  • Positive customer response
  • Evidence that the plan results in a measurable step up in how the community perceives us
  • Staff should be excited about the plan and they should apply the plan to daily work
  • The plan should be complete and usable
  • The plan allows us to be proactive rather than reactive
  • The public knows what are plan emphasizes through our actions
  • The Library will have an active role in improving the region's literacy rate
3. How does "the Library" define success?
  • Too much focus on statistics; not enough emphasis on qualitative evaluation
  • "Numbers!"
  • "how many, how many, how many..."
  • The size of our budget
  • How many hours we're open
  • If we "make the news"
  • How much we "get out in the community"
  • How much we increase accessibility
  • The number of public computers, programs, etc.
  • The size of our collection budget
  • Percentage of Summer Reading completions
4. What is the role of the strategic plan in achieving success?
  • A good plan itself defines success
  • Allows us to maximize our resources
  • Provides focus
  • Leads to sense of "team"
  • Provides mechanism for accountability
  • Tool for internal and external communication
  • Empowerment device
5. What aspects of the Library's internal culture could put this project at risk to fail?
  • Cynicism
  • Negativity from staff due to the genesis of the strategic plan document
  • Culture of fear
  • Perception that staff can't speak their mind
  • "Territoriality" of services/programs (e.g. "I don't want to give that up.")
  • Perception of exclusion
  • Authoritarian model of leadership
  • Secretive management practices
  • Anti-staff approach to management
  • Lack of trust on the part of staff
  • General feeling of being overworked
  • Original planning process was "demeaning, condescending, stupid".
6. Why did the initial work on the strategic plan come to a halt?
  • It wasn't about the staff
  • It was propaganda
  • It isn't a finished document
  • No sense of staff ownership
  • Perception that the document created a sense of failure among staff (i.e. staff weren't able to meet demands as laid out by administration)
  • "The Reorganization"
  • Sense of organizational uncertainty
  • Lack of resources
  • Managerial inconsistency
7. What are your wildest dreams for the outcome of this project?
  • Staff unity
  • Nobel Peace Prize for the SPIT
  • National recognition (e.g. LJ Starred Library, HAPLR ranking, ALA, Congress :-)
  • Endowments from the community
  • Positive staff attitude toward the project
  • Optimism among staff
  • Meaningful appreciation of staff
  • The best use of our resources
  • Greater appreciation of what we do on the part of the City and the County governments
  • Public support
  • The tools to do what we're asked to do
  • The Library becomes more "politically connected"
  • An enhanced opinion of the value of the Library on the the part of elected officials



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SSJCPL 		Latest page update: made by SSJCPL , Aug 12 2010, 10:51 AM EDT (about this update About This Update SSJCPL Edited by SSJCPL


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