Leaving Douglas County Libraries

This week I announced to my board and staff that I'm leaving Douglas County Libraries.

Two years ago, I tried to see if I could give a professional talk, for pay, once every other month. Done. The next year, I did two a month. This year, I've almost hit (a few times over the year) one a week. And boy, it's fun. (It did eat up some of the vacation time I've built up over 23 years.) I've been to Moscow, Pittsburgh, Anchorage, Boston, Miami, Sydney. I learn a lot, it pays well, I meet fascinating people, and I have a chance to deeply explore new issues. In Douglas County, I helped one library district achieve excellence. What I'd really like to do next is help move MANY libraries in that direction. I got into this profession for love, and I'm still in love. This is the best time ever to be a librarian.

So the first thing: I'm around for another 90 days, leaving around mid-January. There's nothing abrupt about it. It's a thoughtful transition. But I am moving on.

The second thing: I leave an organization that is vital, alive, well-funded, with money in the bank, with a brilliant, astute and forward-thinking board, with a staff that is innovative, conscientious and staggeringly accomplished, with a community that is one of the most engaged, active, and supportive in the world, and in an area that is one of the most jaw-droppingly gorgeous in the universe.

If you think you have the right mix of skills to be the NEXT director, I strongly encourage you to look here: http://douglascountylibraries.org/AboutUs/Jobs. It will be a while before you see the job listing, but not TOO long. The board wants to move quickly.

The third thing: very soon, I'll be moving full time to writer, speaker, facilitator, workshop leader, consultant. A lot of what I do is immediately applicable to libraries. But much of what I've learned is applicable to a much larger world. My particular interests: leadership training and development (especially for those emerging Millennial generation hires), the management of hiring processes for executives, strategic planning, and - this is key - consultation for the institutions (of ANY size) who are about to do something big.

I would also add something else: I would like to help public institutions learn how to tell their story. Public relations staff, public information officers, hear me: we have watched the public sector pulled apart for so long. Can we not learn how to tell short, powerful tales that reframe our value, that reclaim our great significance in the public square? [Yes. Call me.]

I open my dance card to the world.

Uncle Bobby's Wedding

Recently, a library patron challenged (urged a reconsideration of the ownership or placement of) a book called "Uncle Bobby's Wedding." Honestly, I hadn't even heard of it until that complaint. But I did read the book, and responded to the patron, who challenged the item through email and requested that I respond online (not via snail-mail) about her concerns. I suspect the book will get a lot of challenges in 2008-2009. So I offer my response, purging the patron's name, for other librarians. Uncle Bobby's wedding June 27, 2008 Dear Ms. Patron: Thank you for working with my assistant to allow me to fit your concerns about “Uncle Bobby's Wedding,” by Sarah S. Brannen, into our “reconsideration” process. I have been assured that you have received and viewed our relevant policies: the Library Bill of Rights, the Freedom to Read, Free Access to Libraries for Minors, the Freedom to View, and our Reconsideration Policy. The intent of providing all tha...

Installing Linux on a 2011 Macbook Pro

I had two MacBook Pros, both 13" models from late 2011. One had 4 gigs of RAM, and the other 8. Both of them were intolerably slow. In the first case, I wound up installing CleanMyMac , which did arcane things to various files, and put up alerts to warn me about disappearing memory. But it made the machine useable again, albeit not exactly speedy. I changed some habits: Safari as browser rather than Firefox or Chrome. I tried to keep tabs down to four or five. The second Mac had bigger problems. Its charger was shot, but even with that replaced, the battery tapped out at 75%. More importantly, the whole disk had been wiped, which meant that it wouldn't boot. Recently, I had downloaded a couple of Linux distributions ("distros") on USB drives. Elementary OS 5.1 (Hera) was reputed to be a lightweight, beautiful distro that shared some aesthetics with the Mac OS. So I thought I'd give it a try. Ahead of time, I tried to read up on how difficult it might be to...

The First Year: 5 strategies for success

[The First Year: 5 Strategies for Success, 1 of 8] Over the past several years, I've had the pleasure of coaching several new public library directors. For a variety of reasons, many directors are stepping into the role for the first time. Often, particularly in smaller or more rural libraries, they haven't even had a lot of supervisory experience. I tell new directors that the two big advantages of confidential access to someone who has walked in your shoes is that (a) you can ask the questions you might feel embarrassed to ask your board or staff, and (b) you have the advantage of someone else's mistakes. To be clear, everybody makes mistakes. It may be the most powerful learning tool we have. But I've thought about my mistakes, and I can help you identify the old ones, and with luck, make new ones. There's no good reason to make the same ones! I believe that there are five key constituencies the public library director must satisfy: your boss (usual...

James LaRue - myliblog

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