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Jane Dysart posted this in Conferences, Learning on December 22nd, 2009 It’s amazing how fast a year goes by and how much we cram into 365 days. Hope everyone has a great holiday season and a terrific year in 2010! At this time of year, I always look ahead to what’s to come, and 2010 looks like it’s shaping up to be exciting. Here’s a peek –
Ontario Library Association SuperConference, Feb 24-27
Rebecca and I are facilitating a pre-conference workshop on Wed Feb 24 — Leadership Renewal: Conversations, Insights & Revitalization (P004) which includes segments with Cindy Ross Pedersen, Strategic Volunteer & Entrepreneur, Ken Haycock, Director, San Jose State University School of Libary & information Science & Senior Partner, Ken Haycock & Associates Inc. and Gordon Vala-Webb, PricewaterhouseCoopers Canada PLC. This interactive workshop should provide lots of wonderful conversations and insights. Rebecca is speaking about Resolving Conflict – Reaching Consensus (317) on Thurs Feb 25 and Service Lifecycle Management: Pruning Gives Other Services Room to Grow (1228) on Friday Feb 26. We have also put together a session on Thurs Feb 25 called Digital Strategies: Practices & Services (1021) which features Aaron Schmidt, District of Columbia Public Library, Amanda Etches Johnson, McMaster University and Daniel Lee, Navigator Ltd. We hope to see lots of our friends and colleagues in Toronto at SuperConference!
Computers in Libraries, DC, April 12-14
This vibrant conference is filled sessions on topics of interest to all those in the information business. Check out the program and join us for stimulating discussions, lots of learning and networking,
Continue reading Happy Holidays & All the Best in 2010!
Rebecca Jones posted this in Uncategorized on December 16th, 2009 The process of formulating their strategy is one of the most important, challenging and invigorating projects an organization ever undertakes. It is the organization’s opportunity to seriously reflect on the evolving environment surrounding it, and the impact it wants to make in that environment. The environment is full of contradictions, incredible opportunities, and daunting threats. But the organization that carefully considers those contradictions, energetically envisions the future it truly wants for itself, and courageously makes difficult decisions about how to realize that future is a strategically hardy organization, ready, willing and able to succeed today and tomorrow.
Being strategically hardy isn’t easy. It requires some real effort and exercise. I’ve honestly lost count of the number of organizations we’ve worked with on strategic formulation. But each one realized & fully engaged in a process that engaged as many people as possible, & that acknowledged – up front – that not everyone was going to be happy with the strategies selected, but that everyone would buy in to the process by which those strategies were selected. That’s what strategic planning is. We call it strategic planning, but it really is about formulating strategy……it really is about deciding & forming & shaping & scaffolding what the organization is going to do over the coming months & years to make a difference — to make an impact — to be successful for its community, its students, its faculty, its staff, its stakeholders.
The strategic muscles an organization needs to build are its decision-making,
Continue reading Strategically hardy organizations: the Four “D’s”
Rebecca Jones posted this in Uncategorized on December 11th, 2009 I’ve been setting aside a pile of blog posts, particularly on leadership, that I’m now ready to write. There’s so much written on leadership, it’s rather daunting to know what to read, or who to read. We can never go wrong with Drucker or Mintzberg or those published with Harvard (you all know by now what a groupie I am of the Harvard Business Review — is there a support group for us?) In fact, HBR has just put out their “10 most read leadership articles” – if you read nothing else, do check these articles out. Even to scan.
But I always like to ask senior executives what has made a difference for them in their leadership approaches. A friend who has been a senior executive for the past decade, & who has dealt successfully with unbelievably challenging situations (I say successfully because, #1, he’s still employed &, believe me, the organization he works for doesn’t tolerate incompetence, and #2, employees he works with – LEADS – like & respect him. ) He suggested I read “The Inward Journey of Leadership,” in the Journal of Surgical Research, April 2006. After some digging – & paying – I found it. And now, I pass his suggestion on to any of you who are in a leadership position (even if that means you have 1 person looking to you for leadership), or are considering moving into a team leadership, project leadership or functional leadership role.
Written by a surgeon who heads
Continue reading Leaders can only lead others when they can lead themselves
Rebecca Jones posted this in Uncategorized on December 11th, 2009 Too often we associate “leadership” with being in a senior management position, making big decisions & big salaries. Oh, we quote Gandi & Mandela, but in the work context we all too look to the CEO’s of corporations for leadership lessons.
Yet the simple truth is that leaders are those who lead people to make a difference – we hope a positive difference! And the other simple truth is that leaders are able to lead others because they can lead themselves.
Cindy Ross Pederson
Cindy Ross Pederson is a leader who leads herself and others in making a difference – a positive difference. Jane always knows the coolest people; she introduced me to Cindy, whom I met in a coffee shop prior to a client meeting. I was immediately struck by her presence – she conveys presence. Years ago when Mary Corcoran & I interviewed senior executives about the qualities they seek when filling senior positions they cited “presence — an individual has to have presence at senior decision tables & when they walk in the room.” Enter Cindy – with her presence, her ability to communicate clearly, succinctly, & in the language of the listener.
Having built a highly successful technology company Cindy sold it for a profit that allows her to shift her focus to being a “strategic volunteer.” In her former role as entreprenuer CEO Cindy dealt successfully with investors, bankers, employees at all levels, clients, partners & stakeholders. She had a clear focus, & used
Continue reading Leaders making a difference & laughing – yeah, laughing
Jane Dysart posted this in Uncategorized on December 8th, 2009 What a shock — my childhood just rushed through my head when I opened up Google this morning and saw Popeye! My father had been in the Navy so Popeye was a favorite character in our house. And remember Popeye’s cans of spinach for strength? there it is! At any rate, is it wonderful that Google honors various artists with Google doodles. Today, E. C. Segar, the creator of the Popeye character is celebrated. Amazing that he died so long ago but his character lives on, especially in my mind. Makes me think of durability — durability of buildings like I saw in Rome earlier this year, durability of organizations (not so many ar built to last anymore), durability of practices, even if we would like to change them……..
Jane Dysart posted this in Uncategorized on December 5th, 2009 Rebecca and I have been doing a lot of work with clients recently in pIanning their future direction and mapping out their strategies for getting there. I think that’s why the words below from James Kobielus in Forresters blog for Information and knowledge professionals resonated with me. Here’s the first couple of paragraphs Kobielus’ post.
Business is all about placing bets and knowing if the odds are in your favor.
As I noted in my most recent Forrester report, business success depends on your company [or organization] being able to visualize likely futures and take appropriate actions as soon as possible. You must be able to predict future scenarios well enough to prepare plans and deploy resources so that you can seize opportunities, neutralize threats, and mitigate risks.
Clearly, predictive analytics can play a pivotal role in the day-to-day operation of your business. It can help you focus strategy and continually tweak plans based on actual performance and likely future scenarios. And, as I noted in a recent Forrester blog post, the technology can sit at the core of your service-oriented architecture (SOA) strategy as you embed predictive logic deeply into …. business process management platforms …. and operational applications.
Rebecca Jones posted this in Tech & Tools on December 3rd, 2009 Jordan Frank of Traction Software has posted the presentation he & Christine Connors (TriviumRLG LLC) gave at the 2009 Taxonomy Boot Camp, “Ontologies & Tagsonomies: Linked Data, Web 3.0, Tag Mush”. Christine addressed “What do ontologies provide that taxonomies and thesauri lack? What is the big deal about the semantic web? What’s the difference between the semantic web, linked data, and Web 3.0 and what are the technologies that will power this next evolution of the web?” while Jordan explored how driven social tagging can work for or against you and then suggests tagging and search driven entity extraction strategies that can put tagging to productive work.
For those interested in other presentations, the userid and password is tbc2009 at http://www.taxonomybootcamp.com/2009/presentations.shtml
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What’s Impacting Our Future?
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