Toolkit Helps Special Librarians Show Their Value
Define your purpose. Develop your unique selling proposition. Measure what you do. Tell a story.
No, these aren’t lessons from All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten, Robert Fulghum’s collection of basic rules for getting along with others (“Share everything. Play fair. Don’t hit people.”). They’re actually recommendations intended to help special librarians and information professionals demonstrate their contribution to the success of their employers.
These and other recommendations were developed by the Advocacy Task Force, which was appointed last year by 2015 SLA President Jill Strand and charged with creating a toolkit to help SLA members make a powerful case for their library or information center. Task force members consulted numerous resources and distilled information from a variety of sources to develop the recommendations, which they are incorporating into articles posted on SLA’s Website. Thus far, the task force has published articles on the following topics:
- Developing Mission and Vision Statements;
- Communicating via Storytelling;
- Working with Disengaged Management; and
- Metrics: The “How, What, and Why’ of What You are Doing.
Additional materials will be created in the coming months. Depending on feedback from SLA members, the task force may also develop recommendations for Webinars, conference sessions, and other educational tools that build on the existing materials.
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