How does sentence diagramming and looking into the future of vital libraries and civic organizations connect? Before you read what Kitty Florey says below from her book Sister Bernadette’s Barking Dog (all about the flooky practice and history of sentence diagramming and how it affects–or not–our lives today) think about this: Writer’s write. Leaders lead. Visionaries envision.
And diagrammers draw diagrams.
Which of these do you aspire to be? Which is active? Diagramming (analyzing or dissecting) a practice or an organization or a job doesn’t create any energy or vitality in it. It simply dissects it. The spirit is in the doing. Innovation is doing. Consulting, studying, dissecting is, well, consulting , studying and dissecting.
Reading Florey’s book reminds me that dissecting takes away the fluid nature–the very spirit–of language, just like peeling apart the layers of a practice to “make it more innovative” stalls out innovation all together. You can’t create a diagram for innovation. The Ren Gen knows this. Real innovators know this. Diagrammers haven’t caught on to this just yet. Are you diagramming your work, your practices too much? If so, consider being the innovation you’re seeking out instead.
“Among the people I’ve talked to about it, the consensus seems to be that learinng diagramming may have helped us to understand the functions of words, to think more logically about language, and maybe event to write more correclty. But it didn’t help us write well.”
Analyzing doesn’t help us innovate. Doing does.
Email Free Friday Update
It’s been about 3 months since we went email free on Fridays in my department. I promised I’d let you know how it goes…and it goes great! What we’re finding is that being email free on just this one day a week is helping most of us be more conscious of how many emails we send during the rest of the week. It also makes me aware of how much information is really necessary and how much is just noise.
Here are 3 quick ways you can turn down the volume on your inbox:
1. Don’t hit the “reply all” button to any email, especially ones that list more than 2 people in the “To” field.
2. Unless your question needs some sort of “documentation,” pick up the phone and call the person.
3. Turn your computer speakers off and minimize your email window so you’re not tempted by the new messages popping up.
Below are some comments from staff in my department on how they feel about Email Free Fridays:
- …it opens up a dialogue we might never have had.
- I really like the e-mail free Fridays. It allows me to catch up and clean up my messages and be prepared for the influx of messages for the upcoming week.
- I think having a day without the constant demand of e-mails that have to be dealt with free us so we can catch up with paperwork, put together reports and… have extra precious time for planning, which is the heart of what we do in our department.
- Please–YES–email free Fridays
Take the plunge–go email free on Fridays! It may sound scary, but you’ll love yourself (and others) for it!
Power & Stumble
Looking for an image to illustrate a post earlier tonight, I came across this image in flickr. It stopped my keystrokes in their trax. OK, what does this say to you?
Who’s got the power?
Plug it into the Web, the Real World, the Virtual, the Smart, the Keyed-in, the Old School, the Ren Gen?
What we stumble upon is sometimes worth A thousand words…
Design, Form, Function, Story
What does the creator of the design savvy $100 laptop have to think about his approach to product creation? “I’m a futurist…in the sense that I integrate new technologies into areas where they haven’t been integrated before,” Yves Behar says in an article in the current issue of Men’s Vogue. This sends shivers up my spine! Isn’t this what the 2.0 Librarian works to support everyday? Another shizz-shivering moment–when I looked up his design studio’s web site and saw that the major tag line (and link to get into the site) is “Design Brings Stories To Life.” The gist of the mission of ImaginOn–one of my own design, and planning projects is –get this–“to bring stories to life.” Shiver with me, folks. Design, form, function, service, awareness, community identity…you name it…it’s all connected. All the cloud colors mix to create the horizon. Design is dreaming in action, in reality. Life and libraries…excellent things! Note to self: Add Yves Behar to contemporary visionary heroes list.
Microtrends & Individual Tastes
Yesterday during the course of an excellent conversation with my colleague Helene, we discussed the idea that likely many of the “core values” of most human beings could be boiled down to a handful of statements that ultimately feed into all missions, goals, you name it. If we (the library, your org, agency) aren’t appealing to those core values or real driving needs of the community we’re often missing the point. One of those core needs is the need to feel “ownership” over things. We want to have our individual tastes, ideas, and products of expression represented in the world we inhabit.
In his book Microtrends: The Small Forces Behind Tomorrow’s Big Changes, Mark Penn discusses the “niching” of our culture. This makes me think of the need for the individual to come out, to be heard or seen. By watching these niche movements we can tap into what’s coming down the pike before it hits us head on. What microtrends are you seeing in the community? Your library? How do we appeal to “the individual” when we’re also serving a larger community. It’s all connected…and quite fascinating (and intense) to look for the weave in it all. But look we must!
Giving Kids Choice, Power & Fun
Yesterday was Webkins Day at the Library! This meant a whole bunch of fun, chat and getting to know a group of kids in a very new way. Matthews Branch Library (Thanks, Trish!) here at PLCMC hosted two back-to-back Webkins Club programs for kids. I went with my colleague Emily to check it out. What a wowee moment! I got far more than I bargained for from these programs. One 4th grader, Samantha, became both my guide and teacher through the world of Webkins. All I had to do was ask her if she’d show me how to do something on the Webkins site. Any question I asked, she was able to answer. “How do you chat with friends?” With a slick click on the cell phone icon she showed me. “You can only do ‘dictionary chat'” she informed me and then continued to show me what that looked like. “Oh, look I got mail from my sister!” With a few swift mouse clicks she had opened her mail and responded. We later played a round of Webkins mini-golf. I played as one of her Webkins pets Taylor the Monkey. “You came in second at 7 points,” she told me politely when we finished. She had 22 points.
One of the things that was so subtly wonderful about these programs is that they were vibrant and cheerful and filled with learning moments–but they practically ran themselves! Trish would say something like “So, who has found out something new about Webkins games?” The hands would fly up and then a kid would continue on to explain her or his new discovery and then the beat would go on. Kids had a chance to make new buddies–both IRL and in the Webkins world as they would exchange Webkins buddy info at the end of the program.
Will Webkins continue to grow? Will this be just another fad that will fade as tastes and technology advance? It doesn’t really matter. Right here, right now we have the opportunity to meet kids (read: our whole community) where they are by reflecting their delights, their fancies–how about even their concerns. It creates connections, makes “our” world and their world collide in meaningful, deeper, and yes, FUN ways. That’s what this Webkins craze and these Webkins Club Days remind me of.
Later after the program when I had chatted with staff at Matthews Branch and was getting ready to leave the library with my equally satisifed colleague Emily, Samantha came running up to me to ask me if I’d share my Webkins info with her so that we could be buddies. Imagine my deflation when I had to tell her I didn’t have a Webkins. But I will soon. And Children’s Departments and Libraries everywhere else, spring for the $15-20 to get one for your staff to play with, explore and make some connections with the Samanthas and Evans and Scotties in your own library worlds. You’ll be glad you did! 
Real Pencils, Revisited
It’s time for an update on the pencil thing! Way back in February when I voiced my first big phat “why?” about golf pencils and their use in public libraries, we’ve had some shift. I ordered personalized pencils–REAL pencils for PLCMC…enough to replace all the golf pencils that float around (and then into the trash cans) the library system.
I’m going to make like a golf pencil and keep this short–sleek black pencils replaced the short stubby ones this summer thoughout the Charlotte region. And we’re hoping they were used and then walked out the door. They are printed with 3 messages:
“Where’s The Point: At Your Public Library”
“Want To Know Something: Go To Your Public Library”
“Reading 20 Minutes A Day Can Change Your Child’s Life”
Please feel free to steal these messages…and pass them around…on real pencils or in any fashion that is handy!
Oh, and this has gone a bit viral since my first rant, but just in case you haven’t seen it, someone else decided to question the short pencil…check out the Short Pencil Saga.
Voting at the Library
One more reason to love public libraries…they can make voting easier. Here’s to counties that allow, and libraries that accept early voting!
Tonight I went to my regular polling station to vote (instead of taking advantage of the fact that I could have voted early in the library building I work in every day!). It wasn’t a bad or long experience (of course, it wasn’t a “major” election), but it was at the end of the work day…in a very uninteresting location, not as convenient sd scattered branches throughout the county–not at the Public Library. And there was the time that it took for looking up my precinct and verification (I moved 2 times in the past year!)l. This doesn’t happen with early voting at the Public Library. It should be easy. It should be convenient. It should feel good.
Meteorologist 2.0
Recently, a familiar and friendly face on the news and weather scene in Charlotte, NC virtually disappeared overnight. After almost 10 years as the chief meteorologist for TV stationWCNC, the local celebrity was abruptly told that her contract was not being renewed. Read the full story here.
That was in July. Just over 2 months later and Terri Bennett has rebounded in a grand way. Because of a no-compete clause in her contract she is barred from joining the news team of any regional TV stations. Weighing her options, she obviously thought fast and acted just as fast. By launching her own web site, www.terribennett.com, she is able to bring the world to her doorstep. This is a true 2.0/ RenGen solution to a problem. In the year that Bennett waits to regroup and sit out the no compete clause, she is able to share her obvious love of all-things-weather, concern for the environment and even gardening. Her web site is layered with her personal passions and allows her to bring her own voice to what she does. What a calling card.
Check out the follow up story that ran in Saturday’s paper. A quick scan of the dozens and dozens of online notes of support not only show Bennett’s obvious popularity, it speaks of the connections and follow-up the community has with what they believe in…and, of course, the point of this post–don’t mess with a smart meteorologist who knows how to use her Web 2.0 skills.
Renaissance Rising
We’re no longer talking about a revolution contends author and researcher Patricia Martin. And she’s found much research and heart-and-head searching to back up her intuitions. It’s a renaissance that is on the rise and it will transform the way we think, work and interact with one another.
The Renaissance Generation is emerging. Martin calls it the RenGen for short. The RenGen is not about a new breed of Flower Children or a temporal artsy movement. It’s about “an emerging strata of enlightened individuals who are hungry for ideas and ways to express them. These ideas include art, culture, social causes and, yes, even business.
The concept of the RenGen is sweeping the nation and grabbing the attention of those interested in what’s going on in the world as well as those that run some of our major cities. Martin believes that the “average Joe” is smarter and “less average” than he’s been given credit for—especially as the RenGen rises.
What does RenGen mean for your organization, library or city? Get smart and find out. The RenGen is ready to co-create with you, to speak their minds and to exchange information and ideas and allow for a new, friendlier, more creative place to live and prosper.
Are you ready for the RenGen?
Find out more by listening to an interview with Patricia Martin that aired today on the brink of Chicago being named a true “RenGen” City.
Yes to Know 