2nd Blog of midwinter - Saturday

Second day of midwinter and I have explored, greeted and done a little bit of tourist stuff. Here is what the rest of my day looked like on Friday.

After the "you are how you communicate" seminar I made my way to the registration booth. A couple of notes about the seminar, I think that it was useful and helpful in terms of learning how I prefer to communicate and how others do it, and how I can do it better. I felt in some ways that the contet really only focused on one idea an never expanded, but over all, the discussion about communication - (or the communication about communication) - was good.

I then made my way to registration and had not received my badge in the mail. It was no problem, a new one was printed and while I was getting registered I mentioned that I was looking for a bar. Just to clarify, what I was looking for was a specific restaurant and bar that was holding a meet and greet for RUSA. I wanted to go and meet some of the people that I would be working with in RUSA because of my new Task Force. Long story short, the person next to me at registration gave me lots of advice on how to find all the lesbian bars in the city. I thanked him, walked away and was very confused.

Then it hit me....It is the new hair! So, I now know that my new cut gives me a very different appearance that has implications. In the mean time, the meet and greet was good and I met the new president of RUSA whom I love!

So I met lots of people and I went to a RUSA meeting where I got some great ideas for my task force. But more on the task force later, for now I will sign off and concentrate on my next blog.

First Blog of Mid-Winter 2009

Welcome to the first blog post of midwinter '09. I am hoping that with increased wireless access I will be able to do many more short posts instead of just a few long posts. Before I get into the conference I'll say that I got in at 8 local time and went to be around 12 local time, or 2 my time. I'm tired today but excited. Denver is so pretty and nice and I'm happy to be here and happy to share some stuff with everyone reading. Just a note about my blogs. I'm going to write about whatever I think of. It hasn't been well thought out and it might be done in the middle of everything else. Bear with it and enjoy, I hope I can share my experience with everone!

I hope you enjoy my picture montoge from the plane. Here I am pointing out the window, contemplating life and musing over the midwest tape invitation.


Today I begin with a Pre-Conference sponsered by LLAMA and is titled You are How you Communicate and is being taught by Alexis H. Sarkisian.

So far I know that Alexis worked in television and that she was at the innaguration. And that she says that she is not bragging. However, I am sure that she will wow me later. I guess I say that because I feel that introductions are important, but I have noticed in my few years of conferencing that some try to impres you with their resume while others give tid-bits for you to relate to them. I am hopeing that I can be the type of person when speaking in front of a group that attemps to relate and not to impress. Then again, maybe that is the wrong perspective.

As we begin to introduce ourselves we have been asked to clarify why we are here. While I could say that I am here because Kathryn Robinson says so, I am really here because I want to learn how to communicate in a group of managers and administrators that have a different communication style. In addition, how does management communicate with staff, how do we all communicate with the public and how to we do it in a way that is productive and enjoyable.

MOre later, for now I'm hoping that I have enough to start conversation, and it not maybe to give you a few things to think about. I am grateful for everyone I work with and an opportunity to learn more and bring ideas back to everyone.

Emerging Leaders and Poster Session

So, I think yesterday went well. I was worried at first and I wasn't sure if I would feel like my group was really connected, but by the end of the day we were on the same page and we worked together well. I think for me, there is something to be said for face to face interaction. I work with people better when I know that I'm making them laugh. It is amazing to me that as I get older humor is more and more important to me.

So I posted a picture of us and a picture of Emily talking to someone about our project.

I was given a certificate and a pin at the end of the day yesterday before the poster session. We all decide that his meant that we have actually Emerged and I suppose this means that I'm a leader now.

So what else did we do all day? Well, we talked about a few topics. 1. Leadership Today, 2. The Dynamics of Collaboration, 3. Understanding Conflict and 4. Ethical Leadership. And I can tell you that I actually found all of these helpful. I'll start from the back to the front. The ethical leadership questions are straight forward, but I think are good questions to ask when making a decision that you are not sure of. I have shared with a few of you before my basic management philosophy, "Don't be a jerk." I think that this gives me a few specific ideas about how to evaluate the inherent "jerkiness" of one decision over another.

The guidelines on understanding conflict were helpful, but even more helpful was the discussion that ensued where other emerging leaders talked about the strategies that they use to resolve conflict where they are.

The Dynamics of collaboration sparked some great ideas and gave me a basic framework to work on a project that I've been thinking about. So useful in fact that I started sketching out ideas in a notebook right then and there. It was very helpful.

The first part however I immediately started writing notes about what it meant to me to hear about some general expectations that people have of their leaders. I thought I would share these with you and you can share your thoughts. Are these really what you expect from Donna and I? From OCLS as a whole? I think that they are fairly on target and in my notes I began to ask myself if I am living up to these expectations and if not, how can I.

The four general expectations are as follows, and some have multiple parts:
Provide: purpose, direction, and meaning
Build: trust
Foster: optimism
Achieve: action and results

I think there are lots of ways in which I have worked on these but I know that I can do more. Your suggestions are welcome! By the way, if you are counting, I believe that I left work with around 18 unread emails in my inbox. Hope this helps, I haven't checked my email at all yet so I haven't messed up the count, nor do I have any idea about it. Today I will be visiting the exhibits to bring home cool free stuff for all of you. Then I will probably attend a presentation on New Service Delivery Models and I will meet my LAMA mentor at noon. Tonight however I think I'm in for some Disney action!