I’m never afraid to try something and have it fail. I’d rather learn from a mistake than learn nothing because I was afraid to make a mistake. I don’t know if that’s a good thing or a bad thing. Certainly, in the four months I’ve been at my job, I’ve learned a great deal (in other words made a lot of mistakes). I came in here with so many ideas about what I wanted to accomplish only to learn that many of them weren’t appropriate when considering the population I was dealing with. My supervisor has been 100% supportive everything I’ve wanted to try, which maybe is the cause of my gusto, but I’m learning to think more before implementing technology solutions.
When I proposed the Web redesign project to the staff, everyone was very supportive. The staff aggreed that they should have a hand in editing content for the areas that they know a lot about. Obviously, it makes very little sense for the newest employee to be in charge of all of the content, especially stuff like circulation and ILL which I don’t deal with at all. After discussing the idea with the Library Director, I created a staff wiki and then spent many hours taking all of the existing content from the Web site and plugging it into the wiki, organized in the new Web page hierarchy I’d developed for the redesign. I then explained to the staff that they could go into the wiki and update and edit the content for the sections. I gave detailed instructions on how to use the wiki and told them that I’d be happy to give any of them a one-on-one explanation. This was almost 2 months ago, and so far one other person has gone into the wiki. No one else has even bothered to look at it, including people who had told me it was a good idea. Yes, wikis are easy to use, but many of the people I work with are averse to new technologies, especially those they don’t absolutely have to learn for their job. I learned something important from this: the tool may be the right one for the job, but if the staff isn’t ready for it, no one will use it.
A couple of months ago I also created a blog. At the library, we had been talking a great deal about how to improve communications between the library, Academic Computing, and the Online Graduate Programs. I had recently given a talk to the administrators of the Online Graduate Program about social software and they were very interested in learning more. The idea of a blog came to me immediately. I thought a blog would be a great way to do that without everyone having to be in the same room. I suggested to the Library Director that I could start a blog where we could share things that are going on at the library and offer information about blogs, wikis, RSS, etc. We could also ask for people from Academic Computing and the Online Graduate Program to take part also and they could share the interesting things they’re working on. I thought it would be a great way to make the three departments feel more like a team (since we’re all supporting the online grad students) and the Library Director agreed. I started the blog, did a few posts about using RSS to keep up and sent out an e-mail to all of the relevant people, letting them know about the blog and asking for people to volunteer to write for it. I got a few “thanks for doing this” comments, but no one volunteered. Looking at my site stats a few weeks later, I found that almost no one had visited the blog. From this, I learned that the group might be tech savvy enough to appreciate the tool, but if they don’t see a need for it, they won’t use it.
I have had some successes though. I’ve helped the Dean of the Online Graduate Program set up a wiki for policy development, and helped another faculty member set one up for similar purposes. I’m helping to advise the Online Graduate Program about blogs, because they want to set one up to share information without e-mail and without having to call a meeting. I have since used the wiki for another project where I developed content with only two other librarians, and that worked out fine. I’ve been working with a faculty member on developing a comprehensive research guide for the Masters in Justice Administration program that includes screencasts to demonstrate each database. Once it’s done, there are several other departments that want me to create something similar. My fellow reference librarians have also shown interest in creating some sort of reference wiki for the reference staff. Each of us has strengths in different areas of research. Rather than running to my colleague every time I have an architecture question or to my supervisor when I have an engineering question, I can find the information I need about library resources in the reference wiki. The librarian who knows a lot about architecture could put her knowledge about architecture resources into the wiki. The librarian who knows a lot about engineering resources could add information about resources that he uses frequently. When a number of students come to the desk with the same assignment, the librarian could enter information about the assignment and what resources they used. That way, the next librarians at the reference desk would have this information at their fingertips. By putting all of this information into the wiki, it’s like having all of your colleagues at the desk with you each time you need to answer a reference question. The difference with these projects is that the people using the tools have a need for the tools and were sufficiently tech-savvy to be inclined to use them.
I’m definitely more cautious now about trying new things. In my excitement to make a difference and in a climate where I was basically given carte blanche, I think I tried to do too much too quickly. Now I know that just because you can doesn’t mean you should. I’m only going to try things where there is a real need (and not one only I see) and where the population is ready for what I’m trying to offer them.
One thing I learned as a psychotherapist was to start from where your client is. Some of my clients were in complete denial about their issues. Others were at a place where they could start to better understand their problems. Still others were already on the road to making changes in their lives. The way I approached each client had to be based on where they were at that moment. If someone is ready to talk the trauma in their life that’s great, but you can’t base your intervention on what worked with another client. Similarly, Library 2.0 is good goal to have, but you really need to start from where your staff and your patrons are. Sometimes it’s not the staff or the administration that are the barriers. Even if your staff is 2.0, your patrons are unlikely to use the “2.0 tools” if they’re not using the tools in their daily lives. I wonder how many patrons actually started using Instant Messaging because IM Reference was offered by their library. There’s no one-size-fits-all approach. It’s great that all these cool things worked at the Ann Arbor District Library or at the Thomas Ford Memorial Library, but not every library has a population like theirs. They patrons in Barre, VT are certainly not the same as the patrons in Chicagoland or Ann Arbor. In addition, there must be a perceived need that can be fulfilled by this technology. I’m just as eager as the next person to do cool things with technology, but I think we all need to take a step back and ask ourselves “where are our patrons at?” “what needs are not being met or could be met better?” “can technology actually fulfill any of these needs?”
As much as I like trying and learning new things, I really don’t want to have any more “brilliant failures.”
[…] An interesting post by Meredith on Information Wants to be Free about implementing the latest and greatest IT solutions. She outlines the failures of some projects – largely because the intended users just weren’t interested in the IT solution. It’s a saluatory warning to all of us who are incipient geeks that just because it’s there, it doesn’t have to be implemented. […]
Meredith,
I think the first step to success is learning to reflect on failures. From this is where true “experience” comes (not one or two years of doing your job). I wish there were more people in the world willing to admit mistakes and make the commitment to do better.
I’m a big proponent of clear business planning before implementing projects. I think institutions really need to think about such things as “who is this service for?” “why would the target group want this?” “are we duplicating something that is already available somewhere else?” “who are we going to tell about this?” “how are we going to tell them?” “what is this going to cost in the short term?” “the long term?” “what are the impacts on other departments?” “are people trained enough to make this project a success?” “are people motivated towards this?” “do we have senior managment support?” and so on. I think if you write the answers to these questions in a document, it gives alot of people an opportunity to give you honest feedback, ask the really tough questions and so on.
Solid business planning does slow down the process of implementing technology. But it’s like anything — if you take the time to make a blueprint, you will prevent bottlenecks, missed details, and other costlies while increasing the probability that the project will be a success. It’s frustrating at times, but worth it in the end.
There seems to be a great difference between what works within an Academic library setting and what works within a Public library setting. Steven Bell has some great ideas about Academic library blogs. I think if you were to get the patrons on your side, the library staff would be forced to keep up.
I would add one more point — once again, depending on the level of knowledge of your population, they may not even realize that there is technology out there that can answer their need. I consider myself fairly tech savvy, but wikis are still new to me, and I don’t yet have a totally clear grasp of how they work. Not an in-the-gut understanding, although the concept is quite clear. But as I start to use Wikipedia more (even thinking of contributing) and look at our internal wiki, I am seeing the shape of what it can do. Maybe what you need more of is publicity. More presentations that demonstrate the possibilities so that others can get excited about the social software you already know about.
[…] I’ve been trying to figure out what it is about Library 2.0 that I’m not comfortable with. And again, it was thinking back to my former career that gave me my lightbulb moment. In my second job as a therapist, I was part of a large-scale grant-funded program which required that we provide therapy based on a particular model. This model was one I was quite fond of and believed would help people to focus on solutions rather than problems, which is important when you only have 10 sessions to work with a family. However, I do not subscribe to the one-size-fits-all approach. Like I said last week, you have to start from where the client is, rather than trying to make your clients fit into a particular model. What works for one person may not work for another, even if s/he is in a similar life situation. Prior to this, I had always taken an eclectic approach to therapy, borrowing from a variety of models to do what worked in that situation. For this job, there was a very specific roadmap I had to follow; a roadmap that didn’t work for all of my clients. […]
Hi Meredith. Thanks for this entry. Very recently, classmates and I completed an assessment for a medical school library on web-based communications tools. (It was an assignment for a course on technology for libraries/library automation ). We evaluated blogs, forums, and wikis, and found great uses for each. It doesn’t really matter though, because we also conducted a small set of student interviews and surveyed the staff and they all pretty much said the same thing: while they think it’s a great idea no one thinks they’ll actually have time to use it. I’ve also noticed that if no one uses it, it’s harder to get others to use it. Catch-22. Anyhow, thanks for supplementing our findings.
Sounds like you are really boring the hell out of everyone there with your great ideas! Eye rolling all around.
Nice one Meredith, I can certainly relate to your experiences. Interesting to note the success you have had in helping smaller teams use wikis. I’m sure that if wikis work for those involved in policy writing, that they would also be able to see where else it could work after a bit of time playing around… also, perhaps there are a few staff (and patrons) you know who are about to go on an extended holiday, or are working on a family tree project… are they blogging their travel photos…?
I think using smaller projects, personalised to your colleagues one to one, that you would slowly build an awareness of 2.0 and prepare people for those big ideas you tried earlier… 1 in every 5 would start to get as excited about it as you and will probably start trying to impliment big ideas as well…
[…] After discussing the idea with the Library Director, I created a staff wiki and then spent many hours taking all of the existing content from the Web site and plugging it into the wiki, organized in the new Web page hierarchy I’d developed for the redesign. I then explained to the staff that they could go into the wiki and update and edit the content for the sections. I gave detailed instructions on how to use the wiki and told them that I’d be happy to give any of them a one-on-one explanation. This was almost 2 months ago, and so far one other person has gone into the wiki. No one else has even bothered to look at it, including people who had told me it was a good idea. Yes, wikis are easy to use, but many of the people I work with are averse to new technologies, especially those they don’t absolutely have to learn for their job. I learned something important from this: the tool may be the right one for the job, but if the staff isn’t ready for it, no one will use it. [Information Wants To Be Free » Blog Archive » Technology Implementation: My Brilliant Failures] […]
[…] 那么?我并不确定。我认为网志流行的一个基础就在于它使得人们可以很简便的将自己的观点放到网上,并与他人分享。如果我们在从事那些不允许自由探究自己的想法,或者在某些情况下,自己的想法和所处机构的学习和共享机制不一致,面对这种情况,这一点将显得尤其困难。我喜欢自己成为一名哲学化的图书馆员,但是我也认为和那些接收你的思想的人进行沟通是非常重要的,了解他们是如何以及为何作出这样那样的反应,以及如何或者为何某一观点能够适用或行不通。我们的读者时刻都在和我们分享他们的希望、梦想、缺点以及雄心壮志,也许现在是时候作出回报了。更多的交互与协作,让沟通的渠道双向畅通,对于我而言,这就是图书馆2.0的真意所在。 […]
[…] I’m trying to sell a reference wiki at my library. After my first failure with wikis at work, I was really hesitant about doing this. In fact, the wiki wasn’t even my idea. Before I went to the effort to create categories and add info, I asked staff members, “are you really going to use this?” and they all said yes. Well, since then nothing has happened. Not a thing. I sent out instructions, I talked to people, and no one has touched the wiki. Sigh. So tomorrow I’m giving a talk through OPAL about Wikis. I’ve told all of the staff about it, and I hope they show up. I was ready to give up on the reference wiki idea, but I think I’m going to try being more persistent and to hope that at some point the staff will decide to buy into the idea. […]
I think that the postive response you received from the Gradulate Program staff was genuine. But although value was perceived, what was not perceived is how it would improve the staff’s way of working in the real world. When a person is used to a set of tools that works well it is hard to introduce a new one. It takes valuable time to learn it and try it out, time that may be better used working through one’s to-do list.
I tried a Wiki to solicit comment about a document I was going to load into student resources. I put up the skeleton, I informed my “community”, and 3 people out of 20 used the wiki. When I emailed the document around (I really did need buy-in) everyone responded.
Long-used tools, like old habits, are ingrained. The way to get a new tool off the ground (as one would a new application) is to launch a project which is (moderately?) important and which requires people to use the new tool enough to see its opportunities.