Apply the fundamental principles of planning, management, marketing, and advocacy.
Introduction
Perhaps it is because of the years I spent as a manager in retail before deciding on a career in information science, but I have found that I have a special fondness for leadership. Obviously managing a corporately-owned store is not the same as managing a library, but the principles of planning, management, marketing, and advocacy are universal and work on many levels, from individual projects to large organizational ones. The challenge of making sure all elements of a plan come together and run smoothly is something that never fails to really excite me, even if it can be hard to appreciate when I am in the middle of a particularly difficult project.
One of the major examples I can think of from my time in retail in employing the principles of planning, management, marketing, and advocacy is the process of hiring new employees to get a store ready for holiday shopping. Planning for the holidays would often begin in the summertime, when we would start analyzing our previous years’ sales numbers and staffing levels in order to estimate what we might need for the upcoming holiday season. Advocacy would inevitably come into play when our requests to hire a certain number of holiday employees was met with some pushback from our corporate higher-ups hoping to save some payroll dollars. We would often have to make our case for hiring additional staff because our shopping center was open much later than others in the area, or there was some special event scheduled that was expected to draw huge numbers of people. Marketing would include putting up a poster in our window or posting an ad on a website to let people know that we were hiring. Management was of course present throughout this process, but was most evident in the activities that took place during the holidays: training, supervising project execution, and monitoring hourly sales and making staffing adjustments based on whether or not we were meeting our sales goals. Though I have not yet had the chance to put my knowledge of these principles to use in a library setting, I feel strongly that my experience with applying them in other situations will be useful when the time comes.
Evidence
Brillat-Savarin Culinary Library Manual
My first piece of evidence is a manual I wrote for a fictional library with a collection and programming focused on cooking. I created a description of the library, its collection, patron base, a number of unique services, and a marketing plan. In addition, I wrote vision, mission, and diversity statements for the library. This project was my first exposure to the principles of planning, management, marketing, and advocacy as they apply to the field of information science and formed the basis for how I viewed applied these principles in future projects.
Action Plan for SLA Student Group Committee
My second piece of evidence is a strategic plan that I wrote for a proposed committee for SJSU’s SLA Student Group. This plan includes the structure for the makeup of the committee, a mission statement, SWOT analysis, and several action plans. This proposed committee would be formed to highlight the accomplishments of the SLA Student Group’s members and create a sense of pride in their work and activities. If my first piece of evidence exposed me to the theories of leadership and management, this piece shows how I put them into practice.
Professional Development
As stated in my introduction, I have not yet had the opportunity to apply my leadership experience within the information science field, but I am confident that I will be able to adapt to any number of situations. I believe that my experience, coupled with the projects I have completed, will be of value when it is time for my library or organization to develop a strategic plan or any of its individual components, determine programming needs, seek out marketing opportunities, or deal with other needs that may arise.