May 2015 Managers Meeting

CE Managers Meeting Notes

May 29, 2015

Compiled by Yolanda Anguiano

CE Update (Michele Gorman):  New Assistant Managers Dominick Spinelli (SMI/YOU) & Vanessa Gempis (FRX/MEY) were introduced.  They both spent their first week training at COL.  Further guidance can be sought from other managers.  Michele encourages that type of organizational culture.

Michele also spoke about the Harwood Public Innovators Lab, a training that Will Mayer and Cylenthia Hoyrd attended this month.  The 3–day program teaches you the tools and skills to strategically move your community forward. It fosters change from within and makes you more aware of how to be more involved in your community. 

Another conference, the Annual Conference on Neighborhood Concerns was attended by Senior Managers Theodora Muokebe, Patrick Atkins, and Pedro Fonseca.  They will be sharing what they learned with us at our next CE Managers meeting.

The new Positive Corrective Action Program that replaces the Positive Performance one came into effect on May 1^st.  Everyone needs to read it.  A link to the guidelines will be sent out.  The Organizational Development team is developing training.  There will also be new training created for HEAR.  They are planning to combine both into a two to three hour session.

This summer all HPL locations will participate in the Volunteer Program.  We are not going to turn away qualified applicants.  Organizational Development wants to use our experienced volunteers to help train the new ones.  We need volunteers to help with the Summer Reading Program.  Michele wants them to do more than shelve books.  She asks that you brainstorm ideas on projects with your staff.

A spreadsheet with the new departments and reorganization of LMS was emailed to everyone.  Please familiarize yourself with the new configuration.

Michele wants everyone to respond to the Customer Experience Survey regarding the progress we’ve made, since she’s been here.  Responses are due by June 3^rd.

Collection HQ Module Training:  (Sally Bates & Chris Hu) Sally & Chris showed us how to do a Grubby Refresh Report in Collection HQ.  It is another tool to move material to where it is needed.  The system identifies grubby materials that need replacing.  You can “shop” other locations for newer copies that aren’t circulating much.  A handout of directions was distributed and will be available on the Training Portal.  Sally suggested running this report before you weed for condition. If you don’t, it will not pull up items that are circulating but in poor condition, and you will lose the ability to easily replace them.  Sally also recommends doing the report on a laptop, so you can take it with you and check items as you go.

            For directions on how to do it, see Sally’s handout.  The default number that signifies a grubby item is 40 circulations.  If your book is still in good condition after the 40 circs, you can also extend the number of checkouts. You should also look at the last circulation date for the copies that other libraries own.  If it has checked out recently at the other library, you may want to let them keep it and choose another copy that has not checked out in a longer period of time.  Use what you know of your customers’ needs to decide what to keep in your collection.

When “shopping” for a copy, please don’t choose an item from CEN.  LMS wants you to do a “grubby” report at least every four months.  Patrick Atkins has been working on a schedule for a monthly rebalancing list.  Overview training on Collection HQ is being developed at COL.

PLA Leadership Academy: (Tomika Price) The PLA Leadership Academy is a week long program focused on developing your skillset for leadership. Monday was a time to “share your truth” and discuss why we were there. Tuesday was about adaptive leadership and seeing our experiences as strengths. It included an improvisation activity. Wednesday was about asset-based community development.  Seeing what your community already has and make better use of it.  Use difficult experiences to grow. PLA leadership model 101, developing leadership projects, and a Fort Sumter Activity were discussed on Thursday, and for Friday we concluded on what to do next to help personal leadership and partnership building.

            Tomika shared important points learned.  Social media should be used to engage the community not just for advertisement. We need to work on relationship building so the library and community organizations don’t have to carry it all, that’s not sustainable. Move the library from charity to investment. Seek out institutes with money that could help influence activities to create partnerships. Connect with the community before presenting library content.

            The “new” normal for public libraries include accepting that change is constant, looking at our successes and providing stories instead of numbers to our community, taking risks and seizing opportunities, working with others within the community, building and leveraging those relationships, and understanding and communicating through the customer’s perspective.

            Tomika’s project for the Academy is mapping Mancuso’s community resources.  It will allow the library to connect individuals to the right resources, technology, and enrichment activities. The focus is to better serve and support community resources and members.  HPL can connect the community to the right resources, connect library staff and resources to organizations creating valuable partnerships, and create a staff resource that allows community resources to be easily transferable.

            Tomika is working to apply this at her location. She wants to be an example and go out to community organization meetings and share what the library has for them and how they can use the library to promote their endeavors.  She is also working on team building activities with her staff.

Branding Liaisons: (Mary Wagoner) Donna Jackson and Mary Wagoner are heading up the branding initiative.  Liz and Mary created a list of branding liaisons that you identified could serve on a series of projects.  Celeste set up the HPL Branding Liaison distribution list. This will improve communication between SPACES and Customer Experience.

In March, liaisons took photos and dimensions of their end caps, as part of standardizing their look.  In April, locations were selected to pilot the new end caps and new tape alternatives were ordered from the list SPACES provided.  This month, the new end caps were ordered and the tape alternatives were distributed to all locations. A request for feedback on those items was sent in an email from Mary.  Those items that prove worthy will become standard supply items.

Upcoming projects include standardizing email signatures. Mary will send a link of a sample email signature.  She will also include one to use in web based email.  Liaisons will also help with card campaign promotion and outreach, monthly event flyer and poster design process, newsletters and electronic promotion.  Working on book displays, creating an image catalog, and helping the declutter initiative are forthcoming liaison projects as well.

HOLDS & Weeding: (Mary Wagoner & Fred Schumacher) Moving forward the new HOLDS printers distribution plan will be rolled out tentatively by July. We are working to see where the print receipt machines should be placed.  There will be training on the HOLDS wrappers before the printers are sent.  A video tutorial is also in the works. 

The HOLDS label for each item will consist of the last four digits of the barcode and the customer’s last name.  You will be able to print your HOLDS labels as you’re scanning your paging lists.  We will also need to retrain our customers on how to retrieve their holds.  It won’t be as easy to pull holds that have expired. One negative is that the spine on the item will not be entirely covered, so it will be easier for customers to “shop” the holds shelf.

As part of a pilot project to lift the moratorium on weeding in a controlled way, Customer Experience, FIDS and Friends have been working closely together.  We are working on implementing the pilot sites’ recommendations.  In Phase III, all locations will be able to weed Juvenile materials in July.  FIDS will pick up Juvenile materials ONLY in August.  No adult materials will be picked up.  Pre-sort of juvenile materials will assist the Friends’ Children’s Book Sale that happens mid-September. 

Please update your box count on the G Drive, under FIDS every Friday by the end of the day, so Belinda can prioritize box pick up.  Contact Collection Development for approval of discards.  Chris Hu will work with you to schedule. Assign volunteers to check Juvenile materials for condition weeding.

In addition to picking up all of the materials from the assigned pilot locations, FIDS has picked up a large number of boxes that were the result of the weeding and tagging project for WAL and has also made great strides in clearing a backlog of discards created prior to the weeding pilot.

                                                                                                     

Julia Ideson Fund: (Liz Sargent) The Julia Ideson Fund was begun by the HPL’s first Director, Julia Ideson.  The Fund helps full and part-time employees going through a financial hardship.  This is a gift and not a loan to be paid back.  The gift can only be granted once in a twelve month period for one employee.  Only the people on the Fund committee know about the requests.  Employees applying for it are not allowed to contact committee members.  If they do, they will be disqualified.  A copy of the handout with the guidelines that was distributed at the meeting will be posted on the intranet in the Forms & Documents Section under the Human Resources tab.

Mileage:  (Laurie Covington) Please submit your mileage requests for May by June 5^th.  Your mileage requests for June 1-15 are due by the 19^th, and the requests for the remainder of June are due July 2^nd.  Send your requests to Celeste Diaz in CE Admin, even if you don’t have your Senior Manager’s signature.  We can take care of that.

TLA Sharing: (Janna Hoglund, Tony Goodwyn, and Rebecca Denham) There is a new blog that Laurie created with staff takeaways from their conference or workshop experiences.  You can find a link to it on our CE blog. It is the third heading labeled “Library Conferences.” Every time a staff member attends a conference, that blog will be the place where you can share what was learned with other staff members. 

            Janna attended a session on weeding where she learned that “weeding is not a crime.”  Weeding helps the location gain appeal with clean orderly shelves.  Circulation improves, space is cleared for new items and you can spotlight a fresh product.  The presentation also covered the CREW method we use.  Guidelines include reviewing collection development policy, establish a schedule for weeding and remove duplicates or discards.

            Tony attended a presentation on crisis communication following an incident at the library.  The important points are to explain what happened, that it will not happen again, and express empathy for the victim(s) or people affected.  Common tips are to listen and take responsibility. Develop a message and think positive. Deliver the message with a correct conception.  Be proactive and be the most credible source of information. Have empathy and care about the incident. Use nonverbal tools and provide a plan for the future. Talk about recovery.

            Rebecca shared the Spirit of Texas Reading Program.  It is a reading program from TLA’s Young Adult Roundtable Committee, of who Rebecca belongs. Texas authors who cover middle school and high school narratives are spotlighted.  The program encourages youth, grade 6-12 to explore a variety of current quality books from Texas authors and illustrators by providing ready-made programming based on their work.  Rebecca passed out a flyer with the names of this year’s participants.  The authors are also willing to do virtual visits or paid visits.  You can find book display ideas, annotated bibliographies, resource lists and more information at the YART TLA website.

            Michele also shared a session she attended about 50 emerging technologies.  She particularly liked the drinkable book where paper is used to purify water, cyclist gloves with directional signals, and the Be MY Eyes app.  It is an app where you can log on and read something for someone who is visually impaired.

Quality Management System:  (Laurie Covington) Please talk to your staff and ask them to get involved with developing best practices for different library procedures.  This takes a detail oriented person that wants to move forward and is frustrated with the inconsistency among procedures.  Four to five people will write each procedure.  Michele wants all front-line positions to be reflected in the writing.  If you have interested staff, email Laurie.  Please include the staff member’s Gmail account in order to facilitate virtual meetings.  Michele wants to get staff involved to create the change so they don’t perceive themselves as being dictated to. 

Announcements: Shammi announced an opportunity for staff to volunteer to help at an outreach on World Refugee Day on Saturday, June 13^th at the University of St. Thomas from 1PM-4PM.  Staffs need supervisor approval.  Volunteers will mostly be working in the Kids Zone.  They expect over 2,000 people attending. Those interested can call (x31511) or email Shammi, shammi.gill@houstontx.gov.

Applications for the Friends Scholarship are still being taken.  If you have a staff member interested, contact Mary.  She can help them fill out the application.

We are revising the monthly Facility Checklist.  Look for an updated one to launch in July.  If you have any specific ideas about the revision, please let Laurie know.

There have been two different emails sent out regarding coding staffs’ time in Kronos for the flooding/natural disaster.  The difference is in the part-timers’ time.  Liz is actively looking for clarification.

Two points, if Tuesday was a regularly scheduled day off or vacation day for the employee, you don’t code in the disaster time.  Also, if wellness was scheduled but couldn’t be completed due to the weather, you can remove that time and replace it with the disaster one.

In attendance: Billy Glasco, LeRoy Robinson, Djuina Hammett, Rebecca Denham, Jennifer Myers, Christy Chang, Sara Pope, Maggie Sepulveda, Kathrine Myers, Brandon Pope, Tula Gorden, Marcos Martinez, Melissa Hayes, Chris Arrowood, Leonore, Hu, Tomika Price, Jayla Parks, Kelly Patton, Donnie Byrd, Angela Barratt, Shirley Singletary, Mercedes Mayne, Virginia Williams, Erika Cardoso, Melissa Gwinn, Janna Hoglund, Patricia Ogea, Felicia Brisco, Michelle Perry, Jennifer Sessa, Jose Santoyo, Lauren Battenfield, Laney McAdow, John Merullo, Edgar Fuentes, Alma Avina, Paty Bustamante, Michelle King, Craig Bertuglia, Diane Doyen, Karen Luik, Tony Goodwyn, Maria Powers, Tara Hornbeak, Nathan Stokes, Vanessa Gempis, Dominick Spinelli, Beatriz DeAngulo, Fred Schumacher, Sylvia Espinosa, Hellena Stokes; Guest: Sarah Bates & Chris Hu; CE Admin: Liz Sargent, Shammi Gill, Laurie Covington, Mary Wagoner, Theodora Muokebe, Patrick Atkins, Pedro Fonseca, Celeste Diaz, and Yolanda Anguiano

Next CE Managers meeting is on June 19^th, 8:30AM-12PM at Heights Library.