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August 24, 2006
MAGIC
Dan Farber, who blogs at ZDNet, points to a blog post by Vinnie Mirchandani, in which he sets out five steps used by Chief Information Officers to define and deliver technology development within their enterprises -- using MAGIC as a framework.
As I read the post, I thought the MAGIC framework could apply more broadly to initiatives to improve libraries. And I'm not just referring to technology developments -- there's a lot of work to be done on the presence of libraries in their communities, which to me means customer experience and the physical structure of the library.
Mashups
Marchandani isn't thinking of combining Google maps with something, but he's talking about:
"exploring every nook and cranny of the ... innovation framework - business model changes, channel optimization, product improvement and more. ... CIOs ... want basic building blocks in each area and then have their teams do the mashup." Read the post, there are some great links in there, particularly to the Doblin innovation framework.
The work that Casey Bisson, John Blyberg, Ryan Eby, Andrew Pace, Ed Vielmetti and others (John Blyberg reminds me of Glenn Peterson's initiative EngagedPatrons and David Walker's work) are doing to create building blocks which the rest of us can use to mashup our enterprises is critical to the future of all libraries (and that's why it's really important to pull as many of the innovators together at Library Camps and other venues so we can look for synergies collaboratively.)
There are many other "business model changes" and "product improvement" efforts going on in libraries that don't fit under the technology rubric, but which are at least as important to our futures as technology developments -- customer services initiatives such as home delivery, "in front of the desk" reference and reader advisory; staffing initiatives and workflow improvements, pre-processing of materials -- that we should be gathering around a metaphorical campfire to discuss and extend.
Alpha Technology
I first thought that this was an area where libraries fall down -- since other than open source initiatives from the committed few I haven't seen much use of alpha technology in libraries. But then I realized that RFID, for example, is a technology where some libraries are far ahead of the early adopters in other industries -- Seattle and Macombs Dam have committed more of their business practice to the use of RFID than Walmart, for example. John Blyberg's recent exhortation to risk failure is a good lesson for us, and we should hold ourselves out to at least listen to vendors who want to try out their new ideas somewhere.
Global Inspiration
Certainly we're doing well here. There have been several conferences I'm aware of where there was a conscious effort to look for global examples of library initiatives: Shattering Stereotypes at Seattle Public Library last year, and the invitation-only NY Public Library program sponsored by the Niarchos Foundation this year.
As I write this, Jenny and Michael are in the Netherlands, and goodness knows one only has to follow Stephen Abram around the world to see that there's a lot of information swapping going on.
Aquabrowser, Bibliotecha, Libramation, FKI and MK all have migrated to the US and Canada from Europe. Talis comes to mind as having adopted an aggressive MAGIC stance: see this announcement.
Internet Librarian International, Access 2006. Lots out there, and not having attended something outside the US, I would hope, but not know, that US attendees have themselves set on "receive" not "transmit."
Intensity
Marchandani puts it this way: " Short time frames. Stingy budgets. Constrained based innovation... It is about tactical, but significant, payback projects."
This is where we should all get to work, right now. I blogged about a project we did with limited scope and big payback, and there are many opportunities like that lying around.
We have wanted for a year to upgrade our web site, but instead of a huge makeover (coming but not this year) we've chosen our spots by introducing blogs, for example. But this work flows from a short time frame stingy budget constrained innovation project that resulted in creation of an HTML-formatted electronic newsletter that we completed more than two years ago.
And even though we are moving into a new building in 24 months, a year ago we reconfigured some underused space (more of a hallway than anything) into a teen area that's becoming more and more popular, and teaching us lots of things for the new building -- like DO NOT put a carpet in the new building's teen area.
Note that the lesson we drew from this is NO carpet, not "NO drinks and food."
We're anxious to undertake some more initiatives -- we think we have a good idea for a delivery service -- and just doing those will give us some ideas about next steps. And don't you have some stf.sb.cbi projects you could do that would result in big payoffs?
Collaboration with LoB (Line of Business)
This is such a buzz-word in the business world that it has a meaning of its own, but I interpret it to mean, "bypass the geeks, go right to the salesforce."
In our world, we're using it in two senses. The positive one is, make sure all members of the library staff are involved in and see the benefit of technology initiatives. Michael Stephens has lots of detail here.
But I think the negative sense of this is the "OPAC sucks" movement, which results from the nearly incomplete willingness of ILS vendors to even consider LoB requirements as an element in their planning. And we all agree we have some MAGIC to do here. If only they would bypass the geeks and go right to the "salesforce" (in our LoB world that's every patron-facing staff member) or even bypass the LoB and go right to the geeks. Just go to someone, please!
Posted by Alan Kirk Gray at August 24, 2006 07:47 AM