by Michael Haynes

As a consultant who works with organisations to improve their performance, I can definitely say that I am in total agreement with the four key components required for future readiness.

Collaboration: It is imperative now that all elements within the value chain (companies, customers, suppliers) work together to deliver the products and services that are being sought after. The ability to effectively develop and deliver sought after offerings is often best achieved through such efforts. As a result, many organisations are starting to do this with their product development. Boeing is an example that quickly comes to mind. Given the added complexity, cost and risk of developing and delivering products and services…this will really need to continue to be the way forward.

Adaptable Skills: Also another imperative that must be met. The way business is being conducted is constantly changing. Hence a much broader and deeper skill set is required in many areas of business. Marketing and Sales are two examples. Both now require a data driven analytical and strategic skill set. The distinctions between various functional areas of business are becoming more and more blurred. Again referring to marketing for instance, today and future marketers need to have solid foundations in marketing, strategy, finance and even IT and statistics. With the heavy emphasis on technology and information (and the increasing sophistication of both) moving forward, continued adaptability and expansion of skills will be critical for both one’s survival and success.

Alignment: Establishing alignment both within organisations as well as among other members of the value/supply chain is critical. Gaining internal alignment is often quite a daunting and challenging task for many large corporations. Senior leaders in the organisation must spearhead and drive this. Unfortunately all too often there is difficulty in gaining alignment to meet common objectives. I suspect this is due to the various internal agendas which exist.

Community: Again given the added complexity that now exists given technology, establishing a community among those with common goals and interests is going to be key to success. They will be able to pull their skills and resources together (ie collaborate) to achieve the desired objectives.  I think a “win win” attitude must be adopted more within the business setting to allow more progress and achievement to occur moving forward.

Michael Haynes is Director of 2Excell Consulting, an international firm that positions B2B organisations to maximise their bottom line performance by empowering them to systematically understand and respond to customer needs. He has over 14 years experience in the areas of customer insights, strategy development and execution working for large corporations in various industries including automotive, financial services and telecommunications in Australia, Brazil and Canada. Michael can be reached at michael@2excell.com

by Aaron Tay

“Always in motion, the future is” — Yoda, Jedi Master

QR codes are 2D barcodes that can be scanned by phones to provide a link between the digital and the physical world. A typical example would be to scan a QR code with your smartphone and be brought immediately to a relevant instructional video. With mobile becoming increasingly common and the possibility of QR code adoption going mainstream, any future ready library or librarian should be prepared to adopt this technology to serve their community.

As such, recently a co-worker asked me whether we should consider going into QR codes given that there is intense interest about QR codes in the library community (I summarized some ideas here). More importantly a recent Mobio report suggests QR codes usage has increased by 1200 percent suggesting that possibly a tipping point is approaching for usage. With powerful companies like Google seemingly throwing their support behind QR codes , it seems to be a good time for libraries to explore them.

How then do we take the following recent piece of news? That Google is ending support for QR codes in Google Places? Does this spell the end for QR codes?

With Google adding NFC (near field communications) to their Android phones and persistent rumors that Apple is doing so for their line of iPhones (but not iPhone 5 it seems), it seems that QR codes could be a short lived piece of technology that is destined to be replaced by the far more efficient and capable built-in NFC scanners built-into future smartphones. Not everyone agrees of course since the number of phones supporting QR codes will always exceed NFC equipped phones in the near term.

So should libraries go ahead and spend time and effort trying to promote QR codes? Or should we adopt a wait and see attitude? In general, dilemmas of this nature aren’t new and are constantly faced by libraries that are “future aware” and aim to be future ready.

One example: Consider the situation a year ago, where it was clear that Facebook would eventually weigh in with location based check-ins which they eventually did with Facebook Places. Being aware of this, libraries were faced with the dilemma, should we support FourSquare knowing that Facebook Places is just around the corner and may perhaps crush the opposition? Or even further back MySpace versus Facebook.

by Aaron Tay

I don’t have any pat answers, whether a library chooses to support cutting edge technologies is a function of their risk appetite, available resources, strategic focus etc.

I would add, however, while the exact implementation of technology may change, the trend itself is often pretty clear. While QR codes may or may not catch on, no one doubts the fundamental idea of creating a quick link between physical objects out in the real word and digital objects will pay off. Similarly, FourSquare may or may not survive (though NYPL seems to be doing great on it) but the idea of adding location based data is definitely sound.

No one can reliably predict the future, but that’s the price of being future ready: you make your bets and see how it turns out. Maybe you might decide to hold off on QR codes, or maybe you might decide to try since it requires no investment of money. Whatever you do keep thinking of how the future might be which will have you well posed to take advantage of any sudden shifts in environment.

Aaron Tay works as an academic librarian at the National University of Singapore. He was named a Library Journal Mover & Shaker for 2011. He blogs at http://musingsaboutlibrarianship.blogspot.com/.

Ann Koopman, Philadelphia Chapter, Multiple Divisions

It’s over thirty years since I entered library school, armed with a fresh BA in the liberal arts, and hoping to go into rare books and archives.  We students thought we were hot stuff, running to the computer center with our shoeboxes full of punch cards that contained PL1 code, or learning to search online services using a phone-cradle modem – skills every “modern” librarian would need!

But we weren’t so much learning specific skills as how to think about professional issues, and how to open our minds to receive and act on new ideas.   For me, that’s the core of being future ready, in any decade and any place.

What are some of the characteristics that allow a person to be flexible, to flow with change and even thrive on it?   What should we all be cultivating in order to shape our own futures?

• Curiosity & willingness to experiment with new ideas and technologies.
  SLA is an especially good source for exposure to new trends and for opportunities to learn new skills.
• Sharing, teamwork, and collaboration.
  Social animals thrive on community and inclusion; we all need the support of our colleagues, both as mentors and mentees.   We also need to integrate ourselves powerfully with our clients, demonstrating our value to the team.   It’s through engagement that we earn validation.
• Solid foundations and respect for the past.
  Knowing who we are and what we believe in provides the confidence needed to build new models.
• Proactivity.
  I love the “pick yourself” post (Dale Stanley, http://futureready365.sla.org/04/06/pick-yourself/).  When we take responsibility for our own continuous learning and for acquiring the new skills needed to cope with a changing professional environment, we position ourselves to embrace and even make new opportunities.  Step up to volunteer yourself for assignments or association tasks that expand your horizons.
• A sense of humor and pleasure in accomplishment.
  If you’re not having fun, what’s the point?  Joseph Campbell’s “follow your bliss” has proven to be a pretty good mantra over the years.

Of course, participation in SLA is one key to professional growth, from CE courses to networking, to leadership development.  It’s where you can find your voice to shape the conversation about issues that are important to you.

Over the years I’ve owned a paper conservation business, worked as a science & engineering librarian, become a medical librarian, morphed into a web content editor, and who knows what the future holds?  It will surely be fascinating.

Ann Koopman is the JEFFLINE Editor for the Academic & Instructional Support & Resources (AISR)  at Thomas Jefferson University.   She is a candidate for Division Cabinet Chair-Elect for the 2012 SLA Board of Directors.

by Sarah Glassmeyer, Kentucky Chapter, Academic & Legal Divisions

Summertime is approaching which means many of us are daydreaming about summer vacation locales.   After a Northwest Indiana winter, I’m craving somewhere warm.  Sunny.  Not snow covered. Maybe I could go to the ocean?  Yes, sitting on a beach with an adult beverage (preferably served in a hollowed out piece of fruit) sounds like just the thing I need.

I have a confession, though:  I’m terrified of going into the ocean.  Like many people in my generation, I saw the movie “Jaws” at an impressionable age and ever since I have been convinced that going into the ocean would equal, if not certain death, then at least the loss of a limb or two.  So I stick to dry land.  Maybe I’ll wade in a little, but no deeper than “still visible feet” depth.

Funny thing about the movie “Jaws”…everyone talks about how scary the shark was, but if you re-watch it, I bet you’ll be surprised to see how little the shark is actually in the movie. As a matter of fact, it doesn’t fully appear until the 81 minute mark (in a 124 minute movie.)  Part of this was due to budgetary constraints on the production, but part of this was for classic Hitchcockian movie suspense reasons.

Alfred Hitchcock knew that the unknown was far more disturbing and scary than the known.  He explained it like this (paraphrasing): Four men are sitting at a table playing poker.  Unbeknownst to the audience, a bomb is placed under a table and it explodes.  That is surprise.   In another scenario, the audience sees that the bomb is under the table but it does not explode.  They don’t know when and if it ever will – and most of the time it doesn’t.  That is suspense.  Surprise is over in fifteen seconds.  Suspense can torture an audience for hours and, as the case with me and the ocean, radically alter one’s worldview.

So what does this have to do with information professionals?

How much do you change your life because you’re afraid of what might happen?  Maybe you don’t speak up in a meeting and share your great idea because you’re not sure if it’s stupid or not.  Or maybe you don’t want to change a procedure in your library because you’re worried that patrons will be upset.   Or maybe you don’t apply for a new job or run for an organizational office or otherwise try something new and different because..something might go wrong.  Who knows what it might be but it’s something!

I think to be future ready we need to stop worrying about the “what ifs” and “somethings.”  We all have our bombs under the table.  Stop waiting and worrying about when or if they’re ever going to go off.  You may be missing out on something great – personally, professionally or organizationally – because of it.

Sarah Glassmeyer is the Faculty Services and Outreach Librarian and an Assistant Professor of Law at Valparaiso University School of Law.  She blogs about the intersection of libraries, law and technology at http://sarahglassmeyer.com.

by Libby Trudell, San Francisco Bay & Silicon Valley Chapters, IT & LM Divisions

At ProQuest and Dialog, we’ve been thinking a lot lately about how to help our customers become future ready. For the last 2 years, we’ve been working to develop a new platform to enable customers meet their strategic goals.  The intuitive, powerful search capabilities were designed through thousands of user contacts to enhance the skills sets  of users ranging from students to professionals.  It has a whole suite of tools to help info pros and end users share their work collaboratively.  It’s what customers have told us they are looking for to meet information needs into  the future.

But another aspect part of future readiness is the ability to work through change.  Moving from a comfortable and known service to something new is a big adjustment for both librarians and users.   Migrating to the new platform will require that all customers  adapt to change, whether they currently use Dialog, DataStar, CSA Illumina, ProQuest Dissertations, or a ProQuest full text content collection.   We invite SLA colleagues to get a feel for what’s  on the horizon for the new ProQuest Dialog™ service and the new ProQuest platform.   We’re getting ready to embark on an exciting journey.

– Libby Trudell, on behalf of the whole ProQuest and Dialog platform development team. Read more and get reacquainted with us at http://www.dialog.com/about/.

Juliane Schneider, Academic & IT Divisions

I’ve been a cataloger/data wrangler for much of my admittedly weird career.  I’ve never worked in a basement (always ground floor), but I speak MARC.  I can tell you that, after hearing the despairing pleas of thousands of dietary voices, MeSH has recently changed the heading “Cookery” to “Cooking.”  “Fleas” are now “Siphonaptera” which is quite the evocative term.

After 15 years of being all tech-servicey in a web startup, insurance library, medical center, religious headquarters, and publisher, cataloging is still about to be dead, our jobs are about to go away any second, and we remain undervalued, even by our fellow librarians.

Ah, Tech Services.  We are the emo band of librarians.

We make resources easily discoverable, available, downloadable and deliverable, and when we do our jobs well, we become invisible.  But–BUT–the LMS-es we deal with are becoming obsolete for our users.  No longer must they wade into separate libraries to use disparate databases; here at Harvard, 70+ libraries are in one catalog. Our fancy new Aquabrowser delivers Googlized results, but I can’t find what I want in there, and I’m the one who cataloged the stuff!

Here is our Opportunity!  We could work with the reference staff to create smaller, savvier, discoverable bits of resources tailored to local users. To do this, good cataloging is crucial to create the crosswalks for the records to go wherever the information needs to be presented, in a way that makes sense to individual users.

As Metadata Librarian what I really do is run around and find interesting things to do/cause trouble. My goal: projects that could involve Tech Services in an ‘embedded’ fashion.  Countway Library is sandwiched between  the Center for the History of Medicine, one of the premier historical medical collections in the world, in the basement and the Center for Biomedical Informatics, on the top floor.  The one thing I desperately want to do is to take the resources from these three places – past, present, and future – and make connections.

Another project, Tech Services as content producers.  This is probably my favorite paper ever:  http://www.ploscompbiol.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1000361.  They took an article on tropical disease, added semantic links to the uBioPortal, and used the raw data from the authors to create geospatial and serological mashups (they call it ‘Data Fusion’ – sexxxay!). This is the kind of thing that Tech Services needs to add to their repertoire. It will make the faculty happy (up that ‘cited’ number with more dynamic publications!), it will make administration happy (our repository is better than their repository) and it will make us happy, because it is visible and makes a connection with people outside Tech Services!

A last project I’m working on is to place QR codes on the ends of stacks that, when scanned, will list the books shelved there.  For once, the user can access a true shelflist of our resources, and instantly know what is on the shelf, and what is remote.  I call that sexxxay, but maybe it is really just geek cataloging.

Juliane Schneider is the Metadata Librarian for Countway Library, Harvard Medical School.  In addition she works with the Center for Biomedical Informatics, the Center for the History of Medicine and Administration on projects from creating a Curriculum Management System to creating an autism ontology.  Currently, she is Chair-Elect of the Academic Division and Secretary of the IT Division.  In the past couple of years, she has a program planner, so she’s looking forward to SLA 2011, where she won’t have to worry about A/V and room setups!  You can connect with her via juliane_schneider@hms.harvard.edu, or on Twitter @JulianeS.

by Lynne McCay, Washington DC Chapter, ENCORE Convener-Elect

Encore! Encore! When I was performing on stage (my “other life” during my earliest years as a librarian), the sound of “Encore!” was thrilling and delicious. With that one little word the audience could express appreciation, joy, enthusiasm, and a plea for “more!” That’s the way I now look at my life in retirement—each day is a joy and an opportunity to do more.

Those who are just starting out in their careers might think of an “encore performance” as being far too distant, when actually we can all treat every day as an “encore.” We all have the opportunity every day to repeat or build on the good work from the day before. Many among us are pursuing librarianship as an “encore” profession and using the skills and talents of “earlier lives” to enrich our roles as information professionals. Some of us are nearing the end of Act 2 (or Act 3!) and beginning to write the script for an “encore performance.” And some of us—like me—are reveling in this unique state in life which appreciates, enjoys, and enthusiastically embraces each day that is new, and fresh, and different—and somehow “more.”

Most of the posts on this blog have been about being “Future Ready” professionally and they have provided useful tips and thoughtful insights. After thoroughly enjoying a most satisfying 40-year career as an information professional, I encourage you to be “Future Ready” personally as well—whatever tomorrow brings. It really is never too late. I will spend tomorrow teaching my 88-year old mother how to use her first computer. She is thrilled with the prospect of learning new ways of connecting with a wider “audience” and all I can say is, “Encore! Bravo! Encore!”

Lynne McCay retired on June 30, 2010 after 40 years of federal service with the Congressional Research Service, Library of Congress.  Lynne is a 30-year member of SLA currently serving on the Finance Committee and the Diversity Leadership Development Program Committee.  She will follow Susan Fifer Canby as convener of the Encore caucus in January 2012.

by Sara Batts, Europe Chapter, Legal, Business & Finance, Leadership & Management Divisions

Career-changing is flexibility in action. It’s being comfortable with the mindset that takes everything you know in one arena, chews it up, spits it out and moves on, adapting your skills and working styles to a new environment. This is my second career and one that, like many, I stumbled across serendipitously. (Saying ‘by accident’ sounds a little harsh, but it’s not far off.) There are a whole host of people’s stories at the Library Routes project and mine’s not unique. What has Future Ready come to mean? For me it’s been about throwing myself in the deep end: connecting with my professional peers via the UK’s BIALL and CLIG and globally via SLA; seeking to learn about new tools, new areas, and new ways of working. We career-changing new entrants bring great attitudes to the Future Ready party. We’re here because we choose to be: this is our profession and of course we’re going to promote our value and our worth. What’s this shy-and-retiring stereotype all about anyway? Whose rules are those to say what is and isn’t an information professional? And we’re not restricted by how things used to be or how we’ve always done things – we want to do what works now, and what will work tomorrow. We have already re-invented ourselves once: in my case from conference organiser to legal specialist; and from non-participant to unit leader – re-evaluating our role is second nature. We’ve been Future Ready since our first day at library school.

Sara Batts is SLA Europe’s president and is also involved a member of several divisions including Legal and LMD. She has been involved with SLA since winning one of SLA Europe’s early career conference awards in 2009 and is one of 2011’s Rising Stars. She’s been Senior Research Librarian in the London office of law firm Reed Smith for three years.

by Donna Slaton, Kentucky & Tennessee Valley Chapters, Solo Librarians Division

Selection is the librarian’s most valuable tool for the future. Selection is not censorship. Librarians of the future should select for value and purpose with clearly defined goals in mind. When the whole world can “Google” anything in print pretty much, what will set libraries apart is the professional arrangement of valuable and useful materials, not the inclusion of vulgar, pornagraphic or trendy material just to say they are not censoring anything. It is time to “control” your stuff and choose wisely, not catalog anything and everything but choose selectively so that libraries are a respected resource not a less than “Google” sized collection of anything and everything.

Selection policies need to be reviewed often in this changing world not to reflect the largest possibilities for gathering in but the most specific scope for the library and its population to be served. Public and academic libraries more than special libraries have continuously grown beyond reason because they have in the last two decades tried to collect everything. But even special libraries that have a more narrow focus have been growing with the attitude that bigger is better to the point where storage and staff expense is not in line with value given to anyone except other librarians.

Weeding is also a necessary tool of selection. Once you have selected it, you have to recognize if it is not in use, or has never been used, you should move it out to provide space for necessary materials. Too many librarians still horde old stuff because they cannot bear to throw away a book. There is simply too much stuff in print for anyone to ever read and too many copies of most of it.

With the advent of OCLC network and Inter Library Loan accessibility, budgets for that continuously grew as well. When I graduated college in the mid 70s, ILL was for serious scholarly research – not for the public, private or special libraries to loan each other at growing mail expenses( which is more than the cost of a paperback), either the second oldest James Patterson novel, or an obscure author that is only held by three libraries, because his second cousin in another state just decided he wanted to read it.

We have promoted libraries as the respository of everything without focusing on needs instead of wants. Libraries cannot out google Google. We do not accept paid advertising. The sooner we realize that and specialize in what we do best as the original search engine the more ready for the future we will be with valuable materials and useful information, not just a room full of stuff.

With sharply focused collections, bibliographies of materials, and links specifically addressing our unique clientele’s needs, special librarians have an opportunity to lead the way in guiding users to the needed materials without gathering all of it ourselves. Future ready is smaller and smarter.

Donna F. Slaton is Librarian II for the Green River Correctional Complex – a medium security prison in Kentucky’s Dept of Corrections. She served 10 years as Associate Director of the Hopkins County-Madisonville Public Library and switched from public to special libraries in 2008, joining SLA in 2009. She writes a weekly column for the Madisonville Messenger newspaper and blogs under LibraryUp and LibraryLadyWrites and is Past President of the Kentucky Storytelling Association. Her web site is www.misspockets3.com.

by James Kane

In 1930, a paper cup salesman for the Lilly Tulip Cup Company walked into a Walgreen’s Drug Store near 43rd St. and Bowen Ave. in Chicago, IL and changed the world.

That’s a pretty dramatic statement, but it’s true. You see, paper cups were big business in the early part of the 20th century. As scientists and public heath officials warned people about the dangers of drinking from unwashed glassware and shared eating utensils, disposable food and beverage products became all the rage. And, of course, where there is a rage, there is a salesman.

One prime target of these paper cup peddlers were drug stores. After prohibition became law in 1919, the introduction of the soda fountain in American drug stores not only filled the social void caused by the closing of bars and speakeasies, but ushered in the dawn of the soft drink. Egg cremes, Black Cows, and Cherry Phosphates became staples of the new American diet, and the glasses they were served in the target of every paper cup salesman in the country.

All except one.

While most cup vendors made the obvious pitch to the drug store owners and soda fountain managers – no more broken glasses, no more dishwashing, no more risk of spreading disease – our salesman had a different take.  When he first walked into the Walgreen’s off 43rd Street, he knew that he couldn’t make a sale using the same tired  arguments that others had made before him. So, instead of trying to sell the products he brought with him that day, he stood in the back of the room and watched.  More importantly, he learned.

It was just before noon when the store began to fill up with day’s lunch crowd.  He watched as the first ten patrons arrived and took up all the seats at the fountain’s counter. And then watched as one by one the people from the streets entered the store, looked around for a vacant seat, and walked out the door, having never bought a thing. It was all that watching that made everything clear.  He knew what Walgreen’s problem was, and it wasn’t paper cups.

The problem Walgreen’s had was the same problem every soda fountain of its day had.  Not enough space. Everyone wanted a seat, but those who got there first didn’t want to leave.  Without the turnover, the stores were losing sales – and lots of them! Our salesman knew by observing one potential customer after another walk out the door without being served that the answer was not cups, it was lids. He explained to the Walgreen’s manager how he would increase the soda fountain’s sales tenfold without adding even one foot of new counter space. Yes, he would provide them with paper cups, but every one of those cups would come with a lid, and the concept of “take out” was born.

This is a story about the power of insight and the importance of stepping back to see what the real problem is.  We all have our bag of goods – the things we try to sell to others every day. We come ready to explain our value and convince the non-believers of our importance, only to be left dumbfounded that they just don’t get it. The tried and true paper cup pitch is “we can SAVE you money.” The insightful one is “we can MAKE you money.”

We all fall into the trap of trying to sell what we have instead of selling what others need. The first requires doing nothing more than what you have always done, the second demands that you step back and understand what the real problem is. Being “future ready” is not only about knowing how to go forward, it’s about knowing when to step back. Knowing how to put yourself in the shoes of others and figuring out what they truly need and want.  What your boss needs.  What your institution and organization needs.  What your client and customer needs.  What your industry needs.  Sometimes you may have the solution in your bag.  Sometimes you will need to order lids.

Insight is not a magical gift we are born with. It is something we develop – by listening, by watching, by learning, and by practicing empathy. It takes some time to get good at it, but the results are definitely worth the effort.  They certainly were for our paper cup salesman. He made the sale to Walgreens, but practicing insight would bring him even  greater rewards. Standing in the back of the room and watching what was really going on gave birth to the take-out business, and forever changed the course of Ray Kroc’s life. Applying what he learned at the Walgreen’s drug store in 1930 would influence his decision to buy a small restaurant in San Bernadino, California 20 years later from brothers Dick and Mac McDonald. The rest, as they say, is history.

Merging the worlds of business, neuroscience, and behavioral psychology, James Kane is one of the leading researchers and consultants in the science of loyalty and the role it plays in human relationships and the communities we form.Kane makes the case that loyalty is a complex human emotion and a fundamental part of our human nature. When an organization or individual demonstrates those loyalty-building behaviors, they can develop relationships that will last a lifetime and result in unwavering and unlimited support.

SLA has retained the services of James Kane for a 12-month pilot program where he will audit and assess one Chapter’s current relationships, consult with and train Chapter leadership, and develop and implement loyalty strategies that will have broad applicability to other SLA units. He is the closing keynote presentation at the SLA Annual Conference in Philadelphia.  For more information see JamesKane.com