“Strategic [plans lead] the library into the future by encouraging action in the present… by constant examination, modification and deliberation.” (Wayne, 2011; p. 13)

Introduction

Existing in a late-stage capitalist society presents numerous challenges for institutions dedicated to providing broad access to informational materials and services. For LIS organizations, having a mission alone is not enough; thriving in this environment requires a strategic and intentional approach to operations. This involves adopting business-oriented practices such as planning, management, marketing, and advocacy. These tools allow organizations to effectively structure their resources, support their initiatives, and deploy their collections, projects and personnel in efficient and impactful ways.

Planning

Organizational and strategic planning are widely used in information centers to establish sustainable outcomes while responding to ever changing community needs. While there is no single, standardized way strategic plans are formed, one common method involves developing guiding vision and mission statements that are supported by SMART goals, objectives, and actionable plans (Buchanan and Cousins, 2012; Wayne, 2011). 

Strategic planning is typically seen as a cyclical or iterative process. It often begins with environmental scans to assess user needs as well as local to global factors that may influence organizational operations. Common tools include PESTEL Analysis, which looks at the political landscape, economic, social, technological, environmental, and legal factors, and SWOT Analysis, which evaluates an organization’s strengths, weakness, opportunities, and threats (Srivivasa Rao, 2017). After identifying these factors, a plan with the aforementioned goals and objectives can be developed and implemented. Strategic plans tend to run for 2-5 years at a time, during which user feedback and other assessment data are collected and continually incorporated into course corrections; eventually, this data informs the next planning cycle (Wayne, 2011).

Management

Numerous situations in LIS environments require management strategies, including the handling of budgets, personnel, collections, data, and even navigating institutional changes. These responsibilities center on the deployment of resources to effectively achieve organizational goals and encompass responsibilities such as planning, organizing, leading, and controlling materials and staff (Moran, 2018). Although many librarians and archivists may not want to participate in management activities, most will be called to take up this role eventually; even first-time librarians are likely to encounter management tasks, whether supervising student workers or overseeing collections (Moran, 2018; Mackenzie-Ruppel et al, 2018). Understanding an institution’s structure is critical for new professionals, as it directly influences human resource management practices. Traditionally, hierarchical structures have provided LIS organizations with a clear chain of command; however, many academic libraries have shifted to horizontal or flat structures. While these models creates a more collaborative environment, they require extra communication to ensure projects remain on track (Hoffman, 2017).

Marketing

It isn’t enough to have a great collection, qualified approachable staff, and a good location; engaging patrons starts before they even get to the library or archive. This is where marketing comes into play. A solid marketing campaign can increase the number of users, boost visibility, and potentially increase funding (Dempsey, 2019). It involves a range of activities from creation of exhibits, publications, and events to assessment and long-term planning. These initiatives may be called outreach, engagement, or promotion, depending on the institution. According to Hauser (2019), “library marketing consists of those activities and processes that comprise user research, user segmentation, the promotion of library products/services, and the assessment of, reporting on, and refinement of those activities and processes” (p. 3). These efforts help users understand the resources and services that are available to them while encouraging staff to reflect on what actual users needs. This assessment and refinement process creates an iterative loop of planning, where to be effective, library staff must continually strategize, implement, and assess their work. Romaniuk (2018) advocates for a marketing mindset, reaffirming the need to consider marketing throughout the service lifecycle while prioritizing users’ needs.

Advocacy

Libraries know all about the power of a good story. Advocacy is putting that knowledge to work by telling the powerful story of why the library or archive is vital to its patrons. Dempsey (2019) suggests that advocacy efforts are better received when presented by entities outside of the organization; however, in today’s funding environment, it is imperative that “all library staffers [must] understand how to communicate the value they provide to their institutions and greater communities” (p. 45).

Evidence

INFO 284: Digital Curation – Project Proposal Ingestion of Professional Fonds

The first piece of evidence that reflects my understanding of project planning and resource management is a project proposal written for INFO 284 (compD_projectProposal.pdf). In this fictional setting, I was acting as the lead archivist at a Teeny Tiny University who was preparing for a large donation from a prominent scientist alumnus who was retiring. This assessment took into account multiple areas that needed to be addressed before work would be able to begin for this collection including project scope, material types, estimation of funds, staffing requirements, partnerships, possible risks, and setting up a timeline.

By reflecting on the collections needs during the planning phase an archive is able to properly advocate for enough support to see the project through. This paper demonstrates my ability to tackle complex tasks by carefully considering multiple factors that might affect the end project and creating a detailed plan to ensure its successful completion.

INFO 204: Information Professions – Strategic Plan & Presentation

The next piece of evidence that establishes my command of planning is the culminating group project for INFO 204 (compB&D_strategicPlan.pdf & compB&D_planPresentation.mp4). As discussed in competency B, this group project explores the process of creating a strategic plan for the San Jose Public Library (SJPL). As a team of four we worked through an environmental scan, a strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats (SWOT) analysis, revamped the mission and vision statements, and created six action oriented, measurable goals for the public library. From start to finish this project explores the processes that larger organizations undertake in planning for upcoming years. 

To properly analyze factors affecting SJPL we needed to understand the macro environment in which public libraries are currently situated down to the micro environments that make up San Jose as a city. Our research involved looking into yearly budgets; gathering and analyzing data on the city census, catalog offerings, and provided services; as well as understanding the organizational structure between branches and within SJPL itself. 

This project was highly collaborative. My role within the group was team lead; I focused on a democratic leadership, helping guide the group through cooperative decision making processes. Larger decisions were decided by the group, while sections of the research and the production of the final products were broken down into individual tasks. This type of group work reflects how planning is done in larger institutions, as many specialists work together to reflect the different departments needs within the institution. Additionally, as team lead I practiced management skills that ensured team collaboration and helped keep the team on task to complete this multi-deliverable project on time.

In terms of the work I created, I worked with a partner on redeveloping the mission statement (p. 2) and researching the SWOT analysis threats and weaknesses sections, while the writing for that was taken on by a different individual. Individual tasks I took on include writing and researching the paper sections regarding innovative technologies (goal 3, p. 7), library awareness (goal 5, p. 9), putting together the executive summary (p. 3), and designing the visuals for the final products deliverables (paper and video). For simplicity during the presentation we split the speaking up for two people to do. My voice can be herd in the video from 0-2:27 & 9:23-10:20, as I cover the introduction, vision & mission statements, then wrap up the presentation, while a different student read scripts we each created to present the goals we individually worked on.

*If it is easier, watching the video on YouTube will allow you to click on these same timestamps in the description box below the video.

Or if you’d like to just look at the slides for my sections you can view those here.

INFO 220: Visual Resources Curation and Arts Librarianship – Omeka Exhibit

The next piece of evidence that showcases a type of marketing is an Omeka digital exhibit created for INFO 220. “An exhibit provides an engaging and creative connecting point where your content, your organization, and your audience can meet” (Marsh, 2023, p. 1). As such this part of outreach can allow a curator to highlight pieces in their collection that reflect stories of significance to the institution and its audience.

In this digital exhibit I explored mending practices represented in different times and cultures. Themes including the historical importance of “women’s work,” socioeconomic divides and a resurgent interest in this craft are somewhat explored. Continuity and image availability were challenges, as the project guidelines limited the image pool to only include creative commons and public domain images that could be found online. Furthermore, writing for exhibits is much different than academic writing as best practices encourage the use of personal pronouns and short sentences to encapsulate ideas, allowing visitors to predominately focus on the works presented. If they are interested in finding out more, curated reading lists can be provided as was done for this project.

This exhibit tested my skills in creating content for a specific audience by picking out objects to tell a story, then writing snippets that were interesting, concise, and accessible to a breadth of possible viewers (including children). Additionally, by choosing Omeka as a platform, I explored a common outreach tool used by archives and special collections that provide patrons with access to resources digitally.

Social Media & the iSchool Social Media Take Over

The last piece of evidence that showcases mastery of my marketing abilities includes a collection of my favorite social media posts created for the ASIS&T Student Chapter. All of the square posts were posted on multiple social media channels which could have included the ASIS&T Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, X (formally twitter), Discord, and chapter website event posts. Additionally, the tall post was created for inclusion in the monthly newsletter. Most of these visuals represent different events put on by the chapter from fall 2023 to present.

Of note, the 2 YouTube Shorts were originally created as part of the iSchool Social Media Take Over during the ASIS&T Annual Meeting in October 2024. These videos were directed, edited and primarily shot by me; the ASIS&T SC Vice Chair is also featured in the videos and provided script writing and voice over in the “Day 2” video. Both of these videos have accompanying write ups and were posted on the schools Instagram, Facebook, and X (formally twitter).

Social media posts connect students (our primary audience) with our events. The graphics and accompanying write ups, capture the vibe of the event and hopefully captured the students imagination while providing them with most of the information they need to know about the associated event and how to get involved. By adhering to design best practices and taking advantage of motion graphics I’ve established some command of social media marketing and understand that different platforms require different post requirements.

Conclusion

Planning, management, marketing, and advocacy are essential practices that help drive LIS organizations forward by establishing foundations for sustainable progress. As a new professional, I expect to take part in these activities therefore it’s essential to understand why and how the profession uses these tactics. Additionally, I need to be proactive about staying informed about new trends in these areas. Certain journals like Marketing Libraries Journal and Library Management may be good options to keep an eye on while professional organizations may provide continuing education or resources that will be helpful such as the ALA Advocacy Academy (https://www.ala.org/advocacy/advocacy-academy).

References

Buchanan, S. & Cousins, F. (2012). Evaluating the strategic plans for public libraries: An inspection-based approach. Library & Information Science Research, 34(2), 125–130. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lisr.2011.11.004 

Dempsey, K. (2019). An historical overview of marketing in U.S. libraries: From Dana to digital. Marketing Libraries Journal 3(1), 26-49. 

Hauser, E. (2019). Implementing marketing plans in the academic library: Rules, roles, and definitions [White paper]. Choice. https://choice360.org/librarianship/whitepaper

Hoffman, S. (2017). Organization, administration, management, and planning. In T. Gilman (Ed.), Academic librarianship today (pp. 29-46). Rowman & Littlefield. 

Mackenzie-Ruppel, M. L., Haller, B., & Goch, R. (2018). Managing human resources. In S. Hirsh (Ed.), Information services today (2nd ed., pp. 305-321). Rowman & Littlefield.

Marsh, E. (2023.) Creating digital exhibits for cultural institutions: a guide. Routledge https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003301493

Moran, B. B. (2018). The new manager: What you need to know to achieve managerial success in today’s libraries. In K. Haycock & B.E. Sheldon (Eds.), The portable MLIS: Insights from the experts. (2nd ed., pp. 103-118). Libraries Unlimited.

Romaniuk, M. J. (2018). Libraries and marketing: So essential. In K. Haycock & B.E. Sheldon (Eds.), The portable MLIS: Insights from the experts. (2nd ed., pp. 119-136). Libraries Unlimited.

Srinivasa Rao, Y. (2017). C5 model for the consortium management: SWOT analysis. Library Management, 38(4), 248–262. https://doi.org/10.1108/LM-09-2016-0073 

Wayne, R. (2011). The academic library strategic planning puzzle: Putting the pieces together. College & Research Library News, 72(1), 12-15. https://doi.org/10.5860/crln.72.1.8489