MLA Conference 2010: Making it Happen, FAST!

Presenters: Brent Husher & Cindy Thompson, UMKC Miller Nichols Library

This presentation is how to incorporate an idea into your library fast.

Beginnings
-How do you make the decisions
-Sometimes if you don't have the authority, you may still need to take the authority

Authority
-If you don't feel comfortable taking the authority by yourself, get others to help
-Understand the culture you work in
-Write a proposal if others initially say no

Buy In
-Politics is a part of most of our work environments
-Negotiate and try to get buy in from those that would be the most involved/interested before throwing it out to everyone
-Think about everyone who will be affected by your proposal and talk to then first
-If you are not the person in charge, make sure you have buy in from your administrator(s)
-Say "I think this is important for our library, I would love to be involved in this, what do you think." Start a discussion, don't just go straight to asking permission. A dialogue should be started which should then lead to permission in the end.

Keep the Ball Rolling
-Need to have frequent follow-up
-Do not necessarily need to have a lot of meetings, but a lot of communication
-Pull a team together thinking who needs to be on the team
-Keep your group focused
-Set deadlines and follow them
-Keep all stakeholders informed as the process is going on

Stumbling Blocks
-Missed deadlines - having a good leader to keep in top of things, and when forming a team if you know they are good at being on top of things can help keep deadlines
-If only one person has the ability to work on a specific area, yet is busy with other things can delay the project. Try to get progress reports and keep communication going with the person.

Finish Line
-With almost any project, there really isn't a finish line. There will always be something that will need to be updated, follow-up, etc.
-Try to have some sort of finish line so that there is some gratification that this process has been completed.

This was a good presentation, with lots of ideas that I can take and use.

Persuasion, Influence, & Innovative Ideas, CIL2010 session

Persuasion, Influence & Innovative Ideas
Rebecca Jones, Partner Dysart & Jones Associates


How to influence your colleagues and your users

Important to Keep in Mind
-An idea or anything new = change
-People don't like change when it involves them, unless there is something in it for them.
-Group = people brought together to work

Discovery, knowledge, exploring, inspiration - words used in mission/vision statements, yet libraries don't really want ideas to inspire or discover or change.

Why are some naysayers?
-Don't see what's in it for them
-Fear
-"laters" or "laggards"

Influencing is built on:
-competence
-clarity
-relationships

Influencing others starts with ourselves
-Presence is the most important part of influencing
-We have to see ourselves as influencers
-We must be clear on what we want to see happen
-We must learn new approaches

"Influence is one of the highest skills that we have as humans" Rebecca Jones

Consider the broader Context
-"Leadership is a process of social influence through which one person is able to enlist the aid and support of others in the accomplishment of a common task." Chemers

Some Underlying Principles
-One in ten Americans tel the other nine how to vote, where to eat, and what to buy
-Passionate, informed, well-connected, articulate people with broad social networks, to whom others look for advice & recommendations
-"talkers"

Effective influencers tend to be:
-"expert" in a specific domain
-"early adopters" or certainly know how to build relationships with early adopters to move change through
-Opinion leaders
-Knowledgeable about the issues being dealt with
-viewed as trustworthy
-with connections

Influence without authority
-Assumptions/everyone is a potential ally
-Clarity/be clear on your goal or objective
-Diagnosis/Understand the other person's situation
-Currencies/Identify what's important at this point for our & them
-Relationships/Develop & deal with
-Influence/Through give & take

Wooing (The Art of Woo)
-Knowing what you want
-Getting it in front of a few people
-Forming, molding & building a snowball
-Following the network
-One idea, one ally, one email, one conversation, one meeting, one presentation at a time
-use their knowledge & connections to help others

Competence
-Know your strengths & weaknesses
-Work to your strengths
-Keep the organizational perspective
-Critical success factor for credibility & expertise

Relationships
-Get to know people, what they do, & keep in touch - regardless of level
-Build trust; it's incremental & fragile
-Must understand your organization's hidden yet important relationships & where the real power lies

"You cannot antagonize and influence at the same time." J.S. Knox

Our language needs to change to make it more streamlined. Presenter never wants to hear the term "bibliographic instruction" again. No one really knows what that means.

Being Part of the Quotient - To move to the decision-making table:
-Clear direction which can be articulated

Clarity
-Be clear on what you want
-Be clear on what you've got & where your lines will be drawn
-Communicate clearly, in the style of the listener

Influencing Styles
-Involving: "pull" communication style matches others'; building collaboration
-Inquiring: "push" listening carefully to identify others' needs & 'currencies'; to give & take
-Leading: "pull" engaging people to share stories & common grounds
-Proposing - "push" presenting possible solutions or a choice of options; structured & rational

Inquiring
-Based on assumption that people are more motivated by what they'll lose
-Requires a good blend of both expertise & credibility - & trust
-Use images & metaphors, not facts & logic

YES!
Core principles that increase your persuasiveness:
1. Reciprocation
2. Authority
3. Commitment/consistency
4. Scarcity
5. Liking
6. Social proof

***This was another good session with lots of information to process.***