A staff survey conducted by administration at my library two years ago pointed to a general feeling of discontent amongst staff. Working with people can have so many ups and downs. But this seemed bigger and, to my administration’s credit, they acted on these results. The administration formed a Staff Advisory committee, which I was tasked with chairing. I can say that it’s been a crazy two years, but, looking back, I’m recognizing all the wonderful things that we accomplished and the great advocacy that we did on behalf of our wonderful library staff.
The library systerm consists of 5 full-service branches, 1 mobile services department that operates our Bookmobile, and an administrative building. We had a mixed response: some staff members were excited, some cynical, some curious, and others skeptical that anything would actually be accomplished by this proposed solution. However, from amongst our 7 locations, we were able to put together a group of 17 people representing all branches and departments. It was important that we had all departments represented, not just their branches. For a children’s librarian, this was extra important since I know that our youth department often could feel ignored or overlooked.
This isn’t, and wasn’t intended to be, a pseudo union. The point of this committee was to promote understanding and cooperation between the various branches and departments of the library; to promote productive cooperation between staff, management, and administration; to provide a place for a constructive exchange of ideas; to serve as a channel for staff questions, comments, and concerns; and to help create a community amongst staff.
We took these goals and ran with them. From a social aspect, we’ve worked to create more community through hosting 6 staff parties, running a movement challenge, doing a reading challenge, doing two summer challenges, and hosting a family picnic. Our representatives from youth services really shined in those moments, planning fantastic details for the events. From the cooperation side, the administration has used us as a sounding board to get feedback on several things. We’ve also had over a hundred issues, questions, comments, and concerns brought up to us either through our anonymous online form or via one of our representatives. Yes, in some cases we weren’t able to solve something, but we discussed every issue and, if necessary, passed things on to the appropriate parties. All things brought to us were given a voice, and I think that is often the simple thing that most people want, to feel heard. We tease that our earliest win was to make staff “tushies” more comfortable by having the single-ply, septic friendly toilet paper changed out in staff restrooms to a better, still septic friendly, two-ply option. It was a small change but an easy win for us and made a difference to our staff.
The biggest win for me wasn’t tangible or quantifiable though. It was fascinating to watch people who, for the most part, had never interacted before, people who hadn’t worked with other staff members outside their branches or had never crossed the line between youth and adult or circulation and reference, discuss issues. In many cases, a discussion would start with strong feelings stemming from feeling siloed or alone in an issue, and then things would evolve and come around as people piped in with sentiments of solidarity, solutions, alternative viewpoints, etc. “Issues” got alleviated by simply giving them a place to be heard. It was beautiful to see!
I don’t know that we’ve yet assuaged the skepticism. We still have people discontent (doesn’t every workplace?), and not everything can be solved to staff members’ satisfaction (yes, we’d all love to make millions in libraries!). But we’ve started dismantling the siloes, helped make administration more accessible, and given a voice to our staff. We’re still growing, but we’ve had a fantastic start!
This post addresses ALSC competency I.5 Demonstrates respect for diversity and inclusion of cultural values, and continually develops cultural awareness and works to address implicit bias in order to provide inclusive and equitable service to diverse populations.
Samantha Kretschmer is writing this post on behalf of the Public Awareness and Advocacy Committee. She can be reached at skretschmer@geaugalibrary.net