Recommended reading
From PLN
Recommended reading
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Library Leadership Network Peer Panel, April 2008
Edited by Frank Hermes, published April 21, 2008
The topic this month is “Recommended Reading.” We asked our panel to cite books they had read that they would recommend to their peers. We also asked that they specify how these books had affected how they go about their jobs. We think you will find their responses very interesting!
George Needham
Finally, a slow, fat pitch right over the middle of the plate. As a defrocked reference/reader's advisory librarian, I took to this topic like a duck to water! Here's what's on my leadership book shelf right now:
- The Long Tail, by Chris Anderson (Hyperion, 2006). If libraries aren't the original long tail institution, I don't know what is.
- The Courageous Follower, by Ira Chaleff (Berrett-Koehler, 1995). You can't lead until you understand what it means to follow. You can't follow until you understand what it means to lead.
- The Innovator's Dilemma, by Clayton M. Christensen (Harvard Business School, 1997). The book that brought the concept of "disruptive technology" to life, and helped us understand why innovation is not always enough to ensure survival.
- The World Is Flat, by Thomas L. Friedman (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2005). Understanding the real costs and benefits of globalization.
- Our Iceberg Is Melting, by John Kotter and Holger Rathgeber (St. Martin's Press, 2005). A deceptively simple parable about change that rewards multiple re-readings.
- RenGen, by Patricia Martin (Platinum Press, 2007). Why changes in technology and our collective view of the world are leading to a second Renaissance.
- Up the Organization, by Robert Townsend (Knopf, 1970). The first business book I ever read, and still one of the best. One piece of wisdom that has stuck with me for over thirty years: "If you have to have a policy manual, publish The Ten Commandments." Probably not workable for a public institution, but the spirit of the advice is unmistakable! More recent editions include Warren Bennis as a co-author.
Bill Crowe
Two books have been at the side of my reading chair, one as a spur to my preparing for a lecture I delivered at Indiana University recently, and one of a kind I cherish--to keep my brain clearer and me more connected with the world beyond libraries and library issues.
The first is The Future of the Research Library (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1964), by Verner W. Clapp. This book was based on a 1963 lecture that Clapp gave at Illinois. He was a major figure in librarianship from the mid-1940s through the late 1960s, notably at the Library of Congress and then as the founding president of the then Council on Library Resources. This brief text (55 pages, plus appendices) is still worth reading for the spirit Clapp evoked about what research libraries are and should seek to become, but also to be reminded about the fleeting nature of the specific elements of our methods and practices.
Consider his words near the end of the text (page 55):
- If it is within the basic presumption of the general research library--and I believe it is--that the research use of library materials must play an increasingly important role in he conduct of human affairs, it follows that the research library of the future must increasingly find ways to promote and facilitate such use... The democratization of the library--the great achievement on which American librarianship should pride itself--need not result in diluted scholarship, but should result in greatly widened usefulness of these institutions wherein the experience of mankind is recorded... How do we put the research library of the future to greater use?
When was the last time any of us heard a library leader--perhaps beyond the public library community--make this case for the foundational role of libraries in society?
At the same time, we need to read Clapp's words about such things as heartening improvements in microphotography as a possible solution to sharing information more broadly. He sensed that we were on the eve of the great burst of applications of computer technology, but was not sure how soon or how deeply that change would come. This insight reminds us not to be captured by enthusiasm for use of the tools of the day, but always to keep a balance in our thinking about "library fundamentals," with a proper skepticism about "library incidentals" as we contemplate the future, make investments, recruit and develop staff, and share our message with decision-makers in society.
The other book is Rome and Jerusalem (New York: Knopf, 2007), by Martin Goodman. I have not finished reading this long text (more than 550 pages), but have been enthralled by Goodman's words. The critics have praised the book for its scholarship, which is focused on the reasons why the Romans sought to destroy Judaism and Jews, an approach that the Empire took with no other people. There is much here that helps to explain some of the origins of modern antisemitism, but also, as one reviewer noted, much "to understand modern Middle Eastern tangles," even as Goodman--a professor at Oxford--himself avoids making such connections.
My brain needs this kind of stimulation for its own sake, but also to ensure that I stay connected to the larger issues of the day in order to keep life--personal and professional--in some balance as a member of a democratic society. Consider me, then, an old fashioned "reader's advisor," as I urge others to take a look at this book and others like it, lest we become captured by the demands on our time to read waves of technical, managerial, and professional reading.
Jeff Horrell
It is not a new book (2001), but one I recently read is Robert Kegan and Lisa Laskow Lahey's How The Way We Talk Can Change The Way We Work, Seven Languages for Transformation. It is in some ways a practical "How to" book on how one uses language of change and the obstacles associated with it. It helps one think about our patterns or approaches and how they impede rather than help the process of moving things forward. Much of it seems like common sense, but only when you think about ways in which you are not using common sense. I admit I did not do all the "exercises" chapter by chapter, but the narrative provides a lot of thoughtful insights. It's worth reading and reflecting upon.
Jamie LaRue
First, The Happiness Hypothesis: Finding Modern Truth in Ancient Wisdom, by Jonathan Haidt. New York: Basic Book, 2006. In essence, it summarizes the past 50 years of psychological learning; all of those experiments are adding up to genuine knowledge and insight. The book alternates between fascinating (experiments in the late 1950's when psychologists severed the corpus callosum--the thickest bundle of nerves in the body, connecting the left brain with the right--and what happened to those people), the funny (the absolute intractability of the lies we tell ourselves), and the profound (the measurable value of volunteerism in promoting our own well-being). It includes a formula for happiness (Happiness = your Set point for happiness + the Conditions of your life, plus Voluntary activities), and points out that there are three surprising ways to turn around even profound depression: Cognitive Therapy, Meditation and Prozac. This book has lingered long in my imagination.
Second, The fourth turning: an American prophecy--what the cycles of history tell us about America's next rendezvous with destiny, by William Strauss and Neil Howe. New York: Broadway Books, 1997. In essence, the authors posit a regular, generation-driven cycle throughout American history. There are four generational archetypes: prophet, artist, nomad and hero. They are defined by a combination of parenting style and external circumstance. How they move through the stages of life--childhood, rising adult, midlife and senior--result in predictable social moods, or "turnings." I first read their work back before Bill Clinton was elected. Unlike most historians, Strauss and Howe make predictions--most of which have since come true. An exhilarating attempt to make sense of history.
I suppose I should have added gushing remarks about my own book, The New Inquisition: Understanding and Managing Intellectual Freedom Challenges, Westport, Conn: Libraries Unlimited, 2007. But until the movie comes out (I see Johnny Depp in the role of dashing library director), it may not capture the popular interest.
Related articles
- While you wait for that movie to come out, you should read Free speech and community challenges, including LaRue's long response to a challenge letter and some of the reasoning behind it.
