Key Concepts from the Planning Classroom Session

There were so many great concepts and ideas in the Planning Classroom session with Rebecca that it is hard to pin it down to just one or two. I guess the area that stuck with the most is the concept of Community Stakeholders. It seems apparent but I had not really thought clearly in these terms before. It is essential not only to identify the key stakeholders for the library but to clarify what our relationship is with those stakeholders and look at our alignment with their goals and objectives. We need to think about other organizations in the community and how the library is "competitive" with them and how we can align with them. Thinking in terms of how the Library can plan a future that considers where community stakeholders want the community to be and other community organization visions makes a lot of sense. Nothing is done in isolation and to garner support Community Stakeholders are essential.

The other concept that struck me as important is the idea of outcome measures. While our Library has been moving in the direction of measuring our success this way I think it is more important than I had realized to make this shift. The Library is no longer a "self evident social good" to everyone and showing the positive outcomes of our services is more important than ever. To include the expected outcomes and how they will be measured strikes me as essential to the planning process for any Library.