401 - Management Implications

Sanders, R. (2004) Chapter 13: Conflict resolution. In Australian library supervision and management (2nd ed., pp.127 - 132). Wagga Wagga, NSW: Centre for Information Studies.

The three things I have learnt are:

• Listen carefully. When involved in a conflict it is all too easy to let emotion get in the way and talk without listening. Listening carefully is important in that it allows you to think about the other party's point of view. To negotiate successfully where both people 'win' this is a key aspect.
• Preparation - to resolve conflict it is better to step back and remove yourself from the situation until people are calmer. You then have time to prepare. Think about your points and how to get them across properly as well as think about the other party's point of view. How does it conflict with yours? How is it similar to yours? What possible solutions are there?
• As a mediator of conflict you also need to be prepared. Perhaps the most important thing to realise if you are a mediator is to keep your emotions and own point of view out of the equation. To successfully mediate you need to be impartial, even if you agree with one of the partys more than the other.

Covey, S.R. (1989). The seven habits of highly effective people: Restoring the character ethic, [Pt. 1], pp. 146-164 and [Pt. 2], pp. 165-182.

The three things that I have learnt:

• 'Effective management is putting first things first.' (p148) and carrying it out. Ordering things according to priority, things that are important, will allow you to carry out on a day to day, month to month basis, what needs to be done. You will be doing all of the important things that are not urgent rather than urgent and unimportant things.
• Delegation is key to effective management. To delegate effectively you need to set the correct criteria, obligations and assessment or judgement and you have to trust the person or team delegated the task. To stand over and have input, and needing to be involved in every step of the task is not effective delegating and you might as well have just done the job yourself to begin with.
• Planning - not by day, month or year, but by week. To sit and write a list of the priorities for the week and then delegate particular times and days and hours to these tasks, and having the self discipline to stick to it will see you achieve more of the important things that need to be done. This is the thing that I have learnt most about and will implement into my working life as well as my home life. I have always liked planning and prioritising but still seem to miss some of the important things in my life. I will sit down and write a list of my roles and what is important in them for this week and then delegate what day and time they will be done. I will come back here and report on how this is going every so often to see if there is any improvement.

Gilman, T. (2007). The four habits of highly effective librarians, (Chronicle Careers), The Chronicle of Higher Education, May 23

I found this article fairly straight forward and I have already been thinking about openness and collaboration but found that this article did not really reflect the situation that the library I am studying is in. It is a small library and collaboration occurs more with the teachers in the school than with other libraries. Perhaps this is something to read again as I go more into this course and understand libraries on a larger scale better. I will come back to this article again.