Creativity For Library Career Advancement

"Creativity is just connecting things," observed Steve Jobs. In today's diverse, ever-changing job market, creativity is more necessary than ever. In a profession offering a broad range of job opportunities, librarians are surrounded by myriad connections to be made. They are trained to recognize them. This collection of new essays covers a wide spectrum of methods for cultivating creativity. Topics include learning through role-playing games, libraries as publishers, setting up and using makerspaces, developing in-house support for early-career staff, creating travelling exhibits, creative problem solving, and organizing no-cost conferences.

"Creativity is just connecting things," observed Steve Jobs. In today's diverse, ever-changing job market, creativity is more necessary than ever. In a profession offering a broad range of job opportunities, librarians are surrounded by myriad connections to be made. They are trained to recognize them. This collection of new essays covers a wide spectrum of methods for cultivating creativity. Topics include learning through role-playing games, libraries as publishers, setting up and using makerspaces, developing in-house support for early-career staff, creating travelling exhibits, creative problem solving, and organizing no-cost conferences.

This book shows academic and public libraries the many benefits of nurturing a culture of creativity, offering hands-on guidance on encouraging cross-disciplinary collaboration, launching active-learning events that highlight collections and services, fostering goodwill and trust-building, and forming partnerships that promote library visibility.

By building on existing elements at your library and filling in the gaps with community-driven additions, your library can be a space that cultivates creativity in both its users and staff.

Development of Creative Spaces in Academic Libraries: A Decision Maker's Guide includes innovative ways libraries are engaging students, including the practice of setting aside high-tech spaces for creativity. Five models of library creative spaces are explored in this book, including digital media labs, digital humanities labs, makerspaces, data visualization labs and knowledge markets. The book explores creative spaces currently offered in libraries, with a focus on academic libraries. It gives real-world advice for the process of crafting a new space in the library, including tactics on how to find campus partners, conduct a needs analysis, and answer important questions. Case studies of innovators of library creativity further highlight the successes—and pitfalls—of embarking on the process of developing a new service or space in the library. Shows administrators what other institutions are doing to enable media literacy Helps university library administrators determine their best course of action Provides detailed, unique case studies on up to 10 leading institutions, along with the service models they are providing

Learn how you can use creativity, innovation, and entrepreneurship as powerful forces for positive and productive change benefiting staff and users. Given the pressures of automation, budget issues, and staff development concerns, creative thinking in the library profession is a necessity, not a luxury. For the first time in a single volume, librarians share specific, practical ways in which managers can release creativity in themselves and their staffs, in order to find solutions to new problems, as well as new ways to address old challenges. The contributors to Creativity, Innovation, and Entrepreneurship also describe how they used creative thinking to develop a very successful fund raising plan, significantly reduce the risks of developing new services in library networks, take part in effective communication between library educators and practitioners to ensure that library science students are better prepared for the field, and much more.

The hallmark of an exceptional career is the ability to devise innovative solutions for work challenges. Therefore, creative thinking skills are vital for your professional advancement. Recent research has revealed a direct causality between ideas and profitability, which means that in today’s competitive and technology-rich work environment, the most crucial element separating an extraordinary career from an ordinary one is creative thinking skills. As one of the world's premiere success experts, Brian Tracy knows anyone can become more creative by practicing with a few helpful tools. This concise, easy-to-read book guides you to immediately begin generating a stream of productive ideas. In Creativity & Problem Solving, Tracy reveals 21 proven techniques that will help you: Stimulate the three primary triggers to creativity Inspire a creative mindset in staff through recognition, rewards, and environment Use methods to solve problems, improve systems, devise new products, and come up with fresh, exciting marketing angles Ask focused questions to generate elegant solutions Understand the difference between mechanical and adaptive thinking Rigorously evaluate new ideas without shutting down the creative impulse Containing mind-stimulating exercises and down-to-earth strategies, Creativity & Problem Solving will help you tap into the root source of their own intuitive genius--and gain the winning edge they’ve been missing all this time.

This book can help you create, encourage, and participate in an environment that is conducive to creativity, helping make change a more natural and organic part of the library's culture.

It is an exciting time to be a librarian. Advances in technology have let libraries expand far beyond walls and lead the way in information delivery, while transforming the physical library into a place where customers can connect to information in new ways. It is also a challenging time to be a librarian. With continual change as the new normal, staying current can seem overwhelming. Even as they face budget shortfalls and staff reductions, librarians are tasked with finding the time and resources to keep abreast of rapid changes. This book offers a cornucopia of practical advice about how to acquire new skills (and formal and informal credentials) through all stages of a career. The 27 essays cover formal and online education, conferences, fellowships, workshops, networking, teaching, mentoring, balancing personal with professional lives, and money matters--and are filled with practical, honest and real-world advice.