2019 Pacific Northwest Library Association Conference

Most of us dread having to attend meetings just for the sake of meeting.  There’s nothing worse than sitting around a table (or webcam) with folks consulting a vague agenda, where outcomes are not clear, decisions are not followed through on, and nothing gets communicated back to stakeholders.  This combination can be toxic to overall morale.  In this session University of Alaska Southeast’s Library Dean Elise Tomlinson will share some free online tools and practical steps she has developed to significantly improve the outcomes of departmental meetings.  This includes how to collaborate on agendas, remove the need for someone to take “minutes”, provide a way to increase accountability and close the loop on action items, and still get minutes out to stakeholders by the end of the meeting.  Dean Tomlinson uses humor and lessons learned from 10 years of running meetings (the good, bad, and the ugly), to show how anyone can improve their process with a few quick and easy changes. 

Attendees will learn how to:
1. Set up collaborative agendas where everyone gets a chance to be heard while eliminating the need for a designated note taker.
2. Increase the accountability of team members and prevent action items from falling through the cracks.
3. Improve timely communication to stakeholders including marketing the hard work of library staff and faculty.