These seminars are designed to complement one another. You may register for either Part Ior Part II to suit your interest and skill level. However, taking Part I will help you get more out of Part II.

The solo librarian must master multi-tasking without the luxury of staff members to whom to delegate tasks. Often he or she feels isolated within their institutions, without colleagues who understand their concerns. The responses to this kind of stress are predictable: the conscientious solo librarian tries to work faster and put in longer hours. The result is a temporary increase in productivity and long-term burnout. Instead, the key to solo project management is to become one’s own manager and leader: pausing to plan, fostering peer relationships with other departments, building partnerships with customers and negotiating priorities.

This two-part seminar series addresses making hard choices, mastering the project map, creating a working strategic plan for special and ongoing projects, communicating expectations and negotiating the ratios among cost, time and quality with multiple customers. Participants will also learn to avoid the most common project management mistakes, including project creep, concrete thinking, perfectionism, pet projects, and conflict avoidance, as they apply good management practices to those everyday tasks that waste time and damage credibility.

Part II

In the second segment, we will review dozens of simple but effective methods to improve productivity in the solo library, even on stressed-out days. The emphasis will be on changing one’s behavior in small steps, from taking five minutes to pick three priorities to stopping for essential quick breaks to investing in short meetings with key players in the institution. Participants will be able to work on real projects and goals, and finish the segment with a quick and decent action plan to improve productivity in the first hours after the seminar is over. The hardest part of this program will be learning that the demands of the workplace is not what is causing our problems but rather how we respond to them.

Targeted Learners

This presentation is for those who work alone, who have multiple supervisors, or who are looking for ways to improve the productivity when staff is cut and budgets collapse. It is also useful for frontline supervisors who want to improve workplace performance. It is designed for people with at least two years’ of workplace experience and would be considered an intermediate class.

Critical Learning Questions

• What do we have to give up in order to stay relevant to our customers’ changing needs?
• What will keep us anchored to our goals on a busy day despite interruptions and conflicting demands?
• Which better project management practices can we apply immediately, even when we don’t have enough time, money or staff to what we think is right?

Register for Part I
Mastering the Project Map: Solo Management and Leadership

Live Seminar
Member $99

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