Editor's Page

Recently I was one of the six Auburn attendees of a four day conference in Atlanta called the; Library Management Skills Institute II: The Management Process. It was an event sponsored by ARL's Office of Leadership and Management Services. The aim of the conference was to introduce the attendees to the concept of Organizational Learning, and thus to explore the possibility of transforming libraries into Learning Organizations. 

The definition of a Learning Organization, (an organization that has the capacity to create its own future) may seem somewhat nebulous, but I will try to describe it as well as I can. A Learning Organization is one of adaptability and creativity. A Learning Organization finds a way to build in the ability to continually learn, to assess the environment, to absorb relevant changes important to its mission, and to integrate adapting strategies if it is to successfully become self created and different. In order to do this the organization learns to listen to its people, to honor their self worth, to support their growth, to follow their expertise, and to nurture their development. Some of the principle ideas and models for the Learning Organization come from author Peter Senge's The Fifth Discipline; The Art and Practice of the Learning Organization. Senge discribes what leadership would look like in a Learning Organization, "In a Learning Organization, leaders are designers, stewards, and teachers. They are responsible for building organizations where people continually expand their capabilities to understand complexity, clarify vision, and improve shared mental models--that is, they are responsible for learning". Transformation in libraries calls for a transformation in leadership. We need leaders who design and build new paradigms, the libraries without walls leaders who work with their colleagues to learn, to grow and to develop whatever is needed to connect people with information and learning. They will not build libraries, direct people or seek power. They will create the learning process. The new leaders will not see themselves as knowing the way and teaching the followers, they will see themselves as learners, joining others in the creation of the organization that will allow them to continually learn, to change the vision, to shape the future. 

Organizational Learning is based on Peter Senge's five disciplines of; Personal Mastery, Mental Models, Shared Vision, Team Learning and Systems Thinking. It would be all to easy to dismissed these new ideas as pie in the sky or pop psychology. While it is an evolving field of organizational management, the methods have been used successfully libraries including the University of Arizona and Cal. Berkley. Problem solving, team work, systems thinking, shared vision and other models and group exercises were used at the conference. While some proved to be more difficult to comprehend than others, the overall ideas expressed seemed sensible, doable and in some cases eye opening. 
All who attended the conference hope to begin to communicate ideas about a Learning Organization to others in the near future.