Three days in the life of a OCLC Members Council delegate

I was happy to be elected to the OCLC Members' Council since I had only served as a replacement for Vickey Johnson when she was elected to OCLC's Board of Trustees. It was a short term and I barely got my feet wet!

Western delegates travel most of Saturday to arrive in Dublin so that they are ready for the 8am Sunday morning meeting of the Western delegation. As busy as we all are, I, like many of the delegates, read on the plane the various documents and background information needed for the meetings. Sometimes it is topical like the E-Content report and sometimes it is more of an adminstrative nature, like the ongoing governance study and the study on the OCLC/vendor relationships. I always take my laptop since most of the information is on the Member's Council working page.

Sunday morning we traditionally meet with just our Western delegation to discuss issues of concerns as well as provide background information about ourselves and our libraries and our statewide activities. This is a great way to meet people so that you feel connected as you immerse yourself in the various meetings. At noon we break and we are free until 5, when the buses leave for the OCLC campus.

After introductions of the OCLC Board of Trustees as well as the Members' Council officers, and OCLC staff, there is official council business followed by a keynote speaker. The keynote speaker this year was Stephen Abrams (Sirsi's Vp of Innovation) who's topic "Information 3.0--What's next" was definitely provocative, to say the least. He seemed irritated tonight at the slow pace at which libraries are moving, or the inertia that slows the rest of the pace driving the social networking environment.

So I spent a year playing with new technologies, and here I am looking at a list of over 30 things I hadn't heard of...such it is when Stephen Abrams (from Sirsi) speaks. He ran through his Powerpoint and my notes were jagged...it was a wild ride through the wide array of 2.0 and 3.0 innovations. There was no mistake that he was frustrated by the naysayers that stand in the way of moving forward.


So, Twine, Schoolrooms, Open Crochet, Podzinger, J2EE, Active Worlds, JSR168, Zotero, Ning and Mozeta are a few of the things I will check out. I just finished today John Kotter's management book/fable called Our Iceberg is Melting, and as Stephen spoke, I couldn't help but draw the parallels to Kotter's first two steps: He set the stage with an urgency that was undeniable; He looked to us as a Guiding Team. Now the develpment of the vision and strategy is up to us to create a new culture.