Five Weeks: Final Proposal

Five Weeks to a Social Library: Final Project Proposal Beaufort County

Beaufort County Library System is already employing the use of several social software tools, thus I crafted a proposal that introduces these tools to the ENTIRE staff via our Intranet pages and & encourages them to begin to explore and use them on a daily basis.

I. Beaufort County Library Intranet Wiki

A. Use Beaufort Library 2.0 intranet wiki pages (built during this course) to build a BCL tutorial that takes staff step-by-step through social software tools learned in Five Weeks to a Social Library.

B. Create timeframe appropriate for staff to comfortably proceed through tutorial.

C. Get approval for a staff “reward” to offer as incentive to complete the tutorials.

D. Have intranet wiki pages tested for errors.

II. Announce the Wiki Pages: Staff Development Day April 11th

A. Staff Development Day already includes introductions in small groups to various social software tools. In addition to this, I will prepare flyers and make an official announcement of the BCL 2.0 Tutorial that staff may use for the program.

B. Kick off the event with the announcement of the “reward” to be received upon the completion of the BCL 2.0 Tutorial. (It won’t end there; we hope to encourage staff to keep participating.)

III. How Will This Serve Our Library/Patrons?

A. First, it will encourage ownership of the tools we are currently using, i.e. blogs, wiki’s, IM throughout our staff so as to encourage active participation, new ideas, and new ways of connecting with patrons alike.

B. Second, this cross training will increase the library staff’s knowledge of alternative ways to reach patrons, while enabling them to assist patrons with new ways of utilizing our resources or helping them with issues they may have with such software.

IV. Evidence This Technology is Useful (Ubiquitous PLCMC: )

A. We are already reaching patrons via IM, Blogs and De.licio.us accounts as evidenced by our staff.

B. We have seen the growing Virtual culture that engages a whole new user. See: Virtual Transformations.

C. We are seeing new conversations/communities build around Library services that utilize social software tools like My Space.

D. We are bringing the people to us via social software by politely getting in our end-user’s face with blogs for Homework Help, Book Clubs, Library Events, and Technology. Creating relevance! Wiki’s For Library Instruction, Information and Events. Videos and Pictures of Libraries, staff, & patrons all engaged in social activities at their libraries and published with social software like Flickr or YouTube.

V. Roadblocks/ Overcome

A. Staff reluctance/ Resistance/Non-interest (Prizes and recognition go a long way to ending this.)

B. Time (Work with Managers to carve this out of the daily work log.)

C. Interest/ MONEY…for the prizes silly :) (Promotion, good marketing, and fundraising will help.)

VI. Suggestions for Upgrades/Maintenance of Current Social Software Used

A. At this point, we would like to host our own blogs, wiki’s etc. So an inevitable migration to software that supports this move would need to happen, along with additional servers. We have bandied about the idea of “owning” an island on 2nd Life (virtual branch) to host these things (long way off :) Currently we use Blogger, which I would move to Wordpress, and PBwiki which I would move to Media Wiki when we have server support. We also use Meebo for IM, and so far fantastic.