Living in More Than One World

Beth Farrell of Library Journal has an extensive survey of self-help audiobooks in Mind, Body & Soul. Although the article is aimed at librarians, anyone interested in this genre will find it useful and informative. Referencing an article from Forbes earlier this year, she notes the billions spent in recent years on these types of books, CDs and related products and services. She also calls attention to LJ’s most recent ranking of most-borrowed audiobooks, in which 15 of 20 were in the self-help category. And not all the audiobooks that libraries offer come only in the traditional CD format; others are available through web-based digital downloads from companies such as Overdrive or Ingram Digital, and in the preloaded digital Playaway format (a new one to me). Farrell writes that her aim is to go beyond the likes of Stephen Covey, Rhonda Byrne and similar big names to worthy titles by lesser-known — but many recognizable — authors with titles worthy of being offered by libraries. And by extension, worthy of our attention as library patrons. She provides bibliographic information and to-the-point thumbnail descriptions for more than 20 titles. I particularly like her description of David Whyte’s 8 CD set The Three Marriages: Reimagining Work, Self and Relationship: “Yorkshire-born poet/business consultant Whyte’s rich, rumbling voice could turn the reading of an auto repair manual into poetry; his erudite, unique take on balancing work, self, and relationships is utterly compelling. Self-help for the literary set.” Other audiobooks worthy of careful listening include This I Believe II: More Personal Philosophies of Remarkable Men and Women, a 5 CD set based on the NPR series and Edward de Bono’s How to Have a Beautiful Mind, also 5 CDs.  Improving yourself for free with these and similar audiobooks at your public library sounds like a great deal.

Although her posting ran nearly a month ago, check out Michelle Richmond’s I can’t bear to part with… on sfgate.com, the San Francisco Chronicle’s website. She explains that she is culling her bookshelves, but that some books not only couldn’t go, but “beg to be read again and again.” Some of the ten books on the list are new to me, such as The Palace of Dreams, by Ismail Kadare and The Death of a Beekeeper, by Lars Gustafsson. What initially drew me to her post was the inclusion of one of my all-time favorite books, Ficciones, by Jorge Luis Borges, as well as A Mathematician’s Apology, by G.H. Hardy. I discovered and read the latter in the past year, and possibly if I had read it in high school (which I theoretically could have, since it was published well before), I might have had a better attitude about studying math. Here is her description of Graham Greene’s The End of the Affair: “This perfectly paced novel should be required reading for aspiring writers: a book about narrative, the arbitrariness of fate, and the writer’s subject – wrapped up in a riveting love story.” The whole list is informative, with beautifully written thumbnail descriptions of her keeper books. I then discovered that this shouldn’t be a surprise, as she is a best-selling novelist of such books as No One You Know and The Year of Fog, which is being made into a film. For more, see her website and her own blog, sans serif. She ends her sfgate.com post with the sensible advice that if her readers are cleaning her own shelves, they can donate books to the Friends of the San Francisco Public Library. No matter where you live, your local library friends organization can serve the same function if you are doing similar book culling.

On July 11th, the day of my book signing at the American Library Association annual conference in Chicago, I met three highly interesting people who were also either signing or performing: Amy Krouse Rosenthal, George Watsky and Mieka Pauley. I had never met them before, and had not even heard of George or Mieka. When I found out that Amy would be at the Chronicle Books booth that morning, I knew that I wanted to meet her, as I had enjoyed her book Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life. I had a nice conversation with her after she finished a signing for one of her children’s books. Be sure to check out her compelling short video, The Beckoning of Lovely, shot last summer in Chicago’s Millennium Park. I discovered George and Mieka in a providential way. A friend had told me earlier in the day that I should meet a friend of hers, an editor at a library-related publication that had a booth at the conference. When I went to find her soon after I finished my signing, I was told she would be at the LIVE! @ your library Reading Stage. When I arrived, she was not there, but I quickly became mesmerized by George’s poetry performance, in which Mieka accompanied him at times on guitar and vocals. Although I only caught the tail-end, they continued with an impromptu performance (separately) at the booth of their representatives, the Auburn Moon Agency. They also talked with those of us who assembled. What was amazing was that neither had performed together before George’s appearance on stage. Check out the material on each of their websites. I would gladly pay to see either of them perform again. And yes, I did find the editor later on. Amy, George and Mieka are each cool, super-creative people I could have easily missed out on meeting if circumstances had been only slightly different. If anyone at the conference (or perhaps any similar recent gathering) has had similar experiences, please let me know so I can share them with other readers of this blog!

As I noted in my previous post, the major reason I attended the American Library Association annual conference in Chicago from July 10-14 was to do the first signing for my new book Living in More Than One World: How Peter Drucker’s Wisdom Can Inspire and Transform Your Life. Today I’ll briefly note some of the sessions I attended, with links to investigate further. Although I have been teaching since 1996, I still learned a lot from Preparing Yourself to Teach: Touching all the Bases, sponsored by LIRT (Library Instruction Round Table). The three presenters (Lisa Hinchliffe and Beth Woodard, both of the University of Illinois-Urbana; and Monika Antonelli, Minnesota State University) all had interesting perspectives on developing teaching skills. The increasing importance and intricacies of digital collections was examined in Collecting for Digital Repositories: New Ways to Disseminate and Share Information. The three speakers (Paul Royster; University of Nebraska-Lincoln; Sayeed Choudhury, Johns Hopkins University and Dianne McCutcheon, National Library of Medicine) made their subject seem doable, even with its inherent complexities. Michigan-based public librarians Holly Hibner and Mary Kelly led a lively session aimed at public library reference librarians, Thingamabobs and Doodads: Why Tech Support IS Reference. I enjoyed talking to both afterwards, and discovered that their blog, Awful Library Books, is developing a cult following. The Power of XML to Enhance Work Flow and Discovery explained and demystified a lot about the history and practical applications of XML in libraries. I had interesting conversations afterwards with both presenters, Patrick Yott of Brown University and David Ruddy of Cornell University. Finally, the Library History Round Table Edward G. Holley Lecture, Five Studies of Readers of Journalism, by David Paul Nord, a journalism and history professor at Indiana University, Bloomington, was a thought-provoking way for me to end the conference. I also enjoyed my brief talk with him after his lecture. Tomorrow, one final ALA-related post on my encounters with a few participants who are not librarians, and have no connection to my book.

Although the major reason I attended the American Library Association annual conference in Chicago from July 10-14 was to do the first signing for my new book Living in More Than One World: How Peter Drucker’s Wisdom Can Inspire and Transform Your Life, the conference was a valuable professional experience as well. I’ve been a librarian since 1987, and a longtime member of ALA, but this was my first ALA annual conference. The size and scale is considerably bigger than the Special Libraries Association annual conference, which I’ve attended four times. I was prepared to be overwhelmed, but I managed OK.  There was more than one session at a time of interest, and the exhibit hall was huge, with vendors I would have liked to have investigated in more depth. There were many writers at the ALA’s LIVE! @ your library Reading Stage, as well as others who signed books at various booths. A major example of the latter, complete with huge lines, was Neil Gaiman. I knew I couldn’t do it all, and planned out my schedule each day before I left my hotel. The conference was mainly held at the massive McCormick Place complex. The signage was generally good, and it was relatively easy to get around. Friday was devoted to getting to Chicago and settling in, registering at the conference and getting the lay of the land. Saturday revolved around my book signing, with the rest of the day spent touring the exhibits and networking. (The latter activity was all-pervasive during my entire time in town.) Sunday and Monday were mainly devoted to attending sessions. I met friends who live in or were visiting Chicago — not for the conference — for meals on Friday, Saturday and Monday. Although it was tempting to go to the author readings, I couldn’t justify doing that when there were so many educational sessions that I wouldn’t be able to attend otherwise. More on the latter in my post tomorrow.

I have just returned from the American Library Association annual conference in Chicago, where I did my first book signing for Living in More Than One World: How Peter Drucker’s Wisdom Can Inspire and Transform Your Life. It was a huge success, thanks to the hosts for the event, the great people at Ingram Publisher Services, the distributor for my publisher, Berrett-Koehler. I signed 150 books in one hour at the Ingram booth, for librarians and other information professionals. Because it was such a whirlwind, I couldn’t talk for very long to each person in line. But I quickly learned the ropes about the protocol, such as to find out if the person you are signing for wants a personal inscription, or just signature and date. There was quite a variation of preferences. Some also wanted it inscribed to them personally, others to their library. It was nice that I could sign on a lucky date, 7-11-09. Although I had never met most of the people, some friends were there, including Duane Webster, the recently retired executive director of the Association of Research Libraries. That was really meaningful to me, as I started seriously studying Drucker’s works in the summer of 1986, for a library management course Duane taught at the Catholic University of America’s School of Library and Information Science. For more on that back story, see the recent guest post I did for the Government Info Pro blog. Marydee Ojala, the editor of ONLINE, also did a wonderful post, complete with a photo of me signing books, on the Infotoday blog. When I left the conference, I found out that the book is now in stock on Amazon, a major milestone for my author journey. Starting tomorrow, and for at least the next couple of days, I’ll blog about what I learned and experienced at the sessions and exhibit hall.

Just a quick post to note that after today, I’ll take around five days off blogging when I’ll be in Chicago for the American Library Association Annual Conference. It should be an exciting time, as I’ll be doing my first book signing for Living in More Than One World: How Peter Drucker’s Wisdom Can Inspire and Transform Your Life, which will be published shortly by Berrett-Koehler. The signing will be held Saturday, July 11th, from 2:00-3:00 PM at the booth of Ingram Publisher Services, B-K’s distributor. If you’re attending the conference, please come by and say hello. (It should be booth #2347, but double check when you get there.) The signing may not be listed in the printed schedules, because it was added only recently.  Also, B-K now has a free PDF excerpt on their product page for the book. Even though I’ve been a librarian since 1987, this will be my first time at ALA. And Chicago is one of my favorite cities. I’ll report back on my experiences and impressions of the conference next week.

My four days at the 100th annual conference of the Special Libraries Association/SLA, in Washington, D.C are over. As I mentioned in earlier posts, I met many new people, reconnected with old friends and colleagues – including a number I had worked with during my 21 years at USA TODAY – and saw many of my former students, including two from the first class I taught, in 1996.  Nearly 6,000 information professionals from around the world attended, a 16% increase over last year’s conference; quite an accomplishment in this economy. The information sessions I attended were very good, and the INFO-EXPO hall had many interesting vendors. It was a great way to learn not only about new products and services, but to find out about information products and services from a wide variety of large and small organizations through quick demos and talking with people working at the booths. A conference of this size would not be possible without vendors’ financial participation.  Check out more about the conference – either if you didn’t attend, or if you attended but want to find out what you missed, since there were so many things going on simultaneously – at these blogs: SLA blog, Infotoday blog (from the editors of Information Today) and Stephen’s Lighthouse, the regular blog of information world luminary Stephen Abram. There are handouts from the conference on the SLA site, which I found through Gary Price’s ever-helpful Resource Shelf.  Next year’s SLA Annual Conference will be held June 13-16, 2010 in New Orleans. I’ll resume blogging in a few days, so I can concentrate on a two-day Berrett-Koehler Authors Cooperative marketing workshop, starting Thursday and hosted by ASTD, the American Society of Training & Development, in Alexandria, Va.

The highlight of my time Monday at the 100th annual conference of the Special Libraries Association/SLA, in Washington, D.C.  – besides meeting many interesting new people and reconnecting with friends and former students – was the 14th Special Libraries Symposium. I produce this event every year for the course I teach at the Catholic University School of Library and Information Science, The Special Library/Information Center. I bring together a group of librarians, who are generous with their time in giving back to the profession, to meet with my students to talk about their career journeys and the state-of-the-art in their work. Yesterday we had a large, talented and highly experienced group that shared their knowledge, experience and advice. Some of the common themes are applicable beyond the world of librarianship to the wider world of knowledge work: continuous learning (with formal classes, new degrees or otherwise), continually upgrading your technology skills and experience, marketing your services, being entrepreneurial, trying different areas of the profession before you find the one that’s right for you, being visible in your organization and developing your managerial and leadership talents, whether or not manager is your title. A number of the librarians had more than one graduate degree, including one with an MBA. Many came to the profession as a second career. Some are working, or have worked, for software vendors. All proved to be wonderful role models to the students and to other librarians and knowledge workers. Thanks to all who participated in this memorable event!

It’s appropriate that this week I am at the 100th annual conference of the Special Libraries Association/SLA, in Washington, D.C., and also carrying around the galleys of my book, Living in More Than One World: How Peter Drucker’s Wisdom Can Inspire and Transform Your Life, which will be published by Berrett-Koehler on August 10th.  Drucker was born in 1909, the year SLA began. He gave one of the keynotes at the 2002 annual conference in Los Angeles. I interviewed him for a feature story in USA TODAY the night before he gave his address, and I started work on my book later that year. At the 2006 SLA annual conference in Baltimore, I gave a work-in-progress presentation on my book, screening my 21 minute video interview with Drucker, which was conducted in 2005. Now things have more or less come full circle:  I’m back at SLA – the course I teach at the Catholic University School of Library and Information Science is built around the conference – and my book will be published shortly. If you see me at the conference, please introduce yourself!