The Value of Networking

Report from ALA Annual 2014

Last month's ALA Annual Conference in Las Vegas marked the end of my term on the Printz Committee. The weekend was full of author dinners, publisher meetings, and ceremonies. I watched and cheered as our committee chair awarded Marcus Sedgwick the Printz Award for Excellence in Young Adult Literature for his book, Midwinterblood. Rainbow Rowell, Sally Gardner, Susann Cokal, and Clare Vanderpool also received well-deserved honors.

Although I greatly enjoyed seeing the celebratory end result of a year and half of hard work, my favorite part of the conference was talking to other young adult librarians and professionals about teen services and program ideas. I think this is a hidden benefit that is the best part of conferences: networking.

Gathering with your peers allows you to talk about your successes, brainstorm solutions to issues, and share your ideas. Trends in services can start small. Our best practices are often organically spread through listservs, social media, and conferences, but I think there is something special about in-person interactions. Face-to-face communication allows you to share the enthusiasm that comes with a really good idea. Questions and answers can be quickly tossed around. The connections I've been able to make at conferences have allowed me to vastly expand the scope of my idea farm for new programming for young adults. I've made lifelong friendships by following up with and continuing to share ideas with these librarians around the country.

Idea-sharing and idea-growing also happens when we gather at FOCUS, call other libraries around the state to ask questions, gather together in systemwide meetings, sit next to someone new at an OLA session, or do community outreach. Finding out what others are successful with and adapting it to best serve our customers can keep our libraries important, exciting places to be.