X-Change Meeting Minutes for August 17, 2009

X-Change Meeting Minutes

Date: August 17, 2009

Location: Belle Isle Library

Those in Attendance:

Ann Aliotta, Lynda Bahr, Julie Ballou, Roy Ballou, Kay Bauman, Karen Bays, Barbara Beasley, Janet Brooks, Rosemary Czarski, Denyvetta Davis, LaVetta Dent, Priscilla Doss, Anne Fischer, Kelley Hoffman, Linda Hyams, Heidi Johnson, Chris Kennedy, Lloyd Lovely, Karen Marriott, Candace McDaniel, Dana Morrow, Todd Olberding, Michael Owens, Katrina Prince, Jamar Rahming, Ric Rea, Debbie Robertus, Pauline Rodriguez - Atkins, Anita Roesler, Diane Sarantakos, Stacy Schrank, Phil Tolbert, John Utley, Maria Watkins, Jimmy Welch, Fariba Williams, John Wood

Guests: Charla Aucone, Teresa Goggins, Dan Holman, Aaron Killough, Ann Meeks, Stuart Williamson

Welcome

Kay Bauman called the meeting to order at 2:00 pm. Kay welcomed the supervisors and guests to the Belle Isle Library and X-Change meeting.

Culture Survey Group Reports

Three groups were created at the last X-Change meeting to investigate the three weaknesses in the system: 1) Increasing appreciation of staff 2) Improving communication and 3) Being more receptive to change. The groups were charged with gaining involvement from the entire system to investigate each weakness and further identify possible root causes and action items. Kay asked the groups to summarize their findings and tell how they got input from the system at large.

Improving Communication (Janet Brooks, LaVetta Dent, Linda Hyams, Donna Morris, Debbie Robertus) Diane Sarantakos, Chris Carroll and Jennifer Adkisson have joined the group and they would like anyone else with ideas for improving communication to join as well.

The group sent out an email asking all staff for feedback on 7/7/09. From respondents’ information, the group found three common causes for poor communication in the system. They are mistrust which inhibits the free flow of communication, filtering information, and bureaucracy. They determined that not only does information need to go up and down in the system, but also across the system. This is not a management issue but an individual responsibility. There is a lot of communication in this system and there is also a perception of filtering from staff. Staff must be educated about how to find information since all information is not in one place. 

Donna has charged this group with going outside the system to see how other large organizations communicate within their organization, the timeline for this project is still in progress. The group has also contacted Brad Voss to get a professional opinion about organizational communication. They hope to find the best practices from other organizations. The group is also going to find out what we are doing right so we can find a way to leverage our strengths.

Increasing appreciation of staff (Roy Ballou, Denyvetta Davis, Jamar Rahming, Pauline Rodriguez-Atkins, and Stacy Schrank) 

The group created a survey for staff that ran from 6-25 thru 7-12. They were seeking to find out who staff feel most underappreciated by and wanted to see if there was a correlation between the amount of appreciation felt and generation of participants. 160 staff members participated in the survey. According to the results, 70% feel appreciated. More non-public service staff responded to the survey than public service staff. The full result summary can be found at http://morris/GotInfo/report_stats/pla/surveys/underappreciated_2009.pdf 

From reading the open-ended comments at the end of the survey, the group could tell that there was a lot of mistrust from respondents. The X-Change group wanted to understand what agencies define as “administration”. Respondents mainly felt that they wanted to feel more appreciated by their supervisor so the group charged the supervisors to give more appreciation and get to know their staff’s preferred method of receiving appreciation. There is not a single award that will make everyone in the organization feel appreciated. 

Stacy is willing to create tools for supervisors to use in order to help them better show appreciation to staff. 

Being more receptive to Change (Kay Bauman, Karen Bays, Karen Marriott, Anita Roesler, Fariba Williams)

From the survey results, employees felt administration was resistant to change. If employees see the administration as resistant to change, the group felt the committee should not be comprised of supervisors. They sent an email on 8/3/09 and asked for non-supervisors to form a new committee that will be charged with finding the problems and solutions as well as working with workgroups to find out what we need to be an organization that embraces change. The people who will set on this committee now are Marilyn Backus (MSL), Evelyn Brown (VI), Kim Edwards (DN), Susan Huchins (DC), Melanie Levick (TP), Kim Ventrella (RE), and Beth Wilson (MC). 

The first meeting of the group will be with the original supervisor committee. They will talk about the charges and let the new committee form their own ideas, etc. The original committee members will be available for questions and guidance if needed. The timeline for the new committee will be 3 – 6 months and any proposal they come up with needs to be in line with our existing mission and values.

The X-Change group continued to discuss the three areas at length. They realize that the process is circular and there will never be a perfect solution to any problem, but they are looking to make things the best they can be. They determined that finding out what we are doing right as a system is the best way to move forward.

Kay led the group in an exercise to help them communicate what had happened during the meeting back to their staff. She stated that communication helps with appreciation and letting people know what is going on helps them embrace change, so the supervisors were asked to summarize what the committees shared.

System Updates

Stacy Schrank briefly shared that Office 2007 is being loaded on staff computers and resources are on the training resource page. He also mentioned that supervisor training for the new appraisal system will begin soon. 

Julie Ballou shared that she has started a new circulation quarterly meeting called the Circulation Forum. This will be a way to share training and help with the consistency of circulation standards system-wide. Their first meeting will be in November.

Dan Holman is working on a spreadsheet for capital improvements that will be added to the intranet. It will have information about who is in charge of a project, the start date, and expected finish date, etc. If anyone would like alterations to the format let Dan know once it is posted.

Todd Olberding shared the following about construction updates:

Ralph Ellison – There are a couple of significant problems with air conditioning and plumbing. It will most likely be mid-September before furniture can be moved in and mid-October before it will be open. 

Service Center – It is estimated that there will be 6-8 weeks until move in. There will be lots of training required for equipment. October 26th is the scheduled building completion date and it will probably be January 1st before it is 100% operational.

Northwest – The last round of comments have been sent to the city. Critical issues will be resolved within 2 weeks and the drawing will be out for bid in 6-8 weeks. Ground breaking should be sometime in October.

Southern Oaks – There have been several design meetings and the most recent plans will be added to the intranet construction page. Right now plans are to vacate next spring and re-enter before June of the next year.

Capitol Hill – There are continuing discussions with this project. The timeline is; Analysis will start in October, an architect will be hired in January 2010 and construction will start in January 2011.

There is a long range plan for a Northeast library.

Downtown Alley/Parking: The Back Alley and Harvey will open up by August 24th. The contractor for Devon will start on October 1st and Harvey will close again.

Adjournment

After no further business the meeting was adjourned at 4:15 p.m