I want to support CLA in its ongoing efforts to improve transformative learning and professional development opportunities for our members. I see a great deal of value in being able to learn from library leadership on a national and international scale. For instance, I am inspired by operational models in Denmark and the service design of Richland Library. I hope to discuss these and other examples within our state association. I also see potential lessons in the for-profit world and such non-traditional fields of improv and hospitality. Whatever we glean from this exploration, the goal must be empowering the state’s most vulnerable communities. By serving on the board, I feel that I can make the library’s hopes into reality.

Questionaire

1. How do you define leadership?
   There’s so much noise and clutter. Leadership is knowing where you or a community want to go or how you want to be, and de-cluttering the rest. That means knowing with incredible clarity what you or a community see as important, and working toward that destination with confidence. Really giving the best of yourself, the best you can offer. The idea is that the important stuff will enhance our life, transform, or make us more. For me that’s not only transforming our communities through learning, but also focusing on the people who are really struggling because I’ve been there, or my family or friends have been there--and I get how they’re really wanting that change. 
   
   I remember watching a documentary about a restaurant in Toronto called Edulis, and the husband and wife team making this exceptional food. The husband and wife were talking about the idea for their restaurant being a place they were happy to be at every day, to do what they love, and for the restaurant to be an expression of their identity and being--they said their soul. They struck me as being exceptional leaders. They had made what was important to them come into fruition. That takes understanding what’s important and that kind of understanding takes time.
2. Why are you interested in this position?
   I don’t see leadership as coming from a single person. We are influenced by those around us. Our colleagues and our communities impact how well we are leading. I want to be in the position because I want to both be a better leader through w meorking with CLA’s talented board and also being a support for them.
   
3. How would you describe your personal leadership/communication style?
   I try to be adaptive and flexible. People are different. Organizations are different, and I try to understand that different people need different communication. What works in one environment may not work in another, so I see communication as a process of figuring out what’s needed by the people I’m with at the moment. The constant is my passion for what I do.
4. What strengths would you bring to the position?
   I know how to build coalitions, and work with the ambassadors of different communities. Right now I am working with a coalition of community based organizations to address at-risk youth for gang activity, and I can do that work because I am genuinely want to understand what they need and want for their community. I am working with our county district attorney and family & children’s services because people want to be involved in that important work.
   
   In the past I’ve worked with over 40 museums and cultural institutions, a special forces medic, and a former executive for Discover Channel because I can see the need that’s out there, and I can identify the people who want to help.
   
   I’m also tenacious. I’ve done development or donor work with over 40 museum and cultural institutions, and have been able to help them understand why libraries are good partners. I’ve turned a $10,000 grant into a half million dollar project through coalition building and being determined to find the right people to help make that vision a reality, and that requires a day-after-day.
5. What experience do you bring to this position?
   I have lots of change management experience. I’ve served on new service development committees for over a decade. I’ve proved that I can develop programming and service that speaks directly to the needs of who I am serving, and that work has been recognized with an IMLS National Medal, and a John Cotton Dana Award. I’ve been recognized as a 2016 Mover & Shaker. I am a Eureka! Fellow. I went back to school and got an MPA. I’ve gone through the University of Cornell’s program in customer-focused service design.
   
   However, I don’t think that kind of experience will mean a great deal to CLA members. The experience I bring that may mean something to them, was I was recently chairing a committee for our library’s staff development day, and just knew that we had the absolute best person on the committee--who wasn’t me--to lead that team. Because they are amazing at staff engagement. So I made them the chair, supported their leadership, and we had one of the best staff days ever. I think that experience with seeing what matters to a community, and having an intuition for the best people to deliver on that need is the experience I will bring.
6. What issues or trends are particularly informing your work at this time?
   Educational access as social justice. I see libraries in Europe, specifically those in Denmark and Ireland expanding their hours of access to very non-traditional hours. With so many families needing to have both parents working, I see these expanded morning and evening hours as addressing the issue of access. To get there I am using tools like service design and community conversation.
   
   I am also looking at degree programs in community development because they teach community change, organizing, community engagement, and those are where I hope to take my work in the future.
   
   Internally in libraries I have been trying to work improv tools into our culture because we often want to get things completely right, and make no mistakes, and that’s just not realistic when we are being innovative. I would like to see us more free to learn from failure in an open constructive way, and I think improv can teach us about that.
7. Who are the thought leaders (in libraries or in other fields) who interest you?
   I am really into chefs and civil rights leaders, and I’ll explain why. Chefs are talking about the language of the senses, and how you feel in their space. They talk about how what separates the best food isn’t the technique, because all that can be copied, but instead the degree to which the person making the food cares about the people they are cooking for. They aren’t creating a third space. They’re creating the home, you didn’t even know you wanted. Civil rights era leaders talked about the importance of how you’re treated when people come into contact with you, that their life was enhanced. I think those people are just plain wise about human need and behavior.
   
   I think Calgary Public Library, Copenhagen Library, and the Richland Library--among many others--are folks I am watching. People like Melanie Huggins.
8. Who are the regional and statewide stakeholders libraries need to be in communication with?
   We need to be in contact with the formal leadership in government, and just as in contact with community-based organizations.  Groups like the International City/County Management Association, and hyper local community-based organizations. I believe that CLA can help with the larger government groups such as California State Assembly Committee(s) on the arts, education, housing, community development, local government, and homelessness.
9.  What do you feel are the most critical challenges and opportunities facing California libraries right now?
   Funding and state support. When I look at the libraries throughout the country that are excelling, I see support from their state.
10. Describe your experience serving on Association committees and/or interest groups.
    I currently serve as the Chair for the CLA Leadership and Development Committee, and have served on the committee since 2015. Last year our team promoted CLA elections, and saw a 20% increase in member voting.
11. Describe your network of connections with library professionals and library stakeholders in California.
    I really enjoy learning from others in the field, and so I make it a priority to spend time talking to people throughout the state. Not just people in administrative leadership, but lots of librarians leading program development and so I really feel well networked from librarian to director and everything in between.
    
    I edit a column in the peer-reviewed Journal of Library Administration, which gives me an opportunity to highlight good work being done in California. I am an ALA, PLA, and CLA member. I was a 2011 Eureka! Fellow.