Circulating Ideas - 6 October 2021
Circulating Ideas facilitates conversations with the innovative people and ideas inspiring libraries to grow and thrive in the 21st century. This newsletter dives deeper into those conversations.
Please let me know if you have suggestions for upcoming guests or for additions or changes to this newsletter. I’d love your feedback!
Keep circulating your ideas!
Circulation Status
Back in 2015, I ran a Kickstarter campaign to fund transcripts of the show's archive, up to that point. It was successful, and I had hours and hours of audio transcribed. The only issue was that my transcriber was a non-librarian from New Zealand, which means she did not always know library-specific acronyms, terminology, people's names, etc. She did a fantastic job outside of that and got the transcripts probably 90% right, which went a long long way.
To address that last 10%, I enlisted the help of volunteer proofreaders, and that's where I first "met" Matt Finch. He volunteered to help out and did a bang-up job.
Why did it take another five years for me to have him on the podcast as a guest? All I can say is 🤷🏻♂️
Matt was on the show last summer, and earlier this year, he pitched me the idea of having Bronwen Gamble on the show with him to talk about the scenario planning they had done together at Reading (PA) Public Library.
Hope you enjoy and learn from the conversation.
Episode 209
CI209: Matt Finch and Bronwen Gamble — circulatingideas.com
In this new episode of the podcast, I chat with Matt Finch and Bronwen Gamble about facilitating scenario planning during a pandemic, involving all staff members in important decision-making, learning to live with uncertainty, and Bronwen's plans (or lack thereof) for retirement.
Matt Finch and Bronwen Gamble – Circulating Ideas — circulatingideas.com
As often as possible, I try to provide a transcript for each episode. A new app I’ve been using has been a big help with this (story for another time; I’ll get around to telling it eventually, promise!).
Circulating Ideas: Scenario Planning With Reading Public Library — mechanicaldolphin.com
On his blog, Matt wrote up his appearance on the show.
Reading Public Library — readingpubliclibrary.org
Reading Public Library website!
IMLS — readingpubliclibrary.org
On Thursday, May 24, Reading Public Library was awarded the 2018 National Medal for Museum and Library Service at a ceremony at the U.S. Institute of Peace in Washington, D.C.
Reading Public Library Recognized as a 2018 Recipient of Nation’s Highest Museum and Library Honor | City of Reading, Pennsylvania — www.readingpa.gov
matt finch / mechanical dolphin — mechanicaldolphin.com
Matt Finch is a strategy & foresight practitioner; he works with communities, companies, and institutions around the world to help them do useful and surprising new things. As a consultant, he works with clients to create innovative and effective strategies, programmes, partnerships, and offerings.
Since 2020, Matt has written a quarterly column, ‘Scripturient’, for the UK’s Information Professional magazine.
“New adventures in disasterology”: Learning from crisis with Christchurch Libraries — mechanicaldolphin.com
Matt and Katherine Moody (a librarian in Christchurch, Aotearoa New Zealand) wrote "Even In The Worst-Case Scenario" for Public Libraries magazine.
How public libraries can help prepare us for the future — theconversation.com We commonly think of libraries as repositories of knowledge accumulated over centuries. But the public library also connects people in ways that can enable communities to plan for their future.
Reading Public Library director to retire in late-2021 | Berks Regional News — www.wfmz.com Bronwen Gamble became the first woman to serve as the RPL's executive director when she was appointed to the role in October 2016.
Recirculated
CI184: Matt Finch — circulatingideas.com
Matt was last on the podcast early in the pandemic, where he and I chatted about what scenario planning is and why libraries need to be doing it, some of the big ideas libraries need to be thinking about, working remotely during a pandemic, and exploring Library Island.
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