Sticky 'Brary

This pretty much sums it up.  If you find yourself sitting comfortably at your desk, day in and day out, you're missing out.

Although I have absolutely no scientific data to back me up on this assertion, I'm guessing that one of the top 10 reasons that librarians don't spend more time engaging with the public is the fear of being out in the public.  Kind of a weird trait for a public librarian to have, but there it is. So how do you work around that?  How do you get comfortable with being uncomfortable?  For starters, give this a try: http://www.ted.com/talks/amy_cuddy_your_body_language_shapes_who_you_are.html

The Atlantic magazine says this is it ( http://www.theatlantic.com/sponsored/bank-of-america/archive/2012/09/new-yorks-best-kept-secret-for-entrepreneurs/262197 ) but I'm guessing that the NYPL could give the Field Center a run for its money.

A site of note: http://www.growinglocaleconomies.com/   A ton of great resources here for anyone in libraryland looking for ways to integrate their public library into the local business scene.

If you haven't seen this and you have a love of public libraries, take a few minutes out of your day and watch this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KqAwj5ssU2c

I'm a rookie Texas Hold 'em player but I love, love, love the game.  One strategy that I have learned over the years: if you have the nuts (poker slang for an unbeatable hand), you should generally go all in.  All the chips go into the center of the table.  If people want to stay in the game, it's going to cost them.  If they want to fold and walk away, leaving me with the smaller win, fine.  I'll take it. Either way, when you're sitting on the nuts that is not the time to hold anything back. Poker to library/business reference transition... In terms of the information world, the library has the nuts in terms of the best model out there to deliver high-quality content to our communities.  It's time we started acting like it.  It's time we started looking around at the best business libraries out there ( http://businesslibrary.uflib.ufl.edu/businesslibraries and http://businesslibrary.uflib.ufl.edu/bestdatabases seem to be good places to start) and fi

Hey WLAers! Thanks for being such a rocking, inquisitive audience.  Here's the link to the Prezi portion of the presentation: http://prezi.com/ks65tb54zgrb/wla-presentation/ Stay in touch and let me know how your business outreach efforts go!

At the WLA conference .  Gonna be preachin' it to the choir tomorrow. 

Here's a word of warning about doing library outreach to the business community.  Well, not so much a warning but rather a tip.  Something to be aware of. Here it is: After a certain period of doing outreach to the business community (about five years in my case), you might start wondering why, if the library's business resources are met with such universal appeal and acclaim, why are there still large swaths of the business community that don't know about the power and versatility of our resources?  I think I have an answer, or at least a partial answer.  Competition. If I show the commercial lenders at one bank in town our market research database, allowing them to save time and money when it comes time to performing due diligence in making a business loan, that information spreads like wildfire... right up to the doors of that particular bank.  Once the news makes its rounds within an single institution, there is no incentive for Bank ABC to share their newfound comp