Organisational challenges of agility: how (not) to run an agile library

Erasmus+ Staff Training at Utrecht University Library, 25-29 May 2020

Utrecht University Library would like to share its experience in running a library in a continually changing landscape. In this week we will focus on the organisational challenges we face in adapting to the developments around us. By looking at various cases we will explore both best practices as well as lessons learned on how not to run an agile library. 

We feel an urgent need to be able to quickly adapt to change. Something that doesn’t come naturally for an organisation that, for the best part of its long history, has operated in a more stable academic environment.

Cases include:

• Research Data Management Support
  
  How a joint venture between the IT-department and the library was launched and what the challenges were in aligning this new support office and existing organisational practices. This case is one of the examples where developments in open science have led us to reimagine how the library can best fulfill its role as information specialist.
• Compass – online training information literacy skills
  
  The implementation of this online training posed several organisational challenges. How do we reach consensus on the content of the training? How do we prepare for the shift in tasks for the instructors? How do we convince faculties on the merits of a standardized training instead of a made-to-measure instruction? And how do we embed the online training in our operational services for the long term?
• The innovation lab
  
  It is often said that innovation is hard, especially for established organisations. After 4 years and multiple iterations of our innovation lab we must concur. What did we learn?

We are excited to share our experiences with other library colleagues and we invite you to bring your own cases on this theme so we can learn from each other.

There is opportunity to adapt parts of the programme to your wishes. When you apply, please outline your expectations of the Erasmus Staff Training Week at Utrecht University Library. In the areas of organisational challenges libraries face today, what would you like to learn?

We are also interested in your work experience and current work, and how this work is relevant to the programme. For this reason, we ask all participants to give a short presentation on their own work.

For whom?

This week is aimed at library staff who are involved in change management and the impact of contemporary developments on organisational structures, work processes and (new) activities. Think of staff members such as policy makers, project officers and managers.