Does your staff need a morale boost to realize their full potential? Is your organization looking for creative approaches to better serve your clientele while maximizing your staff’s skills and talents? Sometimes what we need in administrative planning is a new way of learning, thinking, and doing! Try the in-reach role, the ability to develop our inner best and bring that to the table. In-reach, a play on “library or community outreach,” helps to develop fresh and different perspectives – and boost morale. In this session participants will learn seven easy-to-use in-reach techniques or can-do-isms. It will show how the in-reach role can stretch us to tap a reservoir of inspiration and goodwill – whether we are navigating internal communications or discovering community needs. It will teach how to cultivate a kind, cheerful, and even-tempered attitude in oneself and staff. In-reach skills reduce friction and tap creative intelligence to move an organization forward.
Learning Outcomes
By the end of this class, students will be able to:
- Examine three tips or principles on how to activate in-reach (the ability to bring out the best in ourself and others).
- Identify benefits of in-reach.
- Determine two ways to put in-reach into action to build department and/or organization morale.
Instructor
Dorothy Stoltz retired as director for community engagement with the Carroll County (MD) Public Library in 2021. She is the lead author of Activate Peer Learning in Your Library and Community, (Waldo Publishers 2023) and six books for ALA Editions: Inspired Thinking (2020), Transform and Thrive (2018), Inspired Collaboration (2016), The Power of Play (2015), Tender Topics (2013), and Every Child Ready for School (2013). She co-authored the ALSC white paper, Media Mentorship in Libraries Serving Youth in 2015. Her articles include: "Find the Right Balance: Technology & Digital Media Mentoring," in Library Administrative Digest, February 2017, “Nurture Creative Thinking Skills” in ALA LRT’s Learning Exchange Newsletter, June 2023, and “Activating Our Intelligence: A Common Sense Approach to AI” in ALA’s Information and Technology in Libraries magazine, September 2024. She spearheaded a public library research-tested study in 2005 – 2007, Carroll County Public Library, Maryland. It demonstrated a causal relationship between library early literacy training of adults and children’s school readiness skills. She has presented workshops on several topics over the years at national and state conferences.
Dorothy is currently serving on the executive board of ALA’s Learning Round Table, as a mentor for ALA Core division’s leadership mentoring program, and on the board of DVA and More (Drug and Violence Awareness).
Dorothy is owner of Waldo Publishers, LLC, which presents books inspired by the philosophy of Ralph Waldo Emerson to “activate from within.” She offers a range of mentor, consulting, and training services on creativity, wellness, boosting morale, and peer learning for libraries and other organizations, through Stoltz Creative Consulting.
Intended Audience
- State library and/or archives agency
- Network/consortia
- Public library
- Academic library: 4 year and graduate
- Special Library
- Academic library: 2 year
- Archives
- Historical Society / Site
Lyrasis Learning events are delivered using the Zoom videoconferencing platform and will have AI-generated captions available. American Sign Language (ASL) interpretation is available upon request. If you need ASL or other accommodations to support your participation in the course, please contact us at es@lyrasis.org at least 2 weeks in advance of the event or as soon as possible.