Daily Thoughts 6/29/2010

The New Novel, Winslow Homer, 1877 Museum of Fine arts, Springfield, Mass

Daily Thoughts 6/29/2010

We spent some time talking with a gentleman from GO2 media design about redesigning our website. They have designed a number of other library websites. http://www.go2mediadesign.com/taxonomy/term/49

I spent some time reading Jason Shhhh! an almost silent comic with a variety of slice of life scenes. They are curious with black and white line art. It is hard to describe the exact nature of the art. I rather like it. This is a link to an article about it. http://www.newsarama.com/comics/Jason-Almost-Silent-100129.html

Two new books came in for to read, Deank Koontz's Frankenstein lost souls and Fitzpatrick's War by Theodore Judson.

Today has been fairly quiet. It was a chance to look at the displays and put some orders together as well as get ready for some meetings on telephone customer service, a staff meeting, and a meeting on using electronic ordering for our library this week.

I also had a chance to read some more Harry Mintzberg's Managing. I am reading a bit about the concept in leadership of moving away from I to we. The point is to be more team oriented and speak and identify as part of a community. This is difficult in some ways. He uses the word communityship which is a concept which I'm trying to get my mind around.

Daily Thoughts 6/27/2010

Profile of Adam Smith authors of An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations Etching created by Cadell and Davies (1811), John Horsburgh (1828) or R.C. Bell (1872). The original depiction of smith was created in 1787 By James Tassie in the form of an enamel paste medallion. Smith did not usually sit for his portrait, so a considerable number of engravings and busts of Smith were made not from observation but from the same enamel medallion produced by Tassie, an artist who could convince Smith to sit.

Daily Thoughts 6/27/2010

I have started reading Henry Mintzberg, Managing. Harry Mintzberg is a professor of management studies at McGill University in Montreal in Canada. This makes the book have a different perspective. The author writes about Canadian, British, French, and Dutch companies which gives a more international perspective to his writing. He also talks about the Harvard Business Review. This comes across as more international in flavor.

His focus is on practice, not just theory. The focus of the program he teaches at is practice. He covers the day to day activities of what happens inside organizations in private corporations, publicly traded corporations, government, and nonprofit sector. There is a focus on tracking what actually happens in the day to day activities from line managers all the way up to chief executives.

I took a brief break from reading and watched a bit of James Cameron's Avatar which is quite interesting. I am enjoying the film so far.

If you have time, and are in the United States, Tuesday is Library Advocacy Day, call or write your senator or congressperson about libraries. http://americanlibrariesmagazine.org/student-member-blog/take-five-minutes-make-difference-libraries