Linking Our Libraries

Book Bites are quick, five minute looks at a book from readers. Try a new book this week!

Today’s book is from Annie: So Far, So Good, by Ursula K. Le Guin. This episode was recorded Live! at the Great River public library in St Cloud, MN.

Book Bites are quick, five minute looks at a book from readers. Try a new book this week!

Today’s book is from Amy: Jonathan Livingston Seagull, by Richard Bach. This episode was recorded Live! on-site at the Great River Public Library in St Cloud.

Book Bites are quick, five minute looks at a book from readers. Try a new book this week!

Today’s book is: On Desperate Ground: The Marines at The Reservoir, the Korean War's Greatest Battle, by Hampton Sides. This episode was recorded Live! on-site at the Great River Public Library in St Cloud.

Book Bites are quick, five minute looks at a book from readers. Try a new book this week!

Today’s book is: Island of the Mad: A novel of suspense featuring Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes, by Laurie R. King (This is the most recent in the series)

This episode was recorded Live! on-site at the Great River Public Library in St Cloud.

It's award season!! And we love books; there are so many to discuss!! We share book suggestions and ideas every single week on our podcasts, but we wanted to take some time to recognize a few that are special to us. The CMLE team of Angie, Lydia, and Mary all contributed to this episode. 

Get all the categories and books on our shownotes page!

You have heard all of us talking about books across all of our podcasts, and we have some definite favorites. This year we are adapting the 30 book challenge from Overdrive’s really good book podcast: Professional Book Nerds. They have suggestions you can use to read 30 different books, to build your own reading interests. We have a link to their material above, and you should check out their podcast and their website!

Today we are going to use those ideas as the foundation for our award show. You should find some good suggestions for your own reading, and definitely take their challenge to find 30 of your own books!

Every single book we share here today is on our shownotes page with titles, authors, and Amazon links. So do not worry about taking notes - we have it all available for you!

Book Bites are quick, five minute looks at a book from readers. Try a new book this week!

Today’s book is from Lydia: Unmentionable: The Victorian Lady's Guide to Sex, Marriage, and Manners, by Therese O'Neill.

Whew!

In Season Four, we have all worked together to work through fifteen of the most valuable competencies you need to be a good leader in your organization. As we said all along: it doesn't matter what your title is, you can lead from any position. So these skills are for EVERYONE! Refer back to our shownotes for any info you missed - and of course for links to the books we shared!

We are taking a break here, and starting up our companion podcast: Reading With Libraries. Season Three starts Thursday Jan. 3. You can subscribe at any podcast app you are already using (like this one!). Each week we explore a new genre, drink new beverages, and chat with new Guest Hosts about the books they like. We have lots of Readers Advisory material on the website, to help you in guiding people to the books they may love.

But we don't want your feed here to be lonely, so we will be dropping a quick Book Bite into it each week. This is a five minute look, by a Guest Host, at a book (or two) they have enjoyed and want to share with you. There are all kinds of genres, all kinds of suggestions - everything you need to find books for yourself, or to share with patrons and friends.

And what's happening with Linking Our Libraries?? We have so many fun plans!! Season Five will be back, exploring all kinds of library skill using pop culture. It will be fast, fun, and filled with great ideas for you and your library! We definitely want you to join us there!

Welcome back to Linking Our Libraries! This is our Season Four finale! It’s been so good to work with you all this season, and talk about building skills.

Check out our full shownotes page for all the information, and the info on the books we read (with links to Amazon!).

Be sure to subscribe to our book group podcast, Reading With Libraries, which will start dropping new episodes and new genres Jan 3. If you are subscribed to this podcast, Linking Our Libraries, we will be dropping Book Bites each week for you – three to five minutes talking about a book our guests want to share. You won’t want to miss it!

Do you want to talk with us about leadership skills? Do you need some training organized for your organization? We are here for you! Check out our website: cmle.org and let’s get this started!

We have talked about a lot of important skills this season – and some different ways to be a leader, not just as a n idea but in reality. Problems solving is definitely one of the keys to leadership success. And fortunately, you will have a LOT of practice in it!

Problems, disasters, things going wrong – all of that will happen in your library daily, weekly, the entire rest of your career. So it’s better to just get in there now and figure out how to be good at solving problems. It will make the rest of your career easier, and it will help to inspire other people to work with you.

You can probably think of people who panic in a crisis, or have no idea how to handle even the smallest problem that occurs – completely falling apart at the smallest problem. This is not leadership behavior, though we all know people in leadership roles who do this – but we want you to be better than that!

Welcome back to Linking Our Libraries! This week we are going to talk about maturity: a competency leaders need to be successful in their work.

Check out our full shownotes page here, including information and links to  to the books we read this week!

Maturity is such a valuable skill for successful leaders! If you think about mangers and politicians you see on TV and social media who behave badly, you can see how they are not respected as real leaders. They have the job title, but no one mistakes them for leaders who inspire others to follow them. A good leader builds a coalition of people, she makes people feel good about the project they are doing, and she inspires everyone to hope for the future. Good leaders demonstrate maturity by working to make things good for everyone – not just a few special people. That includes staff, patrons, community members – everyone.

It’s hard to do!! But you can see leaders who do exhibit Maturity in their work, and it’s impressive.

So, what do we mean by Maturity anyway? It could mean all kinds of things in different situations, but for us it means someone who shows they are calm and in control, demonstrates emotional intelligence, and that they think of others first.

Check out our full shownotes page here!

Welcome back to Linking Our Libraries! This week we are going to talk about an exciting leadership competency: Risk Taking!

Your first thought when listening to this topic might be surprise. Hasn’t everything we’ve talked about this season implied that leaders need to be reliable, steady, and predictable?

Yes. All of that is true. These are important qualities for leaders.

But you can’t just take the safe course all the time. Sometimes you need to take a chance, try something new, to boldly go where no librarian has gone before!

Good risk taking skills will help to propel you and your organization forward. So let’s talk about risk taking, and strategies for minimizing risk and maximizing your chances for success!

What do we mean by risk taking? Different people may think of this in different ways, but we mean not taking the easy way; taking a chance of failure; bold or courageous action.