By Janice Keeler, Manager of Information Resources, NERA Economic Consulting, and winner of the Illinois Chapter travel award to the 2008 SLA Annual Conference

The 2008 SLA Annual Conference [1], held in Seattle June 15-18, ranks among the top SLA conferences in my experience. With dozens of Continuing Education workshops and programs, over 5,000 attendees, and over 280 exhibitors, there was plenty to keep everybody busy learning, networking, and finding out about products and vendors.

:: Inspiring Words

The opening keynote session was a fascinating interview between Charlie Rose, host of his own TV interview show, and Vinton Cerf, one of the acknowledged fathers of the Internet, and currently VP and Chief Internet Evangelist for Google. Cerf gave a brief overview of the early development of the Internet. He made a point that even back when they were working on the original protocols, developing the internet was an international effort.

He observed that mobile computing has grown even faster than the internet, with approximately twice as many current users. He stressed that the openness of the internet has enabled creativity and innovation, and must be maintained. He expressed concern about relying on digital information unless ways can be found to maintain old software in which the data is stored.

Cerf described several interesting current projects, including developing protocols for interplanetary communication (for spacecraft transmitting to Earth and back), and solar powered/satellite network internet cafes in developing countries. Quotable quote: “Information is power is baloney. Information sharing is power.”

The closing keynote speaker was marketing guru Seth Godin. He challenged the audience to recognize that everybody is a marketer; the goal is to spread ideas. He shared some interesting bits of marketing history, but focused on the point that the internet has created a marketing revolution. According to him, mass marketing to everyone leads to average stuff for average people. New marketing trends are:

• A direct connection between people who make and use things that can be sold on the internet – with no need for the wholesale/retail infrastructure
• Amplification of individual users, with the example of an internet company that sells three mismatched socks for $10 to teenagers.
• Recognition of the importance of the “long tail”. With infinite online shelf space, you can sell things that don’t appeal to mass markets, or customize products.
• Numbers are meaningless. What matters is getting the right audience for the product.

:: Innovation Lab

The big news at the conference this year was the creation of the SLA Innovation [2] lab. This exciting new offering gives SLA members access to over 100 pieces of software for free experimentation. There is also a project called 23 Things [3], intended to give members an introduction to 23 new technologies like blogging, RSS feeds and wikis in nine weeks over the summer, spending only fifteen minutes a day. Those with less time can choose to do a smaller set of topics.

This year was the first year attendees were encouraged to Twitter during the conference (see demo on the Innovation Lab site). Although I’m not keen on the metaphor of SLA members as lab rats, the Innovation Lab looks like a great place to spend some time learning about the top IT trends for information professionals.

:: Program Sessions

It’s impossible for one person to report on all the variety of sessions at this conference, so for more information on the conference in addition to the SLA and division web sites, see:

• SLA's blog [4]
• SLA’s press release [5]
• A Washington Times article, “Library Techies: Beyond the Dewey Decimal System [6]”
• InfoToday [7] blog 

Here are highlights from a few of the sessions I attended:

‘Knowledge can’t be conscripted’

David Snowden’s talk was thought provoking and entertaining. It’s well worth listening to the podcast of his session at Cognitive Edge [8]. Key points:

• “Knowledge is only ever volunteered. It can’t be conscripted.” “We only know what we know when we need to know it.” Memory is triggered by weak signals from contextual stimulation.
• The way people know things and make decisions is different from how they describe their process afterward. In other words, they may retrospectively create a logical, rational reasoning process if asked to explain, when they really used a quick rule of thumb and didn’t think through a formal process.
• We always know more than we can tell; we can tell more than we can write.

Snowden advocates prioritizing the collection of narrative and anecdotes and not spending time summarizing these into reports or best practices because the unedited stories have more context and usefulness. He says best practices are only relevant in ordered systems (like industrial processes) where there is really only one best way to do something. As he sees it, most business issues are part of what he calls complex adaptive systems, and thus there may be many good ways to do things.

Illinois in Seattle

The Illinois Chapter was well represented among speakers, moderators and division leadership, as documented in the handout sent to chapter members in advance (available from Chapter President Katrina Perez [9]--Editor). I got to Karen Muller, in her session on How Libraries Can Implement a Portal for their Organizations, talked about the portal she has implemented for the American Library Association, including a professional tips wiki, fact sheets and FAQs.

Dianna Wiggins moderated the Knowledge Cafes session by David Gurteen. Knowledge cafes are a method of dialog and knowledge sharing defined as an open creative conversation on a topic of mutual interest. After explaining the process, Gurteen had the whole audience split up into small groups and discuss the topic, “What are barriers to knowledge sharing and how can they be overcome?”

Lessons-Learned Process

The session on After Action Reviews/Lessons Learned, Dale Steinhauer of the U. S. Army described the structured After Action Reviews conducted by the army. These are structured as observation, discussion, and recommendation on specific actions and training sessions. His group then harvests lessons from these After Action Reviews and looks for trends. These lessons are published in handbooks and newsletters.

Mary Durham of Genzyme described how they applied the lessons learned process to the preparations necessary for inspections in a regulated industry. Nerida Hart of Land and Water Australia described an approach called anecdote circles, getting people to share knowledge through story, and gathering the anecdotes. She referred to David Snowden’s Cynefin framework and to Anecdote [10] as background for her approach.

:: SLA Leadership and Association News

Stephen Abram, SLA President, gave an update on SLA activities and member benefits at the opening session on Sunday. Topics included:

• SLA’s new Innovation Lab [11] and Green Initiative [12].
• Growth of ClickU [13]. A free course is available to members each month. There are also thousands of video tutorials.
• Two EBSCO databases are available free to SLA members. GreenFILE [14] covers all aspects of human impact on the environment, with over 300,000 abstracts and 4,700 full text articles from scholarly, government and general-interest titles. Library, Information Science & Technology Abstracts™ [14] covers librarianship, information management and related topics.
• SLA offers members multiple information industry newsfeeds at News Connections [15].

Awards [16] were presented Sunday night to an impressive group of SLA members as well as to the key vendors whose financial support underwrites conference expenses. Video clips [17] of award winners and comments by colleagues are now available on the SLA web site.

The traditional speeches of SLA board candidates were videotaped this year, and played additional times during the conference. If you didn’t see them in Seattle, you can take a look at them at Candidates for Board of Directors [18]. 

At the Annual Business Meeting, our treasurer reported that SLA is in the black financially. Janice LaChance, SLA CEO, gave an overview of association issues, including international and advocacy activities. SLA was the first association to speak publicly against the closing of EPA libraries, and is now concerned about a proposed 20% cut in the budget for the U.S. National Agricultural Library.

She announced SLA ads [19] in the Wall Street Journal, courtesy of Dow Jones. Janice introduced a major alignment project on SLA’s strategy and marketing. Representatives from the organizations conducting the study explained their process and plans. Janice is celebrating her 5th anniversary with SLA on July 1.

:: Fun and Celebration

View from the observation level of the Seattle Space Needle, setting for the SLA Awards reception Sunday night. 

The Pacific Northwest chapter hosted several dine-arounds on Saturday night. The Illinois Chapter reception was held Sunday night in the “Bookstore Bar” in the "Library Bistro [20]" at the Alexis Hotel.

 
Current and former Board members (top, left to right)  Karen Krupka, Ramona Howerton, (bottom, left to right) the author, Maureen Malinowski, and Katrina Perez.

:: Next Year

Mark your calendars! Next year’s conference will celebrate SLA’s 100th birthday in Washington, DC,  June 14-17, 2009. The theme is "Information to Inspiration: Knowledge & Vision Shaping the Future."

This article is adapted from a report to the SLA Illinois Board of Directors.
Janice Keeler can be contacted at janice.keeler@nera.com [21].