Staff Development Day at Jacksonville Public

Richard Mott sent over this great description of JPL's latest Staff Development Day. There is detailed information posted on NEFLIN's Staff Development Interest Group Wiki (password = neflin) and photos from this event on NEFLIN's Flickr Page. Enjoy!

Note from Stephanie - JPL borrowed two LCD projectors from NEFLIN's Equipment Loan Program to use during their staff development day. This saved them the expense of renting equipment.
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“On March 20, all 350 or so full-time employees and many of the part-timers of the Jacksonville Public Library gathered at the Main Library downtown for our annual Staff Development Day (It’s the one non-holiday a year that the entire system is closed to the public). After registration and a continental breakfast, we gathered in the auditorium for a kickoff session highlighted by a hilarious keynote address by Bill Barnes, the library-world-famous cartoonist of the Unshelved comic strip.

The middle part of the day consisted of three 75-minute breakout session periods. Staff were able to choose from 37 different topics, ranging from Tai Chi and Stress Reduction Through Guided Imagery to Circulation Urban Legends to Excel Tips & Tricks to JPL Pioneers & Milestones: A History of the Jacksonville Public Library.

In the middle of all that, we squeezed in a catered hot lunch. We came back to the auditorium at the end of the day for a closing session, in which we acknowledged some of the individual achievements of the past year, gave a special presentation to Margaret Smith, a retiring librarian of over 30 years, announced a few of the over 70 door prize winners, and watched a humorous video in which a gorilla customer-turned-employee illustrates each of the goals of Destination:Next, our strategic plan.

One of the highlights of the day was our first ever ‘Transform Your Truck’ book cart decorating contest. It was patterned after Unshelved’s national Pimp My Book Cart contest, in which a normal book cart is transformed into some new creation altogether. Ten branches and units participated, transforming carts into a horse from the wild west (the grand prize winner), a pirate ship (the runner up), a hot air balloon, big bird, and many other flights of fancy.

The day had several goals: to make staff feel appreciated for the hard work they do all year, to learn some helpful stuff, to increase the spirit of unity among the staff, and to boost morale. We always see a lot of ways to improve, but most staff have expressed in a follow-up survey that we were successful in meeting each of these goals. If you have suggestions for making the most of Staff Development Day, we would love to hear them. Thanks for your interest in ours.”