Carly Scarberry – INFO 287 – The Hyperlinked Library

Jennifer Crain replied 1 weeks, 1 days ago

Awesome job presenting your information (I really need to play with Canva!)…. I appreciated how you question yourself, think aloud and metacognitively ask yourself questions during your presentation- this highlighted to me that you really did a deep dive and are continuing to process and engage with the material.
- Carly Scarberry replied 1 weeks, 1 days ago
  
  Thanks Jennifer!
  Canva is so user friendly. The only think I routinely forget to do is open Canva in Google Chrome not Firefox. Recording is only available in Google Chrome.
  
  I did actually learn a lot from diving into the idea of flat organization.
Rachel Syme replied 5 days, 5 hours ago

Hi @carlys! I really enjoyed your presentation on the flat organization model. I think that this is one of those terms that a lot of workplaces like to claim, but few actually implement. In my limited experience, school districts, libraries, and other government organizations seem to suffer from an excess of hierarchy. This hierarchy can make change incredibly slow or even nearly impossible, depending on your managers (and their managers, and their managers). I was particularly drawn to your slide detailing the pros and cons of a flat organizational structure, since it seemed like the “cons” are ones that we already see in our hierarchical organizations. I have worked at plenty of libraries with a traditional administration/middle management/employee structure that still suffer from a lack of accountability, a dearth of clear roles, no opportunities for advancement, and high employee burnout. If this is true in other libraries, it feels like we might not have much to lose if we try to implement the flat organization model in our libraries.
- Carly Scarberry replied 5 days, 5 hours ago
  
  @rcsyme I totally agree that flat organization is a term that is thrown around without real implementation. I was discussing this topic with my husband who is in the military, the ultimate hierarchical organization, and he was pointing out that some systems just cannot be hierarchical – like the military. The military is just too large of an organization to be flat and in cases of global war and peace people with experience and knowledge are a better choice for making decisions.
  
  However, I also agree that other government organizations have a unneeded surplus of managers and upper managers. Working in a school, I see this when I need to make a purchase for say book tape. Here is the scenario: Me: “Oh man I am out of tape. I need to email our secretary to request a purchase order.” I fill out the purchase order and email back to her. She evaulates whether we have funds in the school account for this tape (we never do) and sends the email to the district office secretary. The district office secretary evaluates it on whatever bases she uses and then emails it to the purchase request person. That person evaluates it again and then deems if I do indeed need book tape and where in the list of purchase requests my book tape request should be processed. All the while, I am stacking books on my desk that need repair which means those books are not available to our students.
  - Rachel Syme replied 4 days, 22 hours ago
    
    @carlys Yowzers! That is an almost comical level of beaurocracy. I’m so sorry you have to deal with all of that; it sounds like it must be so frustrating!
    - Carly Scarberry replied 4 days, 1 hours ago
      
      It can be very frustrating. A teacher this school year waiting three months for ink for her printer. It became a running joke. “Oh I would print that but you know I do not have ink in my printer.”
Ashley West replied 4 days, 1 hours ago

Hi Carly! What a cool idea to embed sound bites into each of your slides, as you said, you are very creative. Thank you for your reflection on flat organizations and how they can be adopted in your own context. The progression of your slides was interesting, I liked the deep dive you did into the top companies that claim to implement a flat organization. It made me wonder about pay structures for employees vs. the C-suite, is this another way for corporate America to underpay its workers under the guise of “innovation”. I wouldn’t put it past them. However in theory, I agree it’s necessary to sustain a culture of collaboration and progress. Thanks again!
- Carly Scarberry replied 4 days, 1 hours ago
  
  @ayeouest OOOOo I didn’t even think about salaries. I am sure there has to be some sort of distinction, right? Which would mean there has to be a hierarchical system anyway.
  
  You’re so smart!

Jennifer Crain replied 6 days, 2 hours ago

This is my third class of INFO 287, and the first one that has made the point that participatory is not always technology based. Highly agree!
Michael Stephens replied 23 hours, 2 minutes ago

@carlys YAY! That’s the big secret about this class. It’s masquerading is a technology class but it’s really about humanism. I appreciate this post well done.

INFO 287 – The Hyperlinked Library

@carlys

@carlys