Learning to lead: an analysis of current training programs for library leadership.

ABSTRACT

LEADERSHIP CONCEPTS AND THEORIES began appearing in the library literature in the late 1980s. By the 1990s a number of leadership development programs were being offered that were designed to develop librarian leadership skills. The programs had various objectives: to improve career development of early and midcareer librarians; to provide access to underrepresented minority groups in management; and to develop leadership skills. These programs, primarily multiday and residential in nature, employed a hybrid mix of training methods, including focus on leadership styles, self-discovery, and emphasis on skill-building. Despite the proliferation of these programs, evaluation research about them has primarily focused on self-reports from participants about their learning and their satisfaction with these programs. Systematic evaluation research, particularly utilizing a control group design or providing a longitudinal assessment, has not been widely conducted in the field.

SECTION ONE: LEADERSHIP THEORIES AND LEADERSHIP TRAINING: AN OVERVIEW

One of the leading management texts defines leadership as "The ability to influence, motivate, and direct others in order to attain desired objectives" (Hellriegel & Slocum, 1992, p. 467). Defining leadership seems straightforward, but explaining how leaders lead and, more importantly, what skills they use to lead, is a much more complicated and complex issue. Presumably, the designers of leadership development training programs have an underlying concept or set of concepts explaining what leadership means and how leaders can be developed. Below we outline some core assumptions behind various leadership development programs.

The first fundamental assumption is that leaders can be developed. Long a fiercely debated topic, it is now accepted as true. Modern leadership training is firmly based on the belief that individuals can be educated, trained, and developed to be leaders. A second assumption important to the discussion of leadership training is the belief that management differs from leadership and that managers can be transformed into leaders through training and development.

The exact nature of leadership skills remains elusive; the skill set of leaders is the focus of considerable discussion and research in the management literature as well as the library literature. "There is no simple formula, no rigorous science, no cookbook that leads inexorably to successful leadership" (Bennis & Nanus, 1985, p. 223). Leadership research has been built upon different theories of how leaders lead. Trait research focuses on the traits or personal qualities of leaders and stresses that successful leaders have certain abilities, skills, and personality characteristics. Leadership research does agree that certain personal traits and characteristics are especially important for leaders and for the exercise of leadership. For example, leadership researchers Kouzes and Posner identified 225 different values, traits, and characteristics as important for leaders. They subsequently identified 15 key traits out of this larger list. The most important leadership skills are for leaders to be honest, forward-looking, inspiring, and competent (Kouzes & Posner, 2002, p. 25). Taken together, these skills constitute leader "credibility," which is the key factor that elevates leaders above other competent individuals (Kouzes & Posner, 1993). Extensive research conducted by Kouzes and Posner over a two-decade period has attempted to assess what characteristics leaders should possess. Table 1 presents a summary of the most important leadership characteristics and the percentage of respondents selecting each leadership characteristic. Kouzes and Posner repeated their research three times. The data shows that followers consistently picked four characteristics: leaders should be honest, forward-looking, competent, and inspiring. These are the top four leadership characteristics followers expect in their leaders.

Some theories of leadership have been based on the assumption that certain physical, social, and personal characteristics are inherent in leaders. Trait research generally also leads to the conclusion that leaders with certain traits will exhibit certain kinds of behavior and that behaviors are likely to be consistent. On the other hand, research based on behavioral theories of leadership began to focus on the differences in the actions of effective and ineffective leaders, particularly behaviors that affect the performance of subordinates. During the 1970s and into the 1980s leadership began to be viewed as a two-part role. The term leader had been applied loosely to anyone who was managing others--a social role. There also exists a distinct and separate role that describes how a leader might define and structure tasks and the roles of subordinates (Conger, 1992, p. 10). Behavioral theories also began to assume that leaders can act differently as circumstances warrant. The contingency view of leadership, as espoused by Fiedler, House, and others, emphasizes the importance of using certain leadership behaviors in different situations (Fiedler, 1971; House & Mitchell, 1974). Variables such as group atmosphere, task structure, and the leader's positional power are all important to this view. The Ohio State Leadership studies found that an effective leader used a behavioral style identified as "considerate" with followers. "Consideration" is defined as the extent to which leaders have job relationships characterized by trust, two-way communication, respect for the ideas of others, and consideration for the feelings and personal goals of others. A second important characteristic of successful leaders is "initiating structure." Initiating structure is the extent to which leaders define and structure their roles and the roles of others through activities such as planning, communicating, scheduling, and so forth. Taken together, consideration and initiating structure are the two characteristics of effective leaders based on this model (Kerr, Schriesheim, Murphy, & Stogdill, 1974).

James MacGregor Burns (Burns, 1978) extends the Ohio State Leadership model and defines leadership as transformational (a focus on change) and transactional (a focus on process and people). Leadership involves engaging not only the heads but also the hearts of others. Transformational leaders lead by motivating others and by appealing to higher ideals and moral values. These leaders can inspire others to think about problems in a new way. Key transformational skills for leaders are long-term vision, empowerment, and coaching. Transformational leaders are able to create trust: "To create trust [leaders] must have competence, congruity (integrity), constancy, and caring" (Bennis & Goldsmith, 1994, pp. 5-6).

Transactional leadership focuses on the initiating structure--the relationship between the leader and his or her followers. Leaders understand how to motivate followers by inspiring a vision of what is to be accomplished. Leaders seem to be able to pull people toward a large vision and have the capacity to create a compelling vision that encourages people to move to a new place. Transactional skills involve the ability to obtain results, solve problems, plan, and organize. Leaders must also be effective communicators. None of the other characteristics, or a combination of these, will be enough if a leader lacks excellent communication ability. As leadership theory evolved, organizational development experts began to view leadership development as a process; leadership trainers began to focus on teaching leadership skills that emphasized visioning as well as developing relationships and people-oriented skills to inspire others.

In any case, there is an emerging agreement on a number of common attributes shared by leaders. Leaders are more than managers. Leadership and management are typically contrasted with one another. Management is about what things get done, while leadership is about how things get done. Management involves accomplishing tasks, while leadership involves influencing and guiding a course of action. Management is usually understood as a skill set that includes planning, organizing, directing, and managing workers and work activities. Leadership, on the other hand, includes the ability to create a vision of the future, engage others in the cocreation and/or perfection of that vision, describe it in a compelling and powerful manner, and create an environment where stakeholders inside and outside the organization work together productively and effectively to implement the vision successfully. Table 2 summarizes how management and leadership differ.

SECTION TWO: LIBRARIANS, LEADERSHIP, AND LEADERSHIP SKILLS

Leadership as a desired skill or competency did not appear frequently in the library literature until the early 1990s. Don Riggs, in conducting his research for a book on library leadership, found only five entries for librarianship and leaders in Library Literature for the years 1975-1981 (Riggs, 1982, preface). Karp and Murdock (1998) point out that the word "leadership" is not used by Library Literature as a subject heading and conclude that "Leadership as a concept ... seems not to be concretely acknowledged as a legitimate entity that merits clearly identified discussion and definition" (Karp & Murdock, 1998, p. 251).

Many states developing continuing education plans in the 1980s and 1990s did not yet identify leadership skills as a key training issue. For example, the California Continuing Education Plan (O'Donnell & Virgo, 1992) defined continuing education needs in five areas: financial management, management administration, communications/personnel relations, multicultural diversity, and technology.

In this plan leadership skills are defined as a subset of training in communications and personnel relations. One evaluator commented that classifying leadership in this manner "may reflect the fact that in the early 1990's economic and demographic factors were considerably different than they are today.... Under current conditions, leadership training assumes an importance that was lacking a decade ago" (Hinman & Williams, 2002, p. 54).

By the 1990s and beyond, the need for leadership had been well established in the profession. Recruitment became a major issue for the profession as the demographics of librarianship changed. How to fill librarian positions in coming years is an important issue for the field at large. Currently, approximately 136,000 librarians are employed in U.S. academic, public, school, and special libraries. Estimates from the U.S. Bureau of Statistics about library manpower and statistics from the Association for Research Libraries' (ARL) 1990 and 1994 salary surveys (Wilder, 1995, 2002) indicate there is likely to be a serious shortage of librarians by the year 2010, when an estimated 83,866 librarians will reach the age of 65. The Library Administration and Management Association (LAMA), a division of the American Library Association (ALA), estimates that one-half of the currently employed library directors in the United States will retire between 2002 and 2010 (Olley, 2002, p. 9).

Diversification of the profession has also been identified as a leadership issue. Throughout the 1970s and 1980s the Council on Library Resources and other professional associations identified a need to increase diversity in the field of librarianship. A number of leadership programs were started both to recruit more minorities into the profession and to develop their leadership skills. ARL currently offers a program for minority midcareer librarians in academic librarianship. The Leadership and Career Development Program has as its purpose increasing the diversity of ARL directors. The (ALA's) Spectrum program and scholarship are also a notable effort to enhance career opportunities for minority leaders. (1)

At the same time, library professionals are becoming aware of the need for leadership skills. For instance, a 2001 survey of continuing education needs for staff in California libraries completed by the Evaluation and Training Institute (ETI) for the California State Library found that more than 40 percent of the respondents had taken leadership and career training in the areas of improving their written and verbal communication skills, conflict resolution, supervision, and stress management; participants also wanted additional leadership training in the areas of creativity, innovation, cultural competency, supervision, and stress management (ETI, 2001).

Leadership training has perhaps also been stymied by a lack of agreement about what constitutes a key set of leadership skills for librarians. Library leadership has typically been described more in terms of stories about individuals. There are few lists of desired characteristics, and there is as yet no accepted core set of competencies, experiences, or aptitudes (Mech, 1996; Hernon, Powell, & Young, 2001; Sweeney, 1994; Berry, 2002). Lynch, in an article on theory and practice in library management and leadership, concludes that the library literature reflects many of the leadership approaches described in general management literature, but she also notes that the contingency and situational models, along with team-based leadership, are the most common orientation for library leadership training (Lynch, 2004).

There is no common vocabulary among library educators or professionals about what constitutes the core body of leadership skills. Added to this issue is the complex problem of defining skills appropriate to librarians working in different types of libraries and librarians in different stages of their careers. Continuing education studies consistently show that librarians can identify a wide variety of training needs as "leadership" related. The question of the legitimacy of leadership in librarianship has changed, however, and insights into what constitutes library leadership can be garnered from a number of sources, although no unifying statement of key leadership skills has yet been produced by a body such as the American Library Association or other professional groups.

In defining "leadership" the articles on leadership discuss applied skills and demonstrate a considerable diversity of opinion about the nature of the key skills. Articles and research on librarians and libraries were examined, as were competency statements prepared by professional associations that discuss leadership. Articles describing the need for library leadership suggest that leaders should be flexible, energetic, empathetic, wise, creative, courageous, principled, gregarious, determined, and possess a sense of humor (Sweeney, 1994). A review of the writing about library leadership describes the essential leadership skills for librarians as the need to be assertive and self-aware (Cottam, 1990), to communicate a vision (Riggs, 1993), to empower others (Sullivan, 1999; Sheldon, 1991), to be innovative and creative (Sheldon, 1991), to be technically and professionally competent (Sheldon, 1991), to have the trust of the staff (Sheldon, 1991), and to value people (Creth, 1988). Hernon's study of ARL directors identified more than 100 skills, traits and areas of knowledge that are considered desirable attributes for an ARL library director/leader (Hernon, Powell, & Young, 2001).

Progress has been made to define core competencies for librarians in a number of areas (Abels, Jones, Latham, Magnoni, & Marshall, 2003; Jones, 1998), although competencies related to library professionals in specific settings have not been defined or discussed broadly. Competencies are defined as "the knowledge, skills, attitudes, values, behaviors or characteristics that people need to do a job successfully" (Bryant & Poustie, 2001). Another definition of competencies defines them as "observable behaviors that reflect knowledge, skills and attitudes learned by individual staff" (Mason, Creth, & Wetherbee, 2001, p. II 3). Competencies increasingly are being defined as a means to correlate desired behaviors with job performance. Competencies can be improved with training, and they are being used to help establish the need for training and development and to specify what performance the training should produce. Competency statements defining key leadership attributes have been developed by a number of different library associations and organizations. The California Library Association (CLA) Statement of Professional Competencies for librarians describes a leadership competency whereby a leader "set[s] an example for others to follow ... values the contributions of others ... and helps them to achieve their full potential" (CLA, 1997). The New Jersey Library Association (NJLA) adopted a leadership competency that defines a leader as one who sees the long view, articulates the direction clearly and enlists others to jointly work to achieve it. The NJLA statement also includes the same phrases found in the CLA leadership competency description quoted above

The Special Library Association (SLA) has adopted a leadership competency statement that simply says that a special librarian "provides leadership" (SLA, 1997). The Queens (NY) Public Library statement defines the leadership of team leaders, which involves management meetings, keeping people informed, promoting team effectiveness, acting as a leader, and communicating a competing vision (Queens Public Library, n.d.). The San Jose Public Library competency statements define leadership as "setting a worthy example for others to follow; valuing the contributions of others and helping them achieve their full potential, and developing, coaching and mentoring staff effectively" (Mason, Creth & Wetherbee, 2001, p. II 3). The Toronto Public Library proposes that the list of competencies of successful leaders should include innovative thinking, strategic vision, excitement, and effective communication. Successful library leaders should have the tactical capability to be action oriented, pragmatic and hands-on; they should fully delegate tasks to empower people, use consultative decision-making to involve others, and be empathetic to demonstrate sensitivity to individual and group needs (Bryant & Poustie, 2001).

A review article of competency statements in the Annual Review of Information Science and Technology found that many such competency studies produced lists of similar competencies, including interpersonal skills, management of technology, knowledge of information sources, and communication skills (Logan & Hsieh-Yee, 2001, p. 440). In preparing the review for this publication, we found that leadership is sometimes included as a specific competency for librarians. In other situations leadership can be described as a set of certain characteristics, such as honesty, integrity, ethics, and so forth. Certain skills such as communications skills are almost always included as key competencies in many of the statements.

One of the few published reports of efforts to link needed leadership skills and training outcomes was the Career Development and Assessment Center for Librarians, which was developed to assess specific leadership skills among librarians in the Northwest. The article describes the center as "the first experimental application of assessment technology to individual professional career development ... in librarianship" (Hiatt, 1992, p. 513). The Career Development and Assessment Center for Librarians operated between 1979 and 1983 in the Northwest. An assessment center defines a process of using multiple assessment techniques (situational exercises, job simulations, etc.) to evaluate individual library workers. The CDACL was able to identify fourteen key management skills in two categories, management and communication, critical for librarians. The skills included listening, oral communication, sensitivity, writing ability, and management skills, including decisiveness, delegation, flexibility, initiative, decision-making, leadership, management control, planning, organizing, problem analysis, and stress tolerance. Eighty-nine librarians were evaluated through the assessment center process. The three strongest managerial skills for this group were decisiveness, listening, and initiative, while the three weakest skills for the group overall were judgment, management control, and flexibility. Largely as a result of these findings, the University of Washington Graduate School of Library and Information Science later conducted training for librarians that focused on these skill weaknesses. The Seattle Public Library later used these study results to develop assessment technique training for supervisors (Hiatt, 1992).

SECTION THREE: LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT TRAINING: LEARNING TO BE A LEADER

Individuals do not develop and hone their leadership skills just in the classroom. In fact, significant leadership development takes place in the workplace and elsewhere. The most important nontraining influences on leadership development are a result of job assignments, adversity or hardships, and personal contacts (McCall, Lombardim, & Morrison, 1988). McCall's research found that, for a majority of leaders, job assignments were a major influence on leadership development, as leaders coped with job variety and with new tasks and unfamiliar situations. Jobs also required managers to build or change relationships and led to learning, as did jobs with high levels of risk or responsibility, for example, jobs with consequences (McCauley & Brutus, 1998).

Hardship experiences found to be influential on leadership development include being fired or demoted, making business mistakes, experiencing personal trauma, or being responsible for downsizing. The third, but less significant, influence on leadership development is in the area of personal relationships. In less than 10 percent of the cases, the leaders felt that relationships with bosses or role models at work had influenced their leadership development (McCauley, 2001, p. 352).

The influence of different organizational contexts on leadership has also been proven. The organizational context can influence leadership development in a number of important ways, including the linkage of leadership development to compensation plans and rewards and the extent to which the organization supports leadership development (McCauley, 2001, p. 347).

Leadership skills are also developed through training programs. The ability to learn is important in leadership training. At the most basic level, the ability to learn leadership skills is a complex mix of motivation, personal orientation, and skills. Below we give an overview of leadership development approaches, which are discussed in terms of the delivery format of the training, the types of leadership training approach used, and the exercises typically associated with each type of approach.

Leadership Training Development Models

The variety of learning approaches in leadership development is vast. This section briefly outlines some of these approaches based on the work of Conger (1992; Conger & Benjamin, 1999). Leadership development training can be described and grouped according to the type of training model used and the type of leadership development exercises employed in a program. Conger has grouped leadership training approaches used in corporate leadership development into four types: skill-building programs (executive training programs offered by various universities are an example); intensive feedback programs (for example, the Leadership Development Program, Center for Creative Leadership, Greensboro, North Carolina); conceptual approaches (for example, The Leadership Challenge); and personal growth approaches (Outward Bound and other physical challenge programs). Detailed descriptions of different learning development programs and the learning approaches used in these programs can be found in Conger (1992) and Conger and Benjamin (1999).

Overview and Description of Library Leadership Development Training

The current plethora of leadership articles and programs in librarianship, as identified in this article, seem to indicate that, although leadership training and development programs were largely unknown in the 1980s, this has now changed. Leadership programs are defined here according to criteria established by the Association for Research Libraries Office of Leadership and Management Services (ARL/OLMS). Programs are held regularly that have as their focus "leadership development, not technical skills or policy analysis" (Neely & Winston, 1999). The first formal leadership development for librarians appears to be the Senior Fellows Program developed in 1982 and still held at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). Another early program that focused on staff development at the University of Missouri-Columbia was funded by the Council on Library Resources in 1984, but only six programs were identified that have existed since the first half of the 1990s. Since 1996, however, the emphasis on leadership in librarianship has increased and more leadership programs have been developed: twenty-one library leadership programs appear to have been founded between 1996 and 2002.

The ARL deserves special mention as a long-time leader in offering a menu of leadership and management programs. ARL, through its Office of Leadership and Management Services, has been providing leadership activities for academic libraries for more than twenty-five years and has the longest and most consistent record of promoting leadership training and skills-building training programs in the profession. Thousands of librarians, primarily from academic institutions, have benefited from one or more of the OLMS programs, services, publications, consultations, or training workshops offered over the years. Table 3 summarizes the different types of leadership development programs that were identified for this review. A brief description of each program is given, and some information is provided about the type of program and the learning objectives. Many of these programs are not pure types, and many employ a number of different types of leadership developmental approaches. Mentors are used in many programs; some programs have follow-up exercises and activities, and others include "leadership projects" that are to be completed by the participants.

In 2003 more than thirty library leadership programs were held annually or biannually. Mirroring the leadership development literature that has developed, however, most of the training is descriptive, and there continues to be very little published research on the impacts and outcomes of these programs in the management literature and almost none at all about library leadership development training in the library literature.

A management researcher noted that "Knowledge about developmental experiences in managerial careers has relied heavily on retrospective reports of executives and case studies of developmental interventions in specific companies.... There is a need for more ... examination of the impact of these [experiences]" (McCauley, 2001, p. 378). This statement holds true for library leadership development training as well.

Of the programs identified, the majority are located in the United States, but one exists in Australia and another in Canada. International programs are also offered by the Bertlesman Foundation and the Mortenson Center at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, which are ongoing programs over a period of months. A number of the programs are focused on statewide library development, including programs in Illinois, Michigan, Nebraska, New Jersey, New York, New Mexico, North Carolina, Ohio, Texas, and Wyoming. The programs in Michigan and Texas (started in 1990 and 1994, respectively) appear to be the oldest continuing leadership programs.

Criteria for defining types of leadership development programs include (1) the type of program (residential, etc.); (2) the intended audience, for example, the inclusion or exclusion of certain individuals; (3) the objectives of the program, such as the types of behaviors and skill sets that are identified or are to be developed during the training, and the intent of the program; (4) the size of the trainee group; and (5) the trainers or faculty used in the program. Most of the library programs fall into the category of a residential program or workshop format. A majority of the programs appear to be set up as residential programs that last either multiple days or a week. Selected participants spend multiple days in a retreat or resort setting.

Leadership development programs appear to be selective in terms of participants. Participants in these programs may be selected from a national pool of candidates and are likely to have been selected through a competitive application process. Participants may have to meet certain criteria, such as being at the associate director level at an academic library, holding a library degree from an ALA-accredited master's program, or having five years of administrative or managerial experience. Participants are expected to spend classroom and social time together. The time spent in the program is considered part of the learning experience.

The content of these programs is likely to emphasize personal growth and development along with leadership skills development. These programs are usually intended to allow participants to bond into a cohort or group, and many of the exercises are intended to encourage building long-term relationships. Mentors are included in many of these programs and provide instruction and coaching for individual participants.

Leadership-focused programs are typically a series of sessions that meet over time from one to several days. These programs may be structured so that participants attend one or two days of training distributed over a period of time at a central site. Participants attend programs during the day but do not spend free time together or stay overnight. Socializing or socialization with this type of program is limited by the format. Examples of internal programs of this type include the Library of Congress Leadership Development Program begun in 1995 and the Harris County (Texas) Leadership Development program. These programs could be formal degree programs, offer continuing education credit, or operate at the local level only. They may be specific to an institution or offered by a regional cooperative organization for its membership. Classes are likely to be the same size as in a residential program, but the application process is less likely to be competitive. Participants may be expected to have a number of years of work experience and a number of years of supervisory or management experience as criteria for admission. On the other hand, these programs may be geared to early or midcareer professionals or minorities. Interaction is generally restricted to the class session periods, and there is less likely to be social time or follow-up activities associated with these programs. Program content can vary and may include focus on personal development as well as building specific leadership skills; mentoring may be part of the program. Organizations may offer internal leadership workshops for their staff based on this type of model. Harris County Public Library is an example of this type of program, as is that in San Jose, California.

Workshops offer training usually in one- or two-day formats with no overnight activities. Applicants typically "sign up" to attend, and their entrance requirements may be limited to attendance quotas. Continuing education credit might be available for completing these programs. Workshops are likely to be offered on a one-time basis and focus on developing one or more leadership skills. Mentoring is less likely to be offered in this type of training format.

Description of Learning Approaches

According to published descriptions, many programs use hybrid approaches to leadership development, including feedback methods, conceptual approaches, and skill-building exercises (see Table 4).

Feedback intensive approaches may include multisource, 360 feedback or assessment center approaches or psychological inventories. The Nevada Leadership Institute and the Monroe County Library Leadership Institute used a 360 assessment instrument, the Leadership Practices Inventory (LPI), based on the work of Kouzes and Posner (2002). Feedback instruments involve having the participants rated by superiors, peers, and subordinates on a number of competencies. Research on 360 feedback approaches has shown that use of these tools does lead to increased job performance (Atwater, Roush, & Fichthal 1995). These programs also increase participant self-awareness, broaden and change perspectives, and lead to successful goal attainment (McCauley, 2001, p. 374).

Conceptual leadership approaches involve theories; the focus of this approach is on giving managers an understanding of what leadership attributes and behaviors are desirable and what it takes to be an effective leader (McCauley, 2001, p. 359). Lectures, case studies, and discussions are typical tools, but these types of programs may also incorporate experiential exercises and feedback instruments. Descriptions of library leadership curricula indicate that conceptual approaches are incorporated into almost all library leadership development programs to some extent. For example, the Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL) Harvard Leadership program includes presentations, discussions, case studies, group sessions, social time, assigned readings, and interaction with mentors. The UCLA Senior Fellow Program includes a program of readings, presentations, site visits, group discussions, reflection, and self-exploration. The Snowbird program includes self-exploration and discovery through learning activities, group discussions, and interaction with mentors.

Skill-building programs may utilize practical exercises in modules. "Within a module, participants are given information and strategies for executing the skill, observe the skill in action, and practice the skill themselves" (McCauley, 2001, p. 360). Techniques might include role-playing with videotape feedback, group exercises, and simulations.

Leadership programs also used profile instruments such as Myers-Briggs, which has been utilized by the Northern Exposure Leadership Institute, or the Enneagram assessment tools. These tools can provide helpful insights into a leader's personality, characteristics and preferences.

Mentoring and coaching are also effective development tools; they serve as a means of matching people for the purpose of learning and personal and professional growth. These activities can also integrate new individuals into the profession and strengthen leadership skills among women and minorities.

A number of the library leadership development programs include mentors in the program design, particularly those developed by ARL. The UCLA Senior Fellow program incorporates this type of approach as do the Northern Exposure to Leadership Institute held in Canada, the Aurora Leadership Institute held in Australia, the TALL Texans program, and the Snowbird Institute.

Personal growth programs help participants to develop serf-understanding through an exploration of their personal values and interests. The most common forms are outdoor adventure programs and approaches that use psychological exercises to help participants explore their inner drives and values. The Outward Bound model of a physical challenge course is used infrequently, if at all, for training librarians. The Wyoming leadership program is one that may incorporate some elements of physical challenge. A more limited type of personal growth program involves exercises and self-assessment. For example, in the ACRL Harvard program, participants are asked to create a personal "Leadership Autobiography" (Saunders, 1999), while participants in the TALL Texans program prepare a Personal Action Agenda.

A number of programs also foster networking with other colleagues and extending personal development through activities beyond the class room. For instance, the TALL Texans and UCLA Fellows programs and other programs include follow-up activities. The Snowbird Institute offers activities such as a listserv, informal reunions at annual library conferences, interaction with other Snowbird attendees, and mentoring relationships after the completion of the program.

The number of participants is limited for many of the programs, with a typical limit of about 20 to 40 attendees. The Stanford-California Institute was unusually large, with approximately 145 participants at the 2002 session.

Financing for programs has varied. Typically participants pay some form of tuition. Many of the programs are not sell-financing, and the programs have relied on corporate sponsorship (SIRSI, epixtech), or use of federal Library Services and Technology (LSTA) funding. Other underwriters include state or regional cooperatives, universities, and associations.

Library leadership program faculty members are drawn from a number of sources. Consultants with library experience and professional degrees conduct many of the state-based programs, including programs in New Mexico, Ohio, Michigan, Nebraska, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, and Texas. The Aurora, Snowbird, and YSLead seminars are also conducted by consultants. Academic faculty, often in combination with consultants and perhaps practitioners, conduct a number of programs. The ACRL Harvard Leadership program involves Harvard faculty, while the North Carolina leadership program involves library school faculty. Northern Exposure and the Stanford-California Institute also use academic faculty in their programs.

SECTION FOUR: RESULTS FROM LIBRARY LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT TRAINING

How effective has leadership training been for librarians? What has it accomplished? Are there any generalized findings about leadership development training? Can the impacts and outcomes of training be stated based on the results of the evaluations that have been performed? Only a few published sources were identified that discussed formal evaluation results from leadership training programs. The bulk of the published materials reporting on library leadership training fall into the category of participant self-reporting or descriptive narratives of program components. Much of the published literature contains statements excerpted from participant comments and personal recounting of the leadership experience (Nichols, 2002; Gilreath, 2003; Bilyeu, Gaunt, & Glogowski, 2000; Mech, 1996). Unfortunately, participant overviews are of limited value in evaluating the efficacy of leadership training. These reviews do little to address the questions of whether the participants actually learned anything new, whether that learning is retained and applied in the workplace, and whether that knowledge or those skills improved the individual or improved workplace performance. From a reading of these overviews, as well as the authors' experience with postworkshop evaluations, the most that can be gleaned from self-reporting about library leadership programs is that reporting participants are "satisfied," believe they received "benefits," and were able to extend their "professional networking."

The other types of evaluations available consist mainly of summaries of post-training evaluations. Most training programs end with participants completing evaluation forms. Some programs also use pretests to assess what participants expect or want to learn and posttests to determine whether their expectations were met. Only a few reports are available that summarize these types of results; presumably most evaluation results remain unpublished in the library literature. A search of deeper Web sources did not reveal much in the way of gray literature, such as reports or unpublished documents.

Evaluation Research and Criteria on Library Leadership Development

This section summarizes the available published evaluation results from library leadership programs. Three examples of more in-depth evaluations include research on the Northwest Career Development Assessment Center (Hiatt, 1992); the Stanford-California Institute (Hinman & Williams, 2002); and the Snowbird Institute (Neely & Winston, 1999). All rely on multiple evaluations.

Hiatt's work reports on multiple evaluation results conducted to assess the efficacy of the Northwest Career Development and Assessment Center for Librarians in developing specific leadership skills among librarians in the Northwest. Three evaluation rounds were conducted by Battelle Research and by Hiatt. Neely and Winston's research examined the effect of the Snowbird Institute on the 213 participants who attended during the years 1990-98. Their objective was to determine the impact of the program on the career background and career progression of participants subsequent to participation in the institute; to detect whether there was an impact on the level and type of involvement in leadership and professional activities; and to assess participant perceptions of the impact of the program on their career development (Neely & Winston, 1999).

Holly Hinman and Joan Frye Williams prepared an evaluation of all three of the Stanford-California Twenty-First-Century Library Institutes. Their summative report provides data on each of the evaluator-administered surveys that were conducted after the institute to identify what participants had learned, how participants intended to apply what they had learned, and how participants intended to use information to change their organizations. The evaluation report provides an overview of the entire evaluation process.

Building upon the three summative reports, this section discusses leadership development results organized according to criteria derived from the management literature and used in the library literature to support and justify the need for leadership development. The criteria used are: (1) participant expectations and satisfaction; (2) individual personal development; (3) career advancement and mobility; (4) development of desired leadership skills; (5) formation of leadership cohorts; and (6) organizational impact or performance. Two other criteria are given in the literature as reasons for leadership development: recruitment to the profession and creating diversity among library leadership. The available evaluation materials do not include sufficient discussion of results in these areas to discuss them in any detail, and therefore they are omitted from this review.

Participant Expectations and Satisfaction

There is a considerable body of information about what participants say they wish to accomplish by participation in leadership training. The Stanford-California Institute participants, for example, had many expectations; frequently these typically track the hopes expressed by participants in other leadership programs. In summary, Stanford-California Institute participants sought the following from leadership training: (1) to gain inspiration from new ideas; (2) to develop leadership skills; (3) to learn how to implement change, communicate with others, lead others, and work with people with different styles; (4) to learn to motivate an entrenched workforce; (5) to create a vision; (6) to advance their careers; (7) to develop their personal characteristics; (8) to increase assertiveness and self confidence; (9) to experience personal rejuvenation; (10) to gain access to experts and resources on library issues; (11) to network with colleagues; and (12) to learn about the role of information technology. The evaluators concluded that the participants in the first institute (2000) "arrived at the Institute with a diverse range of expectations, many of which were fulfilled" (Hinman & Williams, 2002, p. 21). The evaluators also concluded that "[o]verall, participants were exceptionally pleased with the Institute experience and gave it a 'very satisfied' rating on the survey" (Hinman & Williams, 2002, p. 21). The 2000 postinstitute evaluations conducted by the Evaluation and Training Institute found that 94 percent of the participants said the results of their participation were what they had hoped. When asked if the institute met their expectations, 86 percent said "yes" in 2000 and 96 percent said "yes" in 2001 (Hinman & Williams, 2002, p. 37).

Individual Self-Development

Those participants at the Northwest Assessment Center who self-reported indicated they prioritized their continuing education needs and could successfully identify their personal skills on which to build their career goals. They had attained a level of self-knowledge useful for life and career planning, acquired managerial information and skills they could use in their organizations, and achieved an understanding of what higher managerial responsibility would entail. Thirty-four percent of the Assessment Center participants reported improved self-awareness, and 16 percent said their self-confidence increased as a result of undergoing the Assessment Center process.

The Stanford-California Institute participants also reported that participation in the institute made a difference in their personal development. Seventy-seven percent said they would take more risk, 80 percent said their confidence in their own leadership ability had increased, 90 percent said the institute had influenced their careers, and 94 percent said they had changed their thinking about professional issues since attending the institute (Hinman & Williams, 2002).

Results of various evaluations by participants in other programs also speak of personal development. A participant in the ACRL Harvard program said, "I've learned a lot about my own organization, my leaders ... and most importantly about myself" (Saunders, 1999).

A TALL Texan Institute participant said, "The Institute gave me an opportunity to zero in on positive ways to improve what I am and to focus on the direction my life is taking" (Berry, 2002). Results from the postinstitute evaluation of the Nevada Leadership Institute conducted in 2003 found that participants all responded in a strong positive manner to the program. They felt the institute had helped them to examine their personal leadership style, to develop a vision for the future, to gain knowledge about leadership, and to clarify their professional goals (Wetherbee & Mason, 2003).

Career Advancement and Mobility

The Stanford-California Institute evaluation for career advancement and mobility compared a control group with a treatment group (those who attended the institute) in order to determine if there were differences between the two groups that might have occurred as a result of the leadership training. Of the participants, only 24 percent had changed jobs or received a promotion since attending. For the control group, 45 percent had changed jobs or received a promotion. "Seventy-six of the participants felt the Institute had had some impact on their career move" (Hinman & Williams, 2002, p. 36). These results were similar for the control group. The evaluators concluded that members of the control group had more career mobility but otherwise were similar to the institute participants in these dimensions.

The Snowbird assessment found 38.6 percent of the participants were still in the same positions they occupied before attending the institute. Thirty percent had become heads of branches or departments. Nearly 7 percent were assistant or associate deans or directors, and 14 percent were deans or directors (Neely & Winston, 1999, p. 6).

The Snowbird study did not use a control group, and therefore it is not possible to determine whether the Snowbird participants were more successful in their career development than others who did not attend. In assessing participants' self-reported attitudes to the institute, 40 percent responded that the institute contributed somewhat to their obtaining subsequent positions, while 19 percent report that it contributed a great deal; 48.6 percent said that they believed their career paths would have been different without the Snowbird experience. The research authors concluded that it "is difficult to identify a direct relationship between participation in the Snowbird Leadership Institute in terms of career progression and greater participation in leadership activities.... It is difficult to determine the relationship between the impact of the institute and the attainment of subsequent positions" (Neely &Winston, 1999, p. 10).

Of the Assessment Center participating librarians, 80 percent reported that participating in the assessment process improved their career mobility. Hiatt also followed up with librarians after ten years and found that the participants still felt that their participation had been valuable to them, but not all of the participants felt it had had an impact on their career (Hiatt, 1992, p. 539).

Leadership Activities

For the Stanford-California Institute participants, 28 percent had been elected or appointed to a professional association, and 25 percent had authored an article for a professional publication. Forty percent had delivered a presentation at a conference, and 65 percent had mentored someone since the institute. The results for the control group, however, were similar. Twenty-nine percent of the control group had been elected or appointed to office in a professional association; 24 percent had authored an article for a professional publication. Thirty-one percent had delivered a presentation at a conference, and 53 percent had mentored someone since the institute.

Snowbird Institute survey results show that the number of institute participants who had published journal articles, books, book chapters, book reviews, and conference papers had all increased in relationship to the number of individuals who had participated in these activities before attending Snowbird. The authors suggest caution in interpreting these numbers since they point out that nearly 40 percent of the survey respondents are still in the same position as when they attended the institute (Neely & Winston, 1999, pp. 8, 10). They also note that elapsed time may have an influence on these numbers as participants move forward in their careers. It is not yet possible to determine what the long-term effect of increased access to leadership training for librarians will be. The efficacy of these programs is not proven, but it seems clear that at the level of individual participation, they clearly respond to felt needs.

Organizational Impact

Seventy-nine percent of Stanford-California Institute participants indicated that they had suggested changes in their organization as a result of attending the institute, and 81 percent saw their changes implemented. Changes included implementing mentoring, improved understanding of a service group, increased adoption of information technology, added staff training and development, improved leadership skills, and improved customer service. In the control group, however, 86 percent had suggested changes, and 89 percent had had their changes implemented--percentages higher than for the institute participants. The conclusion of the authors of the evaluation report after an analysis of the detailed responses from the control group was "It is evident that the Institute participants displayed more creative thinking and broader understanding of libraries" (Hinman & Williams, 2002, p. 47). This does not explain, however, why the control group performed better than their institute counterparts in on-the-job success in implementing changes.

Twenty-four percent of the librarians in the study group said their job performance had improved as a result of the Assessment Center process (Hiatt, 1992. p. 530). Assessment Center librarians also said the leadership process had helped them to acquire managerial information and skills they could use in their organizations, as well as achieve an understanding of what higher managerial responsibility would entail (Hiatt, 1992, p. 537).

Formation of Leadership Cohorts

Collegiality can play an important role in both the positive or negative experiences of leadership development participants, and in long-term relationships it can have an impact on career development and mobility. The Stanford-California Institute participants said that 81 percent of them had remained in contact through listservs and email (62 percent), personal meetings (32 percent), and professional association contacts (44 percent). Seventy-six percent of Snowbird Institute attendees reported that collegial relationships were important, particularly informal interactions with other participants, as opposed to listserv activities or collegial reunions.

Problems with Interpreting Impacts of Leadership Training

Aside from the three studies just discussed, very few published evaluations on library leadership training programs have been designed to yield stable and valid results about the impact of these programs on the abilities and careers of training program participants. Far too much of the evaluation information that is available from most leadership programs is self-reports about participant experiences; obviously this does not help to isolate direct impacts of these programs. Another important hindrance to better outcomes assessment of library leadership training is the lack of a clear and agreed definition of "leadership skills." The absence of a widely accepted definition of leadership skills for librarians is a substantial barrier to evaluation of program impact, as is the lack of a shared or defined definition of what constitutes a "leadership skill." In the absence of defined criteria, it is difficult to determine through research the efficacy of training programs.

While the Stanford-California Institute, Assessment Center, and Snowbird Institute evaluations have endeavored to improve data collection and evaluation by using multiple methods of collecting data, control groups, and even longitudinal data, problems still exist with data interpretation. For instance, the control group and treatment groups are very similar in composition, and this raises questions about whether the control and participant groups in these studies really are two independent groups that can be compared with one another.

As noted earlier, the Assessment Center research and the Stanford-California Institute research found that the comparison between the assessment group and the control group yielded only minor differences. In both cases, the control group and the treatment group, rather than having been drawn from two separate pools, seem to be drawn from the same group. Therefore, the experimental design using a control group is not useful for detecting meaningful differences in the two groups as a result of leadership development training. As the researchers noted in the evaluation of the Assessment Center, both the assessment group and applicant group were similar in that they both were composed of "highly motivated, career-oriented groups of librarians" (Hiatt, 1992, p. 537).

Although the studies did conduct longitudinal evaluations of participants, difficulties arise in interpreting whether participants publish more or engage in more professional activities due to their leadership training or because of other factors that have not been identified. More research that controls for the passage of time and other possible external factors is needed to better understand the interrelationships between leadership development training and subsequent career activities.

CONCLUSION

There is no doubt that leadership concepts and leadership training have diffused broadly into the library profession. Due to significant changes in recruitment for the profession, and the recognized need for leaders at all levels of libraries, leadership training has been developed and offered by libraries, professional organizations, and state library professional associations, as well as academic and nonprofit foundations. Most of the leadership training programs appear to have been developed by the profession for the profession. These programs touch library personnel, degreed and otherwise, at various career levels. Interestingly, those institutions now making significant investments in leadership training for librarians do not appear to include any significant leadership programs developed or offered by library and information science programs. While faculty from some schools are involved in teaching in one or more library leadership programs, no programs hosted by library schools were identified. It may be that graduate schools offer courses on leadership, but we did not examine the curriculum offerings of the different schools to determine if schools are offering a course titled "Leadership."

It is also clear that the package of required leadership skills for librarians and other workers is not a one-size-fits-all list. In fact, there continues to be considerable variety in ideas about an appropriate library-related set of leadership skills, or, to use a current term, competencies. Despite the work that has been done on defining library leadership competencies by various organizations and associations, the field awaits an accepted set of core leadership competencies for the profession or for any subset of the profession. The lack of an agreed-upon set or sets of core competencies means that, although training programs are often worthwhile and beneficial to individual participants, there is no accurate way to determine if the most effective skills are being taught to leaders and aspiring leaders. More work needs to be done to clarify a library-focused list of leadership competencies. Program planners could then use this conceptual foundation as a starting point for designing leadership development programs.

The review of leadership and leadership development training makes it clear that, although many training programs have been developed and conducted successfully, the evaluation methods used to date to assess the success of these programs have, in most cases, not yielded definitive results about the success or failure of programs to achieve their stated objectives, such as individual personal development, career mobility, workplace improvement, and so forth. Most evaluation methods employed to date have measured short-term goals, including participants' self-assessments of whether the training met expectations and the extent of their personal satisfaction with the training. For the future, if the designers of leadership training hope to claim that such programs improve productivity and achieve an economic payoff for libraries, better evaluation methods must be developed and used in a systematic way. The authors believe that two basic improvements would be very helpful. First, evaluators must more carefully define the experimental design by using trainee control groups that are truly different from the target trainee group. Second, leadership program advocates should conduct more longitudinal research to determine what happens to leadership development participants over two years, five years, and longer. These two improvements will be good steps toward better evaluation and will increase understanding of what works and does not work in leadership development. A third and perhaps a much more difficult goal to attain would be a concerted effort within the profession to clearly define what librarians really mean when they use the term "leadership." These changes may help leadership training designers to achieve the sought-after and intended results of investments in individual leadership development.

Looking to the future, the library profession is expected to undergo a number of significant changes in the coming decade. One of the most important changes will be the predicted retirement of a large number of librarians as they reach retirement age. Libraries will undoubtedly experience a loss of a large number of library leaders, and libraries and library organizations must continue to expand leadership training if there is to be a new cohort of leaders ready to take over. The workforce in all types of libraries is becoming more diverse, reflecting the growing diversity in the United States overall. A few leadership programs have already been developed to recruit and develop more library leaders from diverse backgrounds and ethnicities, and this effort should be continued and expanded in the future.

Given the foregoing analysis of the current state of library leadership training, the authors also recommend that library schools and/or other professional bodies define a leadership training research agenda to be completed in the next ten years. Such an agenda would have as its focus the creation of a set of tools that could measurably improve library leadership. A first step would be the development of a clear and broadly accepted set of general library leadership competencies for all types of library settings. The second step would be the vigorous promotion of these competencies in library training and educational venues of all types.

Table 1. Characteristics of Admired Leaders

                       2002              1995              1987
Characteristic    Respondents (%)   Respondents (%)   Respondents (%)

Honest                  88                88                83
Forward-looking         71                75                62
Competent               65                63                67
Inspiring               66                68                58
Intelligent             35                40                43
Fair-minded             47                49                40
Broad-minded            40                40                37
Supportive              42                41                32
Straightforward         34                33                34
Dependable              33                32                32
Cooperative             24                28                25
Determined              20                17                20
Imaginative             23                28                34
Ambitious               17                13                21
Courageous              28                29                27
Caring                  21                23                26
Mature                  20                13                23
Loyal                   14                11                11
Self-controlled          8                 5                13
Independent              6                 5                10

Note. Results of questionnaires administered by the authors three
times. Respondents were asked to identify characteristics of a
good leader. Survey size is approximately 75,000 persons on six
continents. Adapted from The Leadership Challenge (3rd ed.),
(p. 25), by J. M. Kouzes & B. Z. Posner, 2002, San Francisco:
Jossey-Bass.

Table 2. Leadership versus Management

Leadership                         Management

A leader does the right things.    A good manager does things right.

Leadership is about                Management is largely about
effectiveness.                     efficiency

Leading is about what and why.     Management is about how to do
                                   things.

Leadership is about trust and      Management is about systems,
about people.                      controls, procedures, policies,
                                   and structure.

Leadership is about innovating     Management is about copying,
and initiating.                    about managing the status quo.

Leadership looks at the horizon,   Management is about the bottom
not just the bottom line.          line.

Note. Adapted from Learning to lead: A workbook on becoming a
leader (p. 4), by W. Bennis & J. Goldsmith, 1994, Reading, MA:
Addison-Wesley.

Table 3. Library Leadership Programs

                          First Offered
                          Continues (Y/N)   Program
Name of Program           Number of Days    Mode

American Library          1997              Residential
  Association Spectrum    Unknown

ACRL/Harvard              1990              Residential
  Leadership Institute    Yes
                          5

Association of Research   1997              Residential
  Libraries Leadership    Yes
  and Career              5 + off-site
  Development

Aurora Leadership         1995              Residential
  Institute, Australia    Yes
                          7

Berdsmann Foundation      Unknown           Workshop
  International           Yes
  Network of Public       Ongoing
  Libraries

EDUCAUSE Leadership       1998              Residential
  Institute               Yes
                          4-5

Frye Leadership           1999              Residential
  Institute               Yes
                          14 +

Library Administration    2000              Workshop
  and Management          No
  Association,            1
  ALA Leadership
  Survival Kit

Library of Congress       1995              Workshop
  Leadership              Yes
                          1 year

Library Leadership        2002              Residential
  Institute (Monroe       No
  County Library          6
  System)

Library Leadership        1993              Residential
  Ohio                    Unknown
                          6

Michigan Leadership       1990              Residential
  Academy                 Unknown
                          7

Mountain Plains Library   2002              Residential
  Association             Yes
  Leadership              5

Mortenson Center for      Unknown           Residential
  International Library   Yes
  Programs                Ongoing

National Library of       2002              Residential
  Medicine AAHSL          Yes
  Leadership Fellows      Unknown
  Program

Nebraska Library          2001              Residential
  Institute               Unknown
                          5

Nevada Leadership         2001              Residential
  Institute               Yes
                          4

New Jersey Library        2002              Residential
  Association Academy     Yes
                          6

Library Leadership        1999              Residential
  New Mexico              Yes
                          5

North Carolina LA         1996              Residential
  Leadership              Yes
                          5

Northern Exposure         1997              Residential
                          Yes
                          5

Snowbird Institute        1989              Residential
                          No
                          6

Stanford-California       2001              Residential
  Institute               No
                          Unknown

Texas Library             1991              Residential
  Association TALL        Yes
  Texans                  5

UCLA Senior Fellows       1982              Residential
  Program                 Yes
                          Unknown

University of Michigan    1995              Residential
  Public Library          Unknown
  Leadership              5

University of             1999              Residential
  Minnesota Training      Yes
  Institute for           8
  Librarians of Color

ULC--Executive            2002              Residential
  Leadership Institute    Unknown
                          4 +

Virginia Library          2002              Residential
  Association Programs    Yes
                          2.5

Wyoming Library           2001              Residential
  Association             Unknown
  Leadership              2

YS Lead MA                2002              Residential
                          Yes
                          2.5

                                                       Selective
Name of Program           Target Audience              Admission

American Library          Minority librarians          Yes
  Association Spectrum

ACRL/Harvard              Academic library directors   Yes
  Leadership Institute      and associate directors

Association of Research   Early and midcareer          Yes
  Libraries Leadership      minority librarians in
  and Career                academic   libraries
  Development

Aurora Leadership         Librarians in Australia,     Unknown
  Institute, Australia      New Zealand, and
                            Singapore

Berdsmann Foundation      Librarians in major Public   Yes
  International             libraries, international
  Network of Public
  Libraries

EDUCAUSE Leadership       Information technology       Yes
  Institute                 managers in higher
                            education

Frye Leadership           Higher education faculty,    Yes
  Institute                 librarians, information
                            technology professionals

Library Administration    Librarians with 2 years      No
  and Management            experience
  Association,
  ALA Leadership
  Survival Kit

Library of Congress       Library of Congress          Yes
  Leadership                librarians

Library Leadership        Librarians and support       Yes
  Institute (Monroe         staff
  County Library
  System)

Library Leadership        Ohio librarians with         Yes
  Ohio                      2-10 years experience

Michigan Leadership       Michigan librarians with     Yes
  Academy                   master of library
                            science degrees

Mountain Plains Library   Master of library science    Yes
  Association               librarians with 10 years
  Leadership                experience

Mortenson Center for      Librarians from              Yes
  International Library     international libraries
  Programs

National Library of       Midcareer librarians with    Yes
  Medicine AAHSL            5 years as department
  Leadership Fellows        head or higher
  Program                   responsibility in
                            academic health sciences
                            libraries

Nebraska Library          Nebraska librarians          Yes
  Institute

Nevada Leadership         Nevada librarians            Yes
  Institute

New Jersey Library        New Jersey librarians        Yes
  Association Academy       with 5-12 years
                            experience

Library Leadership        New Mexico librarians        Yes
  New Mexico

North Carolina LA         North Carolina               Yes
  Leadership                professionals,
                            paraprofessionals, and
                            graduate students

Northern Exposure         Professionals plus 7 years   Yes
                            experience

Snowbird Institute        Early career librarians      Yes
                            nationally with less
                            than 5 years experience

Stanford-California       Mostly California            Yes
  Institute                 librarians--the next
                            generation of library
                            leaders--most mid-career

Texas Library             Midcareer librarians, TLA    Yes
  Association TALL          members
  Texans

UCLA Senior Fellows       ARL directors or             Yes
  Program                   associate directors

University of Michigan    Library directors            Yes
  Public Library
  Leadership

University of             Minority librarians, early   Yes
  Minnesota Training        career with 1-3 years
  Institute for             experience
  Librarians of Color

ULC--Executive            New and midcareer            Yes
  Leadership Institute      librarians

Virginia Library          Unknown                      Unknown
  Association Programs

Wyoming Library           Wyoming librarians           Yes
  Association
  Leadership

YS Lead MA                School and Public            Yes
                            librarians working in
                            youth services

Name of Program           Primary Emphasis

American Library          Improve local-level library
  Association Spectrum      service; minority
                            recruitment.

ACRL/Harvard              Leadership, organizational.
  Leadership Institute      Strategy, transformational
                            leadership, planning

Association of Research   Encourage diversity in top
  Libraries Leadership      leadership of academic
  and Career                libraries.
  Development

Aurora Leadership         Emphasis on developing
  Institute, Australia      leadership skills, change,
                            creativity,   etc.

Berdsmann Foundation      Leadership skills
  International
  Network of Public
  Libraries

EDUCAUSE Leadership       Develop management skills
  Institute                 focusing on motivation and
                            deployment of staff

Frye Leadership           Leadership skills for higher
  Institute                 education leaders

Library Administration    Leadership concepts and
  and Management            theories; personal
  Association,              assessment; leadership
  ALA Leadership            skills
  Survival Kit

Library of Congress       Focus on developing leadership
  Leadership                skills

Library Leadership        Personal assessment;
  Institute (Monroe         leadership skills
  County Library            development
  System)

Library Leadership        Train leadership skills for
  Ohio                      tomorrow's library leaders

Michigan Leadership       Leadership theories and
  Academy                   behavior, change, risk,
                            power, diversity,
                            collaboration

Mountain Plains Library   Leadership theories and
  Association               behavior, change, risk,
  Leadership                power,  diversity,
                            collaboration

Mortenson Center for      Leadership in international
  International Library     libraries
  Programs

National Library of       Introduce leadership theory
  Medicine AAHSL            and practical tools for
  Leadership Fellows        implementing change; develop
  Program                   networks between fellows and
                            mentors

Nebraska Library          Self-awareness, leadership
  Institute                 styles, change, planning,
                            funding, conflict resolution

Nevada Leadership         Personal assessment,
  Institute                 leadership skills
                            development

New Jersey Library        Leadership theories,
  Association Academy       self-awareness, leadership
                            styles, change, planning,
                            funding, conflict resolution

Library Leadership        Self-awareness, leadership
  New Mexico                styles, change, planning,
                            funding, conflict resolution

North Carolina LA         Develop and enhance leadership
  Leadership                skills, building
                            self-concept; create a
                            vision, empower others,
                            diversity

Northern Exposure         Assist professional librarians
                            to strengthen their
                            leadership skills; focus on
                            understanding leadership
                            types, use of Myers-Briggs,
                            ethics, advocacy, change and
                            vision

Snowbird Institute        Leadership styles, role of
                            vision, creativity,
                            risk-taking.

Stanford-California       Focus on topics including
  Institute                 technology, library
                            collections, organizational
                            effectiveness, facilities
                            planning, technology impacts

Texas Library             Foster leadership
  Association TALL          capabilities, define
  Texans                    leadership development for
                            TLA members; leadership
                            style, politics, change and
                            foster cultural diversity in
                            library leadership

UCLA Senior Fellows       Enhance leadership in North
  Program                   American libraries,
                            particularly research
                            libraries

University of Michigan    Change and adapting to change,
  Public Library            future issues, facilities
  Leadership                planning, new technologies

University of             Effective communication,
  Minnesota Training        teamwork, decision-making,
  Institute for             conflict management
  Librarians of Color

ULC--Executive            Action learning with applying
  Leadership Institute      leadership skills in real
                            situations over a sustained
                            period. Adaptive creativity,
                            personal leadership
                            development

Virginia Library          Promote leadership skills for
  Association Programs      paraprofessionals

Wyoming Library           Leadership traits and skills
  Association               development, conflict
  Leadership                resolution, communication
                            skills, teamwork

YS Lead MA                Leadership theories and
                            behavior, change, risk,
                            power, diversity,
                            collaboration

                          Number of
Name of Program           Participants   Moderators

American Library          Unknown        Various
  Association Spectrum

ACRL/Harvard              14             Harvard faculty,
  Leadership Institute                     M. Sullivan, and
                                           others

Association of Research   20             Varies
  Libraries Leadership
  and Career
  Development

Aurora Leadership         30-35          Schreiver &
  Institute, Australia                     Shannon

Berdsmann Foundation      16             Various
  International
  Network of Public
  Libraries

EDUCAUSE Leadership       Unknown        Various
  Institute

Frye Leadership           40             Various
  Institute

Library Administration    Unknown        Abigail Hubbard
  and Management
  Association,
  ALA Leadership
  Survival Kit

Library of Congress       10             Various
  Leadership

Library Leadership        40             Wetherbee & Mason
  Institute (Monroe
  County Library
  System)

Library Leadership        30             Schreiber &
  Ohio                                     Shannon

Michigan Leadership       26             M. Sullivan
  Academy

Mountain Plains Library   30             M. Sullivan
  Association
  Leadership

Mortenson Center for      Varies         Various
  International Library
  Programs

National Library of       Unknown        Various
  Medicine AAHSL
  Leadership Fellows
  Program

Nebraska Library          31             Schreiber &
  Institute                                Shannon

Nevada Leadership         45             Wetherbee & Mason
  Institute

New Jersey Library        25             M. Sullivan,
  Association Academy                      Schreiber &
                                           Shannon

Library Leadership        24             Schreiber &
  New Mexico                               Shannon

North Carolina LA         30             North Carolina
  Leadership                               faculty

Northern Exposure         24             University of Alberta

Snowbird Institute        30             Schreiber &
                                           Shannon

Stanford-California       125-145        Various with
  Institute                                Stanford faculty

Texas Library             25             Sullivan & Siggins
  Association TALL
  Texans

UCLA Senior Fellows       15             Various
  Program

University of Michigan    30             Varies
  Public Library
  Leadership

University of             Unknown        Various
  Minnesota Training
  Institute for
  Librarians of Color

ULC--Executive            50             Varies
  Leadership Institute

Virginia Library          Unknown        Various
  Association Programs

Wyoming Library           15             National Outdoor
  Association                              Leadership
  Leadership                               School ENCK
                                           Resources

YS Lead MA                49             M. Sullivan

Note: The material reported here was gathered from a database search
that identified leadership-related training programs for librarians
and those working in or for libraries. Print and Web-based journal
articles, promotional pieces, and reviews by participants were used
to construct the table data.

Table 4. Training Approaches, Learning Assumptions and Learning
Methods

Training
Approaches       Learning Assumptions        Learning Methods

Conceptual       Adults learn through use    Written and video case
  awareness        of mental models and        studies, lectures on
                   conceptual frameworks       conceptual models,
                   that are often built        dicussion groups
                   around contrasts.

Feedback         Personal feedback allows    Observational exercise;
                   learners to identify        survey and verbal
                   their strengths and         feedback from training
                   weaknesses along with       observers, fellowx
                   a set of competencies.      observers, fellow
                   The feedback                colleagues (360
                   positively reinforces       exercises).
                   strengths and
                   encourages learners to
                   address weaknesses or
                   find a means to
                   compensate for them.

Skill-building   Learners can develop        Practice exercises for
                   leadership competencies     skills. Simulation and
                   from behavioral             lectures may be used.
                   modeling. Participants      Trainers may model
                   use structured              behaviors, and video
                   exercises to practice       case studies might be
                   skills and then receive     used.
                   feedback on their
                   implementation.

Personal         Emotional and physical      Outdoor adventures or
  growth           challenges force            indoor psychological
                   reflective learning         exercises with emphasis
                   about individual            on risk-taking,
                   behavior, work views,       teamwork, and personal
                   and personal                values exploration.
                   aspirations.

Note. Adapted from Building leaders: How successful companies develop
the next generation (pp. 44-45), by J. A. Conger & B. Benjamin, 1999,
San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

NOTE

(1.) See http://www.ala.org/spectrum.

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Florence M. Mason, Owner and Principal, F. Mason Associates, 10520 Crestover Drive, Dallas, TX 75229 and Louella V. Wetherbee, Owner and Principal, Lou Wetherbee and Associates, LLC, 3758 S. Better Drive, Dallas, TX 75229