Years ago, senior leadership had a vision to provide developmental opportunities for our managers to energize our staff as we were faced the ever-changing needs of our community. In addition, in 2011, we recognized that we had 42 potential retirees who were the bench strength of our organization. We recognized the importance of the need to transfer their knowledge to staff who had the potential of leading the library into the future. As we set a strategic goal of addressing changes in the library and the implications of the challenges, differences between management styles, we developed a leadership program that would optimize our desired leadership proficiencies. Our goal was to ensure that the proficiencies for future leaders were not only technical skills but skills would allow them to see the vision beyond the four walls of our library and to effectively manage change through positive communications which would result in an effective manner of serving our customers, becoming an advocate for the library and having a stronger impact in the community.

The Leadership Academy is an experience which assesses the skills, offers opportunities for learning and reflection, and allows the participant the opportunity to put new skills into practice. Phase I of the Leadership Academy is called “Tomorrow’s Managers Program” (TMP). This 12 month program was designed to identify potential candidates for leadership roles. This phase was developed to help high potential staff prepare to take on greater responsibilities, monitor their performance and professional growth as they meet new challenges. They experienced opportunities to be fast-tracked and exposed to a variety of professional development opportunities. The participants were also exposed to the responsibilities all units including the support services units such as the fiscal office and human resources units. Phase II of the Leadership Academy is called “Management Academy” which is an 18 month program. This program is designed to help managers take our strategic goals and put them into action. Participants’ leadership success rests on their ability to translate the vision into action and influence the different groups of people they work with including staff, peers and their direct leaders. Components of both programs include formal learning opportunities which were built on Leadership Core Competencies identified by our senior leaders, informal learning opportunities, coaching, assessment tools that identified their natural tendencies and behavioral characteristics which result in the development of individual development action plans, job shadowing, project team leadership, coaching and an assessment center.

Leadership Academy has completed two classes of “TMP” since 2011 with a total of 24 staff. Our bench strength has been increased resulting in 15 (60%) of the participants being promoted to management positions. The other participants have accepted broader responsibilities including project team leadership roles including our library levy campaign. As an outreach success, another smaller library in Ohio has implemented a “Leadership University” as the result of our successes with this program. Leadership Academy “Management Academy” has graduated 11 classes of managers since its inception. 37 of the entry to mid- level managers have been appointed to mid and senior-level management positions. This year we have 28 new managers who are taking the Management Academy journey. Many of the graduates in former classes have served as individual coaches to those who are in the classes. The journey does not end at the graduation level. It is a progressive journey for managers who have staffing and relationship changes. They are constantly incorporating new behaviors into their everyday interactions with their direct reports, peers and direct leader and ensuring that they have the right people on the right bus as they work to achieve the library vision and goals. This Leadership Academy was developed with the assistance of an outside consultant and the Administrative Staff. With this program relying on the strength of our library, it is important that the professional development opportunities are reviewed each year to ensure that it is aligned with our library’s strategic plan.