Enabling Knowledge Creation: An Organizational Development Approach for Advancing Academic Library Centrality

Abstract

Contemporary 21st Century libraries face unprecedented challenges. Anticipating appropriate responses depends on activating and extending what organizational members know and how they leverage it. To develop a more 'knowledge-able' workplace, library faculty and staff at California Polytechnic State University employ evidence-driven systems thinking (Checkland/United Kingdom) fortified by workplace information literacy (Bruce/Australia). This knowledge creating approach to evidence-based information practice informs repurposing the library, re-inventing systems, and refocusing personnel. Boundary crossing information exchange and reflective dialogue promote appreciative inquiry and enable collective sense-making. Shared commitment to collaborative participatory design activities ensure consideration of diverse stakeholders’ viewpoints and intensify interactions with student and faculty user communities. In transforming data into evidence through dialogue, relationships, roles, and responsibilities continuously evolve. Intersubjective capacity building promotes ongoing learning among library colleagues and with campus stakeholders. Interactive evaluation and assessment outcomes ensure heightened levels of engagement with the learner and alignment with the institution.