Contents

• President's Corner
  
• The H.W. Wilson Company Award
  
• Research Tip of the Month: Book Review
  
• Book Review
  
• Katherine Blauer's Vision for OCLC CAPCON
  
• DC/SLA Mentoring Program
  
• Welcome New Members!

President's Corner:
By Susan Fifer Canby, sfiferca@ngs.org

Dear Colleagues:

Local Elections
Now it is time for you to vote for your next DC/SLA Board. We have an excellent slate thanks to the work of the Nominating Committee chaired this year by past-president, Sue O’Neill Johnson. Please review the biographical information and photos of the candidates, then vote and return your ballot before March 15, 2004 to P.O. Box 287, Benjamin Franklin Station, Washington, DC 20044.

SLA Leadership Meeting, January 21-24, 2004, Albuquerque, New Mexico
I promised you a report on the meeting in my last message. Several of your officers attended, but this is what I heard:

Awards and Kudos
As you read in the February Chapter Notes, five of our own – Anne Caputo, Lyle Minter, Wilda Newman, Kenlee Ray, and Donna Scheeder will be recognized at the national meeting in June 2004. Congratulations to each of you. You’ve made us proud! The Association election results should be in shortly and we have our fingers crossed for our candidates.

New from the Association
The Association approved the new governing documents and they will be sent within the next two weeks to the Chapters with recommendations on how to institute them. The Association is beginning to plan for the 100^th anniversary of the Association and has tasked Guy St. Clair with writing the book. The Chapter Cabinet asked the Board to have the Finance Committee consider alternative payment structures for dues to address the needs of our newest members in particular.

Executive Director
To help focus the re-branding efforts that will follow next year, Executive Director Janice Lachance (Janice@sla.org) is meeting with executives of various companies to hear first-hand how libraries make a difference and add value to their organizations. She said her focus for this year will be:

• Professional development: SLA is working with a new web conferencing provider which was featured at the February 4th meeting on Work/Life Balance. She has begun the development of a professional certification program. She reported that SLA is creating a matrix to support learning and to tie competencies to learning.
• Advocacy: SLA is reaching out to non-traditional sources to promote our new vision and mission to ensure a unified messaging and branding plan to communicate the new face of SLA.
• Communication and services: SLA has simplified the payment process, redesigned the website (http://www.sla.org). It is now available in 12 languages and includes a search taxonomy.
• Networking: The new Community of Practice page on the SLA website has been added to facilitate best practices and networking. Almost 120 recruiters helped add 700 new members to SLA in the last membership campaign. Eastern Canada, Oregon and others will be recognized at the national conference for their recruiting efforts.
• Move from Washington: The new building in Alexandria, Virginia will offer better space for meetings as well as Association business.

Grants
The committee for the SLA Endowment Fund is looking for proposals by August 1, 2004, that suggest ideas to benefit our Chapter, or Division or the profession that they can underwrite. Visit the Leadership page of the SLA website.

Stacey Greenwell (staceyg@email.uky.edu), ITE Member Services Chair, is requesting submission by April 9, 2004 for the most inspired cutting-edge and innovative chapter technology programming of 2003-2004. Chapters could win $500 and be highlighted in the ITE newsletter.

We heard an excellent customer service message from keynote speaker, Ann Rhoades, of JetBlue, who addressed us on "People-Centric Cultures that Pay Big Dividends for Great Companies.

• People come first. Find a way to say Yes. Be passionate about the company and its customers. Define our values and priorities. Culture is what people do when no one is looking. Choose staff better than me. What you do for people will result in support of customers.
• Communicate. Define behaviors – caring, integrity, fun, passion, safety. Caring can’t be faked. Re-recruit your own staff everyday. Talk to people, especially "A" players. Be specific about what they do that is great. Find out what turns them. Treat people fairly, not equally – individual treatment – constantly assess the state of your people. People want more than sex and money – they want recognition and praise. Write letters home to them so they can share with their families.
• Hire "A" players. Hire fewer, better players. Take ownership of hiring mistakes. Oscar Wilde said, "I have the simplest of tastes. I’m only satisfied with the best." When hiring, ask very specific behavioral questions: When did you break a rule for a customer? Involve your people in recruiting and hiring. Ask what it takes to get them to Yes.
• Think outside the box. Fun ads talk to people. Have line people solve problems. Develop a tiger team with no managers. Engage everyone in the solutions.
• Keep it simple. Hesitate to make more rules. Empower staff to get to yes. The rest of the staff will notice if we don’t mirror our values. Continually exceed expectations. Never lose "A" players – keep track of them; they may come back.
• Be excessive about service. You are unique and so are our customers. Get back to the customer; do simple things well and consistently. Recovery is everything; say you’re sorry if things mess up; take ownership and call personally.
• Create a disciplined culture of excellence. Don’t be fooled by your own press. Improve and differentiate your brand: What do we deliver? The brand is US. Do the right thing. Communicate, encourage initiative and innovation and inspire greatness – this is what employees want of managers.

Spring is coming. Hang on. Best, Susan

Research Tip of the Month: Stalking the Elusive Guru
Submitted by Mary Ellen Bates, mbates@batesinfo.com

We know about the problems of finding information on the "invisible web" -- that portion of the web that search engines cannot or will not spider. But there is a deeper, truly invisible web of information that will forever exist beyond the scope of search engines -- the knowledge residing in the brains of experts. The web and email enable us to identify those gurus... the people who have in-depth knowledge and who are thought-leaders and influencers.

Unfortunately, web gurus are bombarded with unsolicited email -- not only with the spam and viruses that we all get, but also with an astounding number of requests that go far beyond what is appropriate to ask. As an info-entrepreneur, I am always amazed to get emails that ask me "How much do you make a year? I want to figure out if this is a viable business for me, so please tell me your salary." And search engine gurus like Chris Sherman and Danny Sullivan regularly get requests such as "Can you please contact all the major search engines for me and explain to them that what I'm doing isn't spam?" What is particularly annoying is that sending email is so quick and easy, people often send queries to experts with no real expectation of a response. As a result, these experts are deluged with what amounts to semi-spam, making it even more difficult to separate the real questions from the "gee, I wonder if I can get Danny to respond to me?"

As someone who both gets these emails and sometimes needs to tap into the knowledge of experts, I have become more and more mindful of the etiquette involved in querying the elusive guru. So, putting my theory to practice, I queried several web gurus and asked them for their thoughts. What would entice them to respond to a random email query? Do they even try to respond? What kind of email do they actually enjoy receiving? And here's what I learned.

• First, don't send an email until you have thought through why you are contacting the expert. Is your question something that you could answer yourself by looking at the expert's web page or by doing some simple research yourself? Is your goal to respond to an article the expert wrote? If so, your email is more likely to be answered if you have something thoughtful to say, rather than simply "Hey, you're so right" or "Hey, you really have it all wrong."
   
• Use an informative subject heading. An email titled "Hi there" or, worse yet, no subject line at all, is likely to get automatically filtered into the spam bucket. On the other hand, a subject line such as "thoughts re: image searching", in response to an article on how to conduct web research for pictures, stands a better chance of getting answered, or at least opened.
   
• Keep it simple. As Danny Sullivan, editor of SearchEngineWatch.com, said, "Chances are, anything with a giant, involved question in multiple parts will just sit there unless I can relate it to a story I'm working on or after I've dealt with all the easy stuff. And as more things come in, the complicated question may get further and further behind. Finally, if it's simply too old, too many days gone by, it's one that's slipped through the net."
   
• Be polite. Chris Sherman, editor of SearchDay, www.SearchEngineWatch.com/searchday, told me, "I ignore virtually all email from anyone I don't know that demands or assumes a reply. I also ignore any email that presupposes I'm happy to spend time researching a topic or providing a detailed reply without any offer of reciprocity. Bluntly, I'm not a non-profit operation." All of the experts I queried agreed that flattery, while always nice, doesn't change whether they will respond or not.
   
• Be thoughtful. Recognize that the expert's time is limited. Include your phone number with your query, on the chance that a phone call is simpler to respond to. Danny Sullivan commented that the reader emails he enjoys getting are those that help him understand something new, which he may then be able to use to help others through a story. Gary Price, editor of ResourceShelf.com, is more likely to answer questions that help test or improve his search skills.
   
• Don't expect something for nothing. Gary Price described a jaw-dropping request he received: "I'm preparing a marketing plan to open a sporting goods business. I need the following lists by tomorrow afternoon. Thanks." Wow.
   
• Be patient. As Gary Price noted, "Don't assume that I'm willing and able to answer your question right away, for free." Many web gurus are on the road a fair amount of the time, on consulting projects or speaking engagements, and often their time online is limited. That means that they return to the office to face a deluge of email, and your query just may not have priority. Chris Sherman made an interesting observation: "I find it ironic that many people who practice good offline time management skills feel guilty about not replying to email. Somehow, email gets an automatic high priority that's simply not justified in the larger scheme of things."
   
• Finally, don't despair if your email isn't answered at all. As Chris Sherman told me, "I hate to admit this, but I don't answer most email -- even 'top priority' messages that I shouldn't put aside (like from my mom)." In fact, one of the web experts I contacted while writing this article didn't respond to me. It's nothing personal; I assume that she was too busy, didn't feel like tackling my email right now, or that it is in her "gee, I should respond to this" pile. I may be pleasantly surprised with a response in a couple of weeks, and that's OK.

Special Libraries Association assumes no responsibility for the statements and opinions advanced by the contributors to SLA's publications. Editorial views do not necessarily represent the official views of SLA. Acceptance of advertisement does not imply endorsement of the product by SLA.

Subscriptions:
Chapter Notes is free to DC/SLA members. Subscriptions to non-members are available at $10 per year.

Advertising:
Advertising rates effective September 1997 are: $95-1/4 page; $175-1/2 page; $290-full page. For information regarding advertisements, contact the DC/SLA Chapter Notes Business Manager:

Kelley Weber
Surface Transportation Board
Phone: 202-565-1668
weberk@stb.dot.gov

EDITOR’S NOTE:
Wednesday, March 17th is the deadline for materials which can be included in the April 2004 issue. The issue is distributed approximately three weeks after the deadline. The preferred submission format is a Word document sent via email.

Materials for Chapter Notes should be sent to the Editor:

Cynthia Holt
The Gelman Library
George Washington University
2130 H Street NW
Washington, DC 20052
Phone: 202-994-1352
holt@gwu.edu

Listserv Moderator:
Kelley Weber
Surface Transportation Board
Phone: 202-565-1668
weberk@stb.dot.gov

DC/SLA Internet Committee:
Frederik Heller
Phone: 202-383-1157
fheller@realtors.org

SLA Headquarters
ATTN: Address/Name Changes
1700 18th Street NW
Washington, DC 20009-2508