From Leader to Leader and the Frances Hesselbein Leadership Forum:
In the News: What’s Happening in Leader to Leader from Bruce Rosenstein, Managing Editor
Congratulations to Leader to Leader author Guy St. Clair, who has received the John Cotton Dana Award, the highest honor given by the Special Libraries Association/SLA. Guy accepted the award in June at the organization’s annual conference in Cleveland, when it celebrated its 110th anniversary. Learn more about his career and the award in the SLA article “‘Take Up That Torch,’ Dana Award Recipient Urges,” (https://www.sla.org/take-up-that-torch-dana-award-recipient-urges/) and in Guy’s blog post “From One-Person Library Management to Knowledge Services” (https://guysblog.smr-knowledge.com/from-one-person-library-management-to-knowledge-services/).
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Warm greetings to all Special Libraries Association colleagues and friends. SLA President Hal Kirkwood has informed me that I am to be the recipient of the SLA John Cotton Dana Award, and I am greatly honored.
Named for SLA’s founder and first president, the award is really a double honor for me, as I learned a great deal about John Cotton Dana when I was writing the association’s centennial history. It is truly a fine distinction to have my name associated with someone for whom I have so much respect (I wish I had known him). It will be a great pleasure to be with fellow SLA professionals on this very special occasion.
The award will be presented on Sunday, June 16 at the Opening General Session of the 2019 SLA Annual Conference in Cleveland OH.
I am happy to post the following, including the citation for the award:
Guy St. Clair, president of SMR International, a New York-based consultancy specializing in knowledge services and knowledge strategy, will receive the John Cotton Dana Award, SLA’s top honor. Named for SLA’s founder and first president, the award is granted to an information professional to recognize a lifetime of achievement as well as exceptional service to SLA and the library and information profession.
St. Clair served as president of SLA in 1991-1992, was named a Fellow of SLA in 1996, and was inducted into the association’s Hall of Fame in 2010. He has written widely about one-person librarianship (now called “solo librarianship”), knowledge management, and knowledge services. His 2009 book, SLA at 100: From “Putting Knowledge to Work” to Building the Knowledge Culture, traces the history of the Special Libraries Association from its founding to its centennial. Guy is currently the Series Editor for Knowledge Services, the new series from De Gruyter Saur, the scholarly publishing house specializing in academic literature.
As it happens, SMR International and SLA are finishing their long workshop programming affiliation at this conference. Since Guy will be in attendance, he and SLA past-president Deb Hunt will lead the final workshop (KM/KS101 Fundamentals of KM/Knowledge Services) on Friday, June 14. In announcing the workshop, the following was sent to SLA members:
This is the final time this course will be offered in person. Learn from the “father of knowledge services” and 2019 John Cotton Dana Award recipient Guy St. Clair and past-president Deb Hunt, leading the full-day workshop together. Guy notes that this introductory course opens the doors to knowledge services for all specialist librarians and provides them with the background and management resources they require to move themselves forward – in a very natural role for SLA members – as knowledge strategists for their employing organizations. Members (and non-members, who will be welcome) can register at https://connect.sla.org/ac2019/schedule/continuingeducation.
Not only am I greatly honored to be the recipient of SLA’s 2019 John Cotton Dana Award, I am particularly delighted to be attending the conference after an absence of several years. To enable me to visit with colleagues and friends, Tony Saadat and the good staff at Soutron Global (in a strategic alliance with SMR International for the past 20 years) have invited me to be at the Soutron Global Booth as their guest. I am scheduled to be there at three specific times: Sunday, June 16 (2.30-4pm), Monday, June 17 (10.30am-noon), and Tuesday, June 18 (10.30am-noon). Special thanks to Tony for his generosity in offering to have me in attendance at the Soutron Global Booth. I look forward to seeing fellow SLA professionals there.
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De Gruyter (Verlag Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin), the scholarly publishing house specializing in academic literature, has announced Knowledge Services, a new series designed to support the successful management of intellectual capital and to ensure the highest levels of knowledge sharing within the organizations in which knowledge. Knowledge Services will be published under the De Gruyter Saur imprint. Details at: De Gruyter’s New Series on Knowledge Services.
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Guy St. Clair, SMR International President and Knowledge Services Evangelist, was interviewed by Mitzi Perdue in Blog Posts | by Mitzi. The conversation centered on “Knowledge Services: Crucial in Today’s Knowledge Economy,” and Guy spoke about knowledge services as a valuable approach to managing intellectual capital.
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Dale Stanley, SMR International’s Senior Consultant and Marketing and Operations Manager, is the author of Managing Change: Vital to Your Project and Career Success in the latest issue of Information Outlook (July-August, 2017). Change management as Dale’s particular expertise and in his consulting and strategic learning activities, Dale is known for his ability to build, train, lead, and inspire high performance teams. With SMR International, Dale has management responsibility for the company’s strategic learning activities for the corporate sector and with Deb Hunt and Scott Brown he conducts webinars SLA’s KM/Knowledge Services Certificate Program (see below for the final 2017 courses, coming up in October and November). Dale’s article is published here with permission and in the Articles section of SMR Share, SMR International’s corporate knowledge capture site.
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The one question most asked of knowledge strategists has to do with how to engage senior management in knowledge strategy and the development of the organizational knowledge culture. A solution is provided in Knowledge Services: Your Foundation for Building the Twentieth-First Century Knowledge Organization by Guy St. Clair. The article has been published in Issue 85 (Summer 2017) of Leader to Leader, the award-winning journal of the Frances Hesselbein Leadership Institute (formerly the Peter F. Drucker Foundation). Guy is SMR International’s President and Knowledge Services Consultant. In the article Guy provides direction for senior executives and organizational leaders seeking to initiate and implement knowledge services in the workplace.
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In Guy St. Clair’s Knowledge Services: A Strategic Framework for the 21st Century Organization, the emphasis is on knowledge sharing, on the development of a knowledge strategy built on knowledge services, and on the transition of any community, organization, or business into a knowledge culture.
In the book’s Preface, knowledge services is defined as:
“…an approach to the management of intellectual capital that converges information management, knowledge management, and strategic learning into a single enterprise-wide discipline. The purpose of knowledge services is to ensure the highest levels of knowledge sharing within the organization in which it is practiced, with leadership in knowledge sharing the responsibility of the knowledge strategist. This book is written to provide guidance for the knowledge strategist and to serve as a reference for that management employee.”
More information is available in the flyer for the book: Knowledge Services: A Strategic Framework for the 21st Century Organization, which can be accessed here.
