I just wanted to thank Chris and Tim for commenting on this session. Alas, I was not able to make it to MCN this year, but part of the reason is because I'm being promoted into a brand new digital initiatives position (and they kinda needed to buy me a fancy new media-capable computer instead! ;)
I'm frequently reminded how fortunate I am to be working at an institution which has had some transitions in recent years. That is not necessarily good or pleasant for the staff living through them, but what it has resulted in is a body of staff who do embrace change and who understand the importance of technology in the institution. This gives us a lot of leeway to make leaps of faith and adopt initiatives which may otherwise have taken years to gain support for. That being said, there's a potential for tension with the Board, who, by and large, are not quite as flexible when it comes to changing institutional ideology. Chris's experience is a great reminder that I may need to sell myself to the Board, particularly with solid results. Even as the DBA, I occassionally needed to send out email blasts to my supervisor and her supervisor, letting them know that I'm currently working on 27 projects, please don't give me any more. Part of this is my own fault, I have to admit, since I don't want to say "no" and I get excited over the new shiny things. We can't be all things to everyone, but in a smaller setting, it can be great fun to wear a number of different hats and actually do the things you're setting policy for. But I think it's also important to make your limits known - to your fellow staff, your supervisors, and also to yourself. Burnout is never fun. Perian Sully Collection Database & Records Administrator Judah L. Magnes Museum 2911 Russell St. Berkeley, CA 94705 510-549-6950 x 335 http://www.magnes.org Contributor, http://www.musematic.org -----Original Message----- From: mcn-l-bounces at mcn.edu [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Chris Alexander Sent: Wednesday, November 07, 2007 4:34 PM To: mcn-l at mcn.edu Subject: [MCN-L] Follow up to Honeysett Director, IT Session Hello, As a first time attendee of the MCN Conference, I have to say that I was very fascinated by the conversation going on about the relationship between IT Professionals and their Directors. I am fortunate because a little over a year ago the director of the San Jose Museum of Art made a decision to embrace technology and created the position which I currently fill. Piggybacking of some of the discussion about communication, I wanted to offer a little info about a situation that arose recently. Around the one year anniversary of my position I was approached by our Marketing Director who mentioned to me that I need to be a little more outspoken about what it is that I do at the Museum. This really caught me off guard. I felt that with every opportunity that presented itself I tried to speak about technology and what it was that I was doing. I went through a lot of denial about this, but finally came to the conclusion that I would draft an email that would recap the previous year's accomplishments; this email would then be sent to certain staff members who I felt were stakeholders. The email took me two days to write and ended up being a four page memo. In it, I tried to put it in layman's terms what was accomplished; this many people downloaded our podcast, this many people watched our YouTube Videos, this many people listened to ou r cell phone tours, I went to these conferences, we are mentioned on this blog, etc., etc. I also included links, which most people are pretty comfortable with clicking on. Basically, I became a self promoter. Not something that I expected to have to do, but embraced after I reflected on all the accomplishments. The email, with attached memo, was very well received and became "Jerry McGuire"ish from people saying, "Have you read the memo?" or "Hey, I enjoyed the memo! Didn't realize you did all that stuff!" It was even printed out and distributed by the Director of the Museum to all the Board Members at one of their meetings. It was also forwarded to our Development staff for use in grants and corporate funding initiatives. And, it also acts as a personal record that can be referred to on numerous occasions when shameless self promotion opportunities arise. I realize that I might be in a unique situation, but I encourage some of you to take up the reins of self promotion. It might help to clear the air about any staff questions and might give you a better picture of where you stand in your organization. Thanks for a great session Nik! I was the last one who received one of the books you were handing out at the end! Best regards, Chris Alexander Manager of Interactive Technology San Jose Museum of Art _______________________________________________ You are currently subscribed to mcn-l, the listserv of the Museum Computer Network (http://www.mcn.edu) To post to this list, send messages to: mcn-l at mcn.edu To unsubscribe or change mcn-l delivery options visit: http://toronto.mediatrope.com/mailman/listinfo/mcn-l
