I'm just going to remind you that guide is posted to the event page, and I'm going to go ahead and get our recording started and welcome our presenters today.

I'm so excited to have these folks joining us today.

Sara white is the youth services consultant at the Washington State Library.

Stephanie Zero is the operations manager for King County Library System, also in Washington.

Elissa Burnley is the associate director of strategic planning and evaluation at Mid-Columbia Libraries.

And Rachel Beckman is the library at Sno-Isle libraries.

We're so excited to have you here.

I know that you all have presented together at the Washington Library Association conference and that you all hail from CAYAS, the Children's and Young Adult Services at the Washington Library Association.

I'm so excited you all are here.

I'm going to have Sara get us started.

Welcome.

   >> SARA: Hello, everybody.

It is true, we are CAYAS, which is my favorite acronym in all of my library world, the Children's and Young Adult Services section of the Washington Library Association.

We originally presented a version of this panel at the WLA conference, which is the Washington Library Association conference.

We're super excited to be here today with WebJunction.

So first, thank you so much for introducing us.

My name is Sara White.

I am the youth services consultant at the Washington State Library.

There will be a slide at end with all of our contact information, but just in case you want it right now, that's my email and my phone number.

I am currently in Tumwater, Washington.

My job is to serve everybody in Washington libraries who serves youth.

Before that, I was a youth services librarian for almost 11 years in a public library.

So we are going to start by talking a little bit about why we're here at all.

We want to do a quick introduction on why we're doing this panel.

We're focused today on building relationships, and before we launch into how we do that, I want to talk about why we should care about doing that and what that even means, what is relationship building.

So because of the impact on equity work in our communities, there's been a lot of emphasis in libraries on some of the words you see in this word cloud.

You've probably heard at least one of these phrases.

We have community-led libraries, community engagement, participatory design, connected learning, co-design, embedded librarianship, and we believe it is absolutely true that the ideal library would constantly be engaging and involving their communities in plans and programs and services.

Because in order to truly support the community you serve, the library should, in essence, be the community.

The problem is that this doesn't just happen magically or instantly.

In order to embark on any one of the practices in this word cloud, it takes a lot of trust, work, time, support.

We could probably do a session on any one of these phrases in this word cloud, but before we can get to those, we believe you have to do the first step first.

The first step is to just build relationships with the people in your community.

You can't do any of the things in this word bubble without that first step.

So having the time and support to spend that time on relationship building is absolutely essential to the work we do in libraries.

Often, we think of library relationships in terms of a transaction of some kind.

We think about what we can do together, how we can partner, what we can offer our partners, what our partnerships can offer us.

However, we believe that a meaningful relationship with someone in the community can and should be an end goal in itself.

Coming to a community relationship without an agenda with just a desire to make a connection and truly understand someone else, what they do, who they serve, what their skills are, and where our goals intersect can lead to just much more authentic partnerships.

And we think we need to give more room for relationships just for relationships' sake in libraries.

Having coffee with people -- so the image in this slide -- is our work.

Chatting is an essential part of our work.

Chatting at the desk, chatting in coffee shops, connecting to someone as a human being is work.

It's really fun and energizing and exciting work, but it is an integral part of what we do as librarians, and we believe as soon as relationships stop being about an end goal or a transaction, they start being real, meaningful, long-lasting relationships, which is where partnership and collaboration can really begin.

So that's why in this panel, we're focusing on that very, very first part, the very first step, which is finding people, making connections, and establishing trust with those people.

Because we believe without those thing, we can't move on to those awesome next things that were in that word bubble -- co-creation, community-led libraries.

So with that, I am really excited to introduce our panel today.

I'm just going to be facilitating, and I have some great experts joining me.

Stephanie Zero, Elissa Burnley and Rachel Beckman are here.

We're going to get started with our first question, which is just to introduce yourselves.

Tell us about yourselves, the communities, your library or library systems served.

   >> RACHEL: Hello, everyone.

My name is Rachel Beckman.

I'm a librarian for Sno-Isle libraries, which is in Washington State.

Snohomish and Island Counties.

I focus on teens and outreach.

And I work on an island.

I work in two different communities on the north part of that island.

As you can see on the map here, I work for oak Harbor and Coupeville.

They're different communities but similar in a lot of senses.

Oak Harbor is home to a Naval Air Force base.

My community there transitions and shifts and changes quite frequently.

I think the percentage is something like 40% will change in three or four years.

So that has its own particular needs and aspects that can be challenging when you're creating relationships.

Then Coupeville is a bit smaller, a bit more of a retirement community.

Their graduating classes are about 50 or so kids.

So even though I'm in a big library system, I do work in kind of remote libraries.

   >> ELISSA: Hi, everyone.

I'm the associate director of strategic planning and evaluation for Mid-Columbia Libraries, which is in the southeast corner of Washington State, that kind of corner part.

And I have worked as a frontline staff in libraries, in the programming department, in community engagement department and outreach on the book mobile, and as community relations manager.

In my system, there are 12 branches over three counties.

We serve both rural and suburban areas, and some of our populations are over 50% Spanish speaking.

   >> STEPHANIE: Hi, my name is Stephanie Zero.

I am CAYAS co-chair.

I was a teen services librarian for 14 years, and now I'm an operations manager at a small library in a shopping center called Crossroads Library.

The King County Library system has 50 locations.

Each library roughly represents a city in King County.

But this doesn't include Seattle.

Seattle has their own library system with 27 libraries just within Seattle.

My experience has been concentrated on the east side of King County, which includes Bellevue and Redmond.

Cities close to Seattle but a world away when it comes to accessing services.

We also include more rural cities like Carnation and Fall City, which have a population of about 2,000 people.

!

    >> SARA: Awesome.

Thank you for introducing yourselves.

This work can be vastly different depend on what kind of community you serve.

So our next question is how do you decide who to approach in the community, and how do you approach them?

Stephanie, I think I'll start with you on that one.

   >> STEPHANIE: Okay.

Soy start with the King County Library system mission, vision, and values when I think about who to approach.

Then also what my local library goals are for the year.

So kind of the whole system and then my library.

Because there's a myriad of community relationships I could build, but I want to make sure I'm spending time with something that's in alignment with our mission and goals.

So for example, we embrace diversity by centering people who are marginalized due to sexual orientation, gender identity and expression, in addition to other marginalized identities.

And as a teen services librarian, I decided to build relationships with organizations that support LGBTQ+ youth.

I reached out to a local counseling center by email, set up a time to chat with the counselor, who specialized in serving LGBTQ+ youth and also reached out.

But I didn't have an idea of what I wanted to do.

I just went in saying, hi, I'm the library.

I just wanted to reach out.

   >> SARA: Thank you, Stephanie.

Elissa, I have you next on my list.

   >> ELISSA: I will look at our goals.

For instance, one of our main goals is early literacy.

So I'm going to look around for groups that have the same similar goals as I do.

For instance, we have an early learning alliance group that pulls together a lot of non-profits that meet every month.

We have a safe kids group.

I think most areas have one of those groups.

You could look it up.

That's non-profits around child safety in your community, including the fire department and the health department, things like that.

And they're happy to have you be a part of their group.

I also meet potential partners at events that the library attends in the community, like local festivals, expos, just school nights, things like that.

And I really think that these resource fairs, as the library is part of them, but it's also a great place to approach people because they're sitting at a table looking to talk to people.

It doesn't have to be a cold call, if that makes sense.

It's also a great place to hand out your business cards and say hello.

You know, I was also going to say that sometimes these partners find you, especially if you're in a rural or small library.

Pretty much every relationship and interaction you have is a good relationship for you, even your regular users.

You know, we have in one of our rural libraries a local farmer that donates money every year for improvements.

And we also have a chiropractic up the street whose kids participants in summer reading.

It's not necessarily monetary.

Do we need volunteers? Things like that.

So every relationship matters.

   >> RACHEL: Yeah, to jump in with that, there's a lot of work that needs to be done face to face, but there's also plenty of work you can do on your computer as well.

You know, just by searching the internet, seeing what kind of local community groups are around.

Thankfully when I came into this job, a lot of that work had been done for me by previous managers and things who really were involved in the community.

But when you're thinking about a new person or a new partnership, you know, sometimes cold calling is what it is.

I think feeling like no shame about the cold call is really important.

You can't feel any shame when you think about just going in to talk to someone just to talk to them.

If you're trying to find people and you don't really know maybe where to start, other than those basic organizations, you can look for sort of the rock stars in your community.

So if you're going to a chamber of commerce meeting or you're going to a youth coalition meeting, like who are the names on those Listservs that you see in multiple locations? Even if they're not connected to an organization, they might be a great person to have coffee with just to see what's going on in their world.

What do you do in the community?

How can we help?

But yeah, looking for those people that are out and about might lead you to some really interesting connections that you can't find online.

12k3w4r6789    >> SARA: Thank you, all.

I'm glad you talked about the multimodal way to connect with people.

We live in a world where you don't have to show up in person, but some people prefer in person.

It's important to assess what the best way is -- email, sending a text, showing up at a meeting.

There's so many ways, yeah.

Stephanie?

   >> STEPHANIE: Well, now I will coordinate a teens meeting with somebody.

You know, now that so many people are comfortable with that, it's semi in person.

   >> SARA: Half in person.

Thanks, everyone.

This is a question we talked about a lot when we were getting this panel ready.

How do you reach out and start to build a relationship with a community you don't share an identity with?

Elissa, you're first.

   >> ELISSA: So I think the first thing and the most important thing is you need to participate in what they are doing and where they are as a participant, not even as the library.

Attend their events, join groups they belong to.

For instance, we have a diversity and inclusion council here.

We even have a chamber of commerce in our area called the Hispanic chamber of commerce.

The library is a member of that chamber.

We attend the meetings, the business meetings along with them.

And as I mentioned, the library is a part of the community.

Just as you want them to attend your events, you should attend theirs.

My library attends the local Pride events, heritage days with local tribes.

Whatever we get invited to, we do attempt to attend.

And I think the identity that we have the hardest time reaching is our Spanish-speaking population.

We have a big hurdle getting those community members into the library and getting them participating with us.

We do translate -- so one of the first things you're going to want to do is translate.

We translate almost everything.

But to be honest, the biggest way we found to reach them is to have a Spanish speaker.

So we make sure that we have Spanish speakers available at events and in our branches.

Yeah, I'm sure some of you are thinking that presents another challenge, finding Spanish speakers.

At least in my area, we have a big competition with the school district to find those Spanish speakers and offer competitive rates and pay them fairly for they bilingualism.

Our union this year has worked really hard to make sure they're getting a fair rate for that.

So we're hoping that attracts more applicants, and we can increase outreach to the Spanish-speaking community.

That's some of my strategies, at least.

   >> SARA: Go for it, Stephanie.

Thank you, Elissa.

   >> STEPHANIE: So I want to piggyback on what Elissa said.

My strategy is to meet people in their space.

So for example, I really wanted to build a relationship with our Muslim community, and I had a contact with the local school, a teacher at the local Muslim school connected me with their community engagement contact.

I was like, I would love to meet you at your -- where you are.

So she invited me to the mosque and gave me a tour of the mosque.

I think another really important part about building a relationship with a community you don't share an identity with is to go in with what's called cultural humility.

Just go in with a sense of learning, kind of forget what you think you know, and just kind of, yeah, meet them where they are.

Go in with a sense of learning.

Then, you know, if your missions align, you could have a program.

In this instance, the mosque really wanted to work on Islamophobia, and we were able to provide resources they didn't know existed.

But it's about building trust before asking for anything.

   >> RACHEL: Yeah, I want to echo Stephanie's building trust.

I love that you created space for people to see themselves in the library.

I think that's really important, to not keep your outreach especially to communities that are underserved or who may not see themselves in the library, to be able to create space for them and say we are ready for something to happen here.

Either we have a collection that we're getting ready to set up, or we have physical space that maybe meets your needs.

Being ready to show people that you are interested and that you will kind of go above and beyond.

You know, I also want to say that it takes a lot of time.

So don't expect that you'll go into a meeting with a community organizer and come out of that meeting being like, all right, we got three programs.

You know, a lot of people don't feel comfortable in a big sort of system like the library.

It can feel really overwhelming, you know, if someone doesn't know what the requirements for IDs are or fines or things like that.

So making sure that you know that this is going to be an extended relationship and building that trust is going to take a lot of time.

But I think one of the ways that is really effective in building that trust is following up with everything that you talk about.

So if someone offers the information that, hey, you know, we would use the library, but we don't see in any materials in our language at the library, making sure you say I'm going to check in on that.

Or if you have information about that, like yeah, we're working on this, trying to get funding, and then continuing to follow up.

So sending emails, saying hey, thanks so much.

We chatted about this.

Here's where we're going to go with this.

Or I checked in about this one particular aspect that we talked about, and it's a go.

Things like that really, really help you to build that trust and hopefully make those relationship-building time periods a bit shorter.

   >> SARA: Thank you, all.

Those are all really great strategies.

In the chat, I love what Laura said.

Trust before asking anything.

But also before giving anything.

As librarians, we often want to throw what the library has at people because we love it so much.

I think remembering to kind of take a breath and step back and wait to see what is actually needed is a really great strategy.

So thanks for pointing that out.

That's a good point.

All right.

So the next question is how would you describe an ideal community relationship in your work?

And Rachel, you can go first.

That would be great.

   >> RACHEL: I think an ideal community relationship is just one that's mutually beneficial as much as possible.

So when we're talking about those first conversations, making sure they're easy going and a bit more building that relationship.

Like Sara said, chatting so you're not coming in hot with, hey, I really want to do this thing.

But seeing what kinds of things can happen organically.

You know, I think sometimes what happens when we're building relationships is that we end up sort of asking for access to a community.

So if we're building relationships with an organization saying, hey, I know that you see these people and we want to see them too, how can we do that?

That's a big ask.

So just being aware of how that might feel and how that might come off is really important.

But yeah, I think something that's mutually beneficial, and it doesn't have to be a program.

One that I was really proud of building was a skateboard art program that we did this summer at the library, which all started by a new skate shop opening up in town.

I hyped myself up for a long time with my business card, and I went in there and said hey, you know, welcome to the community.

I'm Rachel, I'm with the library.

You know, just wanted to check your space out.

This is so cool.

Would you ever be interested in partnering with us on something?

And I loved that the skate shop owner said why.

Like, why would I want to do that?

That doesn't make -- I can't see how that would be of interest to me.

I said yeah, no worries.

Like, I just think this is really cool.

I'm all about supporting communities, and as much as we can kind of partner together and make ourselves stronger and our community stronger, that's just what I'm interested in.

So eventually, we can continued talking and we were talking about a skateboard art program.

Wouldn't it be so cool?

And then I went to the local Big Brothers Big Sisters of Island cannedCounty, who I knew just from connecting with them via other organizations and coalitions.

I knew they had a big grant for connecting community mentors with kids.

And I said, hey, you know, the kids that go to the skate shop are not kids that the library sees.

They're not kids that Big Brothers Big Sisters sees, but we're very interested in serving those kids.

So would you be interested in funding a skateboard art program.

They said absolutely.

And they bought us 70 skateboards, which was incredible, but they made it kind of a cool little community scavenger hunt at the end where they had tickets to go get their trucks and wheels at Big Brothers Big Sisters and get their helmet down at the skate shop.

So I felt like that was a really awesome connection of multiple organizations, and it was really cool seeing the skate shop owner at the end, you know, discussing this with potential customers and saying, yeah, I'm just here supporting my community.

I was like, that's it.

That's it.

You got it.

That was a long rant, and again, it doesn't have to end in a program, but that is my ideal type of relationship.

   >> SARA: That's amazing, Rachel.

I love that you talk about relationships as just not between you and one other organization but as a way of building a network of people who all have relationships with each other.

So that's really cool.

Elissa?

   >> ELISSA: So if I'm talking ideal, one where we both have clear roles in the partnership.

It's going to establish how we can help each other, and we work together as often as we can.

That's the ideal world.

That's not how it usually works.

But I really feel like the relationships you work on should impact and multiply the impact of both organizations.

We know our health department wants to reach young children for car seat safety checks.

So we invite themas a story time guest to our story times.

They have an opportunity, a very short opportunity, to talk to parents about car seat safety.

They'll even check car seats right on the site in that moment, make sure they're buckled in right and all that kind of stuff, the right size.

They can even find better -- you know, they have opportunities to give car seats to families that need them, that kind of thing.

So that's a great way that we can help them and help our community in the same way, but kind of how that relationship changed and evolved is when COVID happened, we suddenly had the health department as a relationship in our back pocket, and we were really lucky to have them with us, having been our partner, and sort of guiding us on what to do.

Not just everyday library stuff.

We became the community place that handed out tests, masks, and we were the hub for all of the vaccine clinics that came through.

So it was really awesome to sort of have that partnership grow, even though it was an unexpected way that it happened.

So as far as laying out expectations for a partnership in my ideal world, as I mentioned in the beginning, I think an email sometimes is sufficient.

Sometimes it can come off -- 

like when I'm trying to write these emails, I don't want to be awkward.

It can be a very casual email saying, hey, it was great talking to you.

I'm looking forward to working on this with you.

I hope, you know -- or I can help you get this to your community.

That kind of thing.

It doesn't have to be a formal document or a contract.

So that's my ideal situation.

   >> STEPHANIE: I'm just noticing a really good question in the chat, Sara.

I'll answer this question, but for me, the ideal community relationship is one that I build before I need it.

So for example, I was talking about how I built some relationships with organizations that served LGBTQ+ youth.

I didn't do anything for two years.

I was just like, hey, I'm here.

Just attended the meeting or asked if I could be a special guest at a support group or something.

Then my library system gave me -- there's a grant.

They're like, we're looking for ideas for partnerships, and I reached out.

So I just think -- my one big takeaway is the ideal relationship is one that I build before I need it.

Yeah.

   >> SARA: Thanks, Stephanie.

I like that.

I'm going to answer this question, too, because I have feelings about it.

I think my ideal relationship is one where I feel like I can have both pleasant and hard conversations.

I think about relationships in my life, and they don't just dissolve when something hard comes up.

We can talk about big, meaty things in a civil way.

And I think when we're serving our community, that's really important to be able to do.

I also think about an ideal relationship as being one that isn't a one-time thing.

It's ongoing, and it shifts and evolves, and it continues.

It happens over time, not just once with a resolution and then it's done.

And there was a follow-up question that I think we can answer pretty quickly.

Do you use any specific tools or things like MOUs to clarify relationships and expectations of roles?

Maybe, Elissa, that might be a good question for you.

   >> ELISSA: So yeah, with larger events and larger partnerships, I'm going to have an actual contact form or MOU.

You can find examples of these documents by searching them.

I can't remember the website we use to get them set up.

Then we have our lawyer look at them before we start using them in our community, just for the protection of the library itself.

But for larger things, especially anything involving money, we would definitely be having something formal for that.

But if you want to come to story time and be a guest, we usually just settle that over email or anything like that.

It's not something that might affect legally an expectation.

So I don't know how other library systems do it, if anyone else has any input.

   >> SARA: We can probably look that up and send out info with the resource for building an MOU afterwards.

All right.

I'm going to move to the next question so we make sure we can get to them all.

We can always come back at the end to more thoughts on that.

So my next question is how do you go about refreshing or revitalizing a relationship that either been broken or just lapsed in some way for some other reason, not because something happened.

Just because that happens to relationships.

Stephanie, if you want to go first.

    >> STEPHANIE: Yeah, I had a relationship with a local youth shelter called Friends of Youth.

I was doing monthly outreach with them.

Some things happened, and I talked to my manager.

We're like, so do we still need to do this monthly outreach?

I was like, I don't know, let's see what happens if we don't.

The relationship lapsed, and I think I was going every three months instead of every month.

Then I went, and the person was like, well, you're trespassing our clients all the time.

Why would we send our clients to the library?

So some trust had been broken, but I did have a relationship with the organization.

So I met with -- I asked my people to meet with their people and sit down at the table and talk about what's been going on, expectations at the library, what we can do to repair this relationship.

That's a quick way of saying -- 

what I'm trying to say is I took the time to repair the relationship.

I was like, oh, this is an important relationship.

I need to take the time to repair it.

Another example of a relationship that had lapsed is also at the youth shelter.

The social workers would turn over quite often.

So I would just make sure that I had the new email of my new contact and just never -- you know, if somebody is not responding, just don't take it personally.

Just go and be like, hi, I'm with the library.

You know, I used to talk to Elaine or Eva or whatever.

Then they'll be like, oh, you know, they moved on, and the new person is this.

So just kind of staying in consistent contact with the organization really helped.

   >> SARA: Thank you, Stephanie.

Rachel?

   >> RACHEL: Yeah, I mean, that consistency is huge, especially when you have that high turnover in organizations, especially when you have high turnover and high-need organizations.

You can't really expect that your one contact is going to be a rock-solid contact forever.

And that's okay.

We don't need to -- I like to think of building relationships as building asset-based relationships.

So you're not thinking about what are the -- you know, what are the deficits of a community or an organization but really trying to reframe as much as you can into asset-based thinking.

But yeah, I mean, I feel like this happens all the time.

Sometimes it's totally not your fault.

When I was working on the book mobile, we changed over some routes.

So I was seeing some new childcares.

Boy, did those childcares like to tell me how it wasn't this way with their previous driver, which is totally fine.

So I listened to those concerns, but ultimately, staying consistent, keeping true to your word, making sure that with these kinds of relationships, you're not wavering a ton in your decision making or who you are.

That really helps rebuild that trust.

And then thinking, you know, trying not to take things personally and thinking of your relationships, maybe if it's not going well person to person, thinking of them more as organization to organization.

You know, I'm representing the library.

They are representing their organization.

How would my organization want to engage in this relationship?

That sometimes helps reframe some issues as well.

   >> ELISSA: And I'd like to just echo what everyone else is saying.

Sometimes you have to start from scratch, and sometimes you're going to have to field some complaints.

Yeah, you're going to have to listen, and maybe the complaints are valid.

So taking that into account.

You know, one thing I can say to prevent any mishaps or changes to what you're doing, like being consistent, as Rachel said, I would document everything.

Actually, on our resource guide is the documentation I use for my library system.

It documents not only who you talk to, when you talk to them, but it does leave open what the last conversation was because sometimes it could be months between these contacts, and you don't even remember.

Maybe their staff left.

Maybe your staff left.

So that helps document everything, and that helps be consistent as well.

   >> SARA: Yeah, I think one thing that we talked about when discussing this question is the idea of this being an organization-to-organization connection, not a human -- I mean, obviously we're all humans, but you have to not be possessive of your connections.

You have to be generous with them and make sure everybody knows about them and what's happening so that if something does happen and someone leaves, there's someone else who might be able to step in.

I also really like -- I feel like we're using the word "open" a lot in the chat and in this, just the openness to taking feedback and not being defensive and having humility and realizing other people's experiences are their experiences.

I think as librarians, we really care about being perfect, and we want everything to go well.

It's okay for things to break sometimes.

Like I said earlier, relationships, all kinds of relationships, break.

It's important to be able to work through that and repair them.

All right.

I'm going to move on to our last question before we take on some of the questions that have happened in chat.

So what is a challenge that you personally face in relationship building, and how do you overcome that?

And Elissa, if you want to go first.

   >> STEPHANIE: Elissa, we can't hear you.

   >> ELISSA: I'm muted.

I'm sorry.

So for me, it's time, and I think it's mostly time for everyone, especially in small or rural libraries where you might be the only person working there.

I did ask some of our small and rural libraries how they prioritize who they partner with and build relationships with.

I want to give a shout out to them.

Several replied that the thing they prioritize most is the relationship with the school or the school district in their areas.

After that, the city or any large community group.

The reason they do that is because that's how they feel they reach the most people in their community with the least amount of time.

It has the biggest impact for them.

And when there's one, maybe two, doing everything, you do have to be strategic with your planning.

When I worked on the book mobile, we often had strong relationships with the people who came to every stop, especially the farmers and agricultural workers we visited.

So every year during harvest, they would give us a hundred pounds of potatoes.

That's a lot of potatoes, first of all.

Or they might make sure the book mobile has a pumpkin for its decoration for the fall.

And I know those are -- you know, the relationship isn't we get something.

It's more the relationship itself.

And it's funny because those relationships are incredibly important for small communities.

Like I said, relationships aren't necessarily about getting money or potatoes, but it's leaving people with a positive feeling about the library.

I think especially in small communities when the library is potentially threatened, those members step forward and voice their support.

I found that in smaller communities, you might not have the numbers in people coming into the library, using the library, but you guys have the strength of your relationships.

Small communities use and love their libraries, and every person knows the library staff, and the library staff know everyone.

So I know that little libraries have their challenges, but they have that hidden advantage of a thorough network that libraries in larger communities simply can't compete with.

So don't be disheartened, little libraries.

Your relationships are just as important, even if they're potato relationships.

   >> SARA: I would be delighted, many people in the chat would be delighted by a large portion of potatoes.

   >> ELISSA: That is a lot of potatoes, you don't understand.

That is bags and bags of potatoes.

   >> SARA: I love that taking that gift might seem like a challenge, the gift itself is building the relationship.

   >> ELISSA: They're taking care of us.

That's how they felt.

   >> SARA: Yeah, all right.

Rachel, go for it.

   >> RACHEL: Yeah, one of the biggest challenges for me is actually just the energy it takes.

You know, working -- I work one day a week in that really small library.

Elissa, you saying that every customer is a potential relationship, that's exhausting.

And it feels exhausting because some days you're like, this -- 

it feels like you have to be on a lot of times.

You know, when you're doing tabling or when you're going to make a new connection, I have to hype myself up for quite some time before I do that.

But honestly, it does get easier.

Like, the more you do it, the more comfortable you'll be in it.

But at the same time, the more you do it, then the next time you're at a community resource fair, you look around and be like, I know half of these people, and I'm going to go say hi and ask them about their lives and about their work, but then I'm also, you know, my pool of people that I need to reach out to is now so much smaller.

Then those people that you know are making connections for you.

That's really helpful too.

So yeah, it takes energy.

It takes time.

But it does get easier, yeah.

   >> STEPHANIE: I would just reiterate that I'm an introvert.

It takes emotional energy for me to build these relationships, but it's more having to choose, you know, which relationships to focus on, which takes me back to the very first question of how do I choose.

So I try and be really intentional.

Building trusting relationships takes time.

Sometimes I -- you know, knowing how much time it takes, it can feel overwhelming if I want to build a new relationship with a community I don't serve an identity with, for example.

But just trusting that over time, it'll work.

And I'm excited to get to some of these questions in the chat    >> SARA: Yeah, there are a lot of really good ones, so thank you for throwing those in there.

I think because we've talked about how important that school relationship is, I'll pull that one out.

There's a question about is there anything unique about how you approach a school relationship.

I think especially because schools are -- I know when I'm trying to make relationships with schools, it's hard because they're so busy and overwhelmed with so much to do.

So does anyone have good strategies for building those relationships?

   >> STEPHANIE: I'm going to chime in and say I saw a question there about, like, somebody was having a hard time getting access to their schools.

I would treat that relationship very much like what we were talking about building this trust and not expecting anything from them.

So there might be a librarian who feels very territorial and doesn't want to do Book Toks with you or wants to do the Book Toks and doesn't want you to.

Like, really just being like, I'm the public library.

Just wanted to say hi.

How you doing?

Like really just not expecting anything from them.

Again, we're talking years.

So don't expect anything this year.

Don't expect anything next year.

It's that really long timeline.

I think of it as -- what's the gorilla lady?

Oh, I'll look it up.

Sorry.

But she just spends the time with the gorillas.

Then they trust her.

Jane Goodall, thank you.

I feel like Jane Goodall.

Like, don't try and ask for anything, especially if somebody feels overwhelmed.

I'm just here.

I just want to make sure you know the library is here.

You know, and I usually do -- I just stop by.

What about y'all?

   >> RACHEL: I'll also quickly echo all of that.

Yes, absolutely.

And if you can find one person that is your rock -- I mean, ideally going to the school librarians, that's your first go-to, but in one of my school districts, they have no school librarians in any of the schools.

So I have a teacher who is like my rock of a teacher.

I was going in and giving presentations, and eventually, other teachers hear about that and say, oh, can you do this in my classroom?

This year, that teacher is out on maternity leave.

I emailed all the other teachers to say, hey, you know, do you want to do anything, and they all responded back, which is so incredible.

So if you have that one, you just need one.

And that's hard.

That even takes a long time.

But that one really, really helps.

   >> ELISSA: And I'll say that if you're having trouble getting into the schools, the people you're going to want to contact are -- you're going to go above the teachers, basically, and go to the district to see if they can get you in.

That role that usually gets us into the schools is a curriculum lead or curriculum support person.

They're going to know what the teachers are doing and sort of where might be the best place to put you as the library.

The other thing that gets us into classroom after classroom is SRC.

At the end of May, June, we start doing rounds for SRC presentations, and teachers usually want to have us come because we give out little things.

I've done assemblies in classrooms and all that.

So SRC is a big one because they want kids to read over the summer as well.

   >> SARA: Another thing someone mentioned in the chat that they've had experience where is other staff members have severed a relationship.

I feel like it might be helpful to talk about maybe some tips for starting fresh when there has been damage in the past.

How do you reset from maybe as a new person coming into a previously challenging or severed relationship?

   >> RACHEL: Yeah, I feel like we talked about this a bit, or at least my perspective of rebuilding that trust, staying consistent.

People are allowed to have their feelings and allowed to have their experiences.

You, as the library, can sort of say let's do something different.

It sounds like this one thing that we tried really didn't work for you.

Thank you so much for telling me that.

Like, thank you.

I so appreciate your honesty.

Let's try something different.

Or let's reconnect soon.

Do you have something going on?

Can I help in any kind of way?

Keeping that so, so easy breezy but also truly sincerely thanking them for their honesty.

   >> STEPHANIE: I don't have anything to add to that.

I think the humanness of that is what resonates with me.

Sort of going into compassion mode, going into listening mode.

That's what happened when the youth shelter was like, hey, this is not working.

Oh, okay.

Let's talk.

Thank you for telling me.

   >> SARA: I also think it's really hard in our culture to say that out loud.

We don't like confrontation, right?

So the courage for a partner to say you're causing harm, I think, should be acknowledged.

It's hard to say that to someone.

All right, I like this question -- oh, go ahead.

   >> RACHEL: I just want to say, we do that with customers all the time.

Customers talk to us about how they're feeling all the time.

So it's just taking that sort of empathy.

You don't have to agree with what happened or how a staff member acted, but just really being super sincere and saying I'm sorry that happened to you, that works for the most part.

It's just taking that customer service and bumping it up a bit.

   >> SARA: Someone had a question about not living within the community that they serve, which I think is true for many of us, especially if you're working in a large library system and you can't possibly live in all the places you serve.

I'd love if you'd address that.

I think connected to that is they talked about how the board served as a connection and a resource.

So thinking about your own internal connections as relationships that can serve your community.

I know that's very big and broad, but I'll just leave it there and see what thoughts arise.

   >> STEPHANIE: I've never lived in the communities I serve.

I'm not sure -- that feels weird to say that.

You know, I don't know, I just go out.

Like, hi, I'm the library.

Actually, now that I said that, it's organization to organization, right.

I'm the library.

That's how I introduce myself.

I don't introduce myself as I'm Stephanie.

Sure, but the local community.

Hi, I'm the library.

Yeah, other folks? 

   >> SARA: I loved the idea in the chat as using your board as a resource and as a connection for making connections.

If someone is taking the time and energy to be on your board, they have connections in the community, and they can probably connect you with people.

I think using other people as brokers.

Like, we are connectors and brokers, but there are so many people and communities that serve that function.

If you find those people, they can help bring you in, even if you're not living there.

   >> STEPHANIE: Yeah, super connectors.

   >> RACHEL: I also feel like I heard in the chat -- and maybe this was the same thing and I just read it differently.

I heard of, like, an interest in outreach to your own board.

And I find that happens a lot.

Like, outreach is a very invisible work.

You can do all of these things and take up all of your time, but ultimately, maybe your co-workers see that you're just sitting on your computer and they're like, hmm, yeah, what are you doing over there?

I'm drafting this email.

It's so hard.

So we put in one of our resources something that I created, which was the last sheet.

It was a sample outreach document.

I started creating these outreach documents week by week so that I could show my work, so I could give these to my supervisor and say, I made this connection, I'm following up on this connection, I have this one outreach event that is going to be happening soon.

That one outreach event ended.

Because it is hard for people to see what you've done, especially if it's not a program.

You know, those numbers, there are plenty of people that are numbers people.

Outreach doesn't have a ton of numbers unless you're creating these programs.

So I find that documenting my time and documenting my efforts and truly being able to say we started here and now we're here, I think that's very, very helpful.

And I just want to say, like, I see you.

That's really, really hard.

   >> ELISSA: I saw a question similar to what you're talking about, Rachel, from Laura.

Laura, you're welcome to contact me.

We can talk about this.

This is basically what I do now for the library.

That tension between numbers and a relationship, because it's hard to quantify a relationship.

As library people, staff and board members, we love numbers.

We love to count circulation.

We love to count patrons.

But counting isn't a good way to measure a relationship, as I just mentioned.

That quantitative verse that qualitative is often a tension in our work, as Rachel was just mentioning.

So how do we connect the two, as Rachel said, relationship building and patron numbers?

I think there's space in there to do that.

It's usually stories.

In our strategic plan, we have space for both quantitative and qualitative information because, yeah, sure, 100 people could have used this, but did they get anything out of that?

What does that mean?

I think that's where we want to connect those two things.

So you're welcome to reach out to me, Laura, if you have more questions about that.

   >> SARA: There's a lot more awesome questions in the chat.

We can try to maybe type some answers up for those we missed.

I saw there was one about working in a juvenile delinquent youth camp.

I'd love to address it, but we're running out of time.

I just want to end by saying thanks so much for all your various expertise.

One thing I've been thinking about while you were all talking is the word outreach.

I feel like we're talking about relationship building, which I think can lead to outreach.

It isn't outreach in and of itself, actually.

I don't know that I love the word outreach anymore.

I feel like outreach feels very one sided, like it's me going out to you.

I feel like what we're really talking about is connection and community building.

Sometimes semantics do matter, right.

I feel like outreach feels very transactional.

What we're trying to do is create less transactional connections in our community.

I think we're about out of time, so I'm going to pass it back.

Thank you so much for having us.

   >> JENNIFER: Fantastic.

Wow, thank you all so much.

Really, really great sharing, lots of ideas.

I think you've really clarified that this is kind of a squishy -- you know, these kinds of relationships are squishy.

This work is squishy.

But I think there are lots of opportunities that really allows us to slow down a little bit.

I've been hearing more about slow librarianship.

I think this is an area where you really need to slow it down.

Certainly, building those relationships so that it's not about what the library can do for them.

It's what they're doing in their lives, what's important in their lives, what they need, you know, input on or what they're curious about.

So remember that those conversations can be even wider than we think they should be.

So just a reminder that I will send an email to you all later once the recording is posted.

The templates that were discussed are the a -- at the end of the learner guide.

Sara will perhaps add a few other responses to those questions we didn't get to on the event page.

That link is the spot to go for everything related to this webinar.

I'll put it in chat one more time.

And I'll also send you all a certificate automatically for attending today.

We also hope that you can take some time to complete the survey I'll send you as you leave.

We collect that feedback and share it with our presenters, as well as guide our ongoing programming.

I did put a link in chat.

We have a session we just scheduled for the end of January.

I know, January sounds so far away.

But we are looking at this topic in another webinar.

So please come back, and we'll continue to think about this.

So thank you so much to all of you again, Sara, Stephanie, Elissa, Rachel.

Thank you for all the great work you do.

Your organizations and your communities are very grateful for you, I'm certain.

So, thank you so much.