Losing Ground -Reply

[Dan Lester]

>>> MARY A. DOYLE, SYSTEMS LIBRARIAN,
ECSU <DOYLEM at ECSUC.CTSTATEU.EDU>
06/17/96 02:36pm >>>
This is one of the most important discussions I
have seen on this list.  I believe that our profession
has adopted new technologies at the same rate as
the rest of society.  This is the good news.
Should they have adopted it faster?   Are they
getting lost in the technological revolution?  These
are the "bad" questions.
One of my roles is to implement technology.  I think
the most interesting issue is "passive aggressive"
behavior.  Any comments from list members in
relation to this? 
-----------------------
I'm assuming you're referring to passive aggressive
(PA) behavior on the part of staff members,
colleagues, customers who don't want to use the
new stuff.  It has existed in libraries for the thirty
years I've been doing library technological change,
and will undoubtedly continue for as long as
mankind is around (and just not in libraries, of
course).  Most of us know someone who doesn't
have a TV, a microwave, an ATM card.  For those
who simply choose not to buy a new product, fine,
that's their choice in a free economy.  

For those who have to work with an organization,
however, their obstructionism can be a pain to the
majority, but we have ways of applying our own
pressure.  When we moved to email for all within
this library (before which about a third of us used
other systems for internet email externally to the
library), there were naturally a few who didn't want
to play.  That was dealt with fairly quickly as the
library director saw the value immediately and soon
ceased using paper for the vast majority of internal
communications.  Once the aginners realized
they'd missed a meeting about staff raises or
rearranging the service areas due to NOT reading
their email where the meeting was announced, they
learned that they'd better read it in self defense.  
There are a few who may still never have SENT a
message, but that doesn't bother me.  Sure, some
folks still print out every set of meeting minutes and
file them away in a drawer...but a lot of other sets
are NOT being printed and filed, including mine.  I
know that the secretary has them organized on disk
if I ever need to see them, and that we have them
backed up off of the network for security (to say
nothing of the filed paper copies in a half dozen
desk drawers  o-)     ).  

After six years of implementing technology in THIS
library some of the major aginners are now starting
to complain that they need better and faster
machines since "the web is so slow on my
machine".  (we distribute power machines to power
users, clunkers to those who use them little)  They
are beginning to see the light at last.  In a way this
variation in rate of adoption helps us cope with
limited resources.  In other ways it makes training
and support much more difficult, as no two
computers of the 120 in the building are identical in
either hardware or software...and some are on
DOS, some Win3.11, some Win95.    

Some organizations can issue "thou shalt use...."
edicts, but that isn't our style....we use a bit more of
the carrot than the stick.  Businesses do the same
thing when they make it quicker and easier to give
them a credit card than a check.  Banks do it by
charging for transactions at tellers instead of ATMs,
or by giving credits for deposits made at ATMs 
(my bank does the latter, my wife's the former).

There will always be Luddites, but the vast majority
will keep up with the times at varying rates of
speed, depending on their personal and economic
need to do so.

cheers

cyclops


Dan Lester, Network Information Coordinator
Boise State University Library, Boise, Idaho, 83725
USA
voice: 208-385-1235   fax:  208-385-1394
dlester at bsu.idbsu.edu     OR   
alileste at idbsu.idbsu.edu
Cyclops' Internet Toolbox:    http://cyclops.idbsu.edu
"How can one fool make another wise?"   Kansas,
1979.