Failing to Innovate: not an option. Jill Hurst-Wahl, president of Hurst Associates, is talking about the need for libraries to offer innovative and engaging services to current and future users in order to remain relevant, and to meet changing needs.

She talks about millennials, and their different needs. I’d also suggest that we pre-millenials want and expect more than previously. It’s dangerous to assume that only the young want new things.

Jill suggests - as we have - that libraries need to innovate in order to ‘compete’ against the alternative sources of information that are springing up around us.

Can the sector change, though? Can we innovate in this way? Or does the Innovator’s Dilemma kick in and prevent us from cannibalising our existing business models whilst building new ones?

Millennials, Jill suggests, are always connected, and multi-task in ways that earlier generations couldn’t. They are overloaded by information, and they want to be able to take what they find, use it and remix it, often without regard to copyright and other restrictions. They want to do things on their own schedule; they want access to the library when they want it, not just when the library is open.

“If you don’t offer them something that has value to them now, you’re going to be irrelevant to them for the rest of their lives. It’s not a risk we can afford to take”

(Eli Neuberger).

Five types of innovation;

• product/service innovation [podcasting, building a new website, etc]
• process/delivery innovation [Virtual Reference services, audio book issues, etc]
• marketing/promotion innovation [new pricing models, free access like Source, 'satellite' libraries in shopping centres (that look like shops, not libraries, and that open like shops, not libraries), libraries on MySpace, etc]
• business model innovation (the library being everywhere, all the time - we said that!)

Hmm. Looks like I’ve missed one.

Thinking a bit more about the marketing/promotion innovation, I’ve always wondered what scope there might be for a library in a bookshop. Seriously, it’s not as daft as it might appear. Maybe someone would borrow a book by a new author about whom they are not sure, and then buy it (and all her other books) if they like it. Maybe people would take more risks in their reading, and maybe reader, library and book shop would all benefit? I wonder if Waterstones would be interested?

Innovation, Jill argues, often takes time. Even the simplest new product or idea often takes months or years of work behind the scenes. We can attest to that one, but it’s going to be great when it’s ready!

Innovation also requires us to adapt, and to take on new skills. Many of our beneficiaries will also need to change and learn new things in order to benefit from our work, and we need to remember - and understand! - the adoption curve. We need to help others cross the chasm.

“If we can’t innovate in order to be relevant to the millennials, we won’t have to worry about the generation that comes after them.”

A good point!

Library 2.0 - an idea that libraries should be innovative, and need to innovate for the future. A good way of putting it…

Jill’s presentation will be online later today, at hurstassociates.blogspot.com, and she had a lot to say that resonates with our own ideas at Talis. A good presentation, that felt (to me!) like it validated much that we’re doing, so thanks Jill.

Technorati Tags: CIL2006, Libraries, Library 2.0, Talis

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