All of a twitter
There's some twittering at present about whether CILIP has (or should have) any "official" presence on various lists or micro blog sites.
The simple answer, of course, is no. In terms of "official" activity, cyber life is just like real like - if it happens in a CILIP-sanctioned space, it's official; if it happens down the pub or in someone else's space, it isn't.
But there's a deeper question to address. As everybody networks with everybody else in an increasingly informal and always-on way, how do organisations maintain a culture of inclusion and, at the same time, retain a methodical approach to work planning, managing, and decision-making? This is a critical issue for organisations like professional bodies or indeed academic institutions - any organisation where a rational approach to management is potentially conflicted by the emotional affiliation of members to their peer group: academics to their field of study rather than to their university; LIS specialists to their field of specialism rather than to their professional institute.
Back in the days when I taught management, Charles Handy wrote about the "psychology" of organisations, contrasting the institute (symbolised by the Doric pillars of classical architecture) and the network (symbolised by a spider's web). But that was a long time before we entered the information age - and it's clear that cyber space and social media have widened the gap considerably between the culture of the institute and the culture of the network.
So, how do we deal with this widening gap? How do we bring together the best features of an institute (integrity, authority, sustainability) and the best features of a network (currency, flexibility, accessibility)? This is a key question which underlies a number of "hot topics" around CILIP at present: communications; governance; relationships between the CILIP people working at Ridgmount Street and the CILIP people working for Branches and Groups.
So - just to test whether anyone actually reads this stuff - what do you think? How can we best combine the authority of our institute with the democracy of our network? How can we continue to use our resources in a planned and structured way - and still find time and space to engage with all the twittering?
Answers on a blog post, please, to this address. And no peengeing...
