This online tutorial teaches library staff how to advocate for their library from the frontlines. It explains that all library staff have opportunities to influence how others perceive the library, regardless of their specific job duties. The tutorial provides examples of "frontline advocacy interactions" where staff can promote the library's strengths and needs during conversations with patrons. It emphasizes that library staff are the best advocates because they interact directly with patrons and understand their library and community.

1. WHERE THE ACTION IS:
Advocating for Your Library from the Frontline
A self-paced interactive tutorial
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2. Welcome!
Everyone who works in a library has
opportunities to influence what others think
image coming
about that library.
The purpose of this online tutorial is to help
you get fresh ideas about how you can be
an effective advocate for your library, both
on and off the job.
The tutorial is easy. Read at your own
pace, and click on the interactive features
that catch your eye. It should only take
about 20 minutes.
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3. What is frontline advocacy for libraries?
The word frontline describes anyone who interacts
directly with others in the course of providing a product
or service.
Advocacy means supporting a cause or action. We
often think that only lobbyists or certain kinds of
administrators have the skills and connections to be
advocates. Not true! Some of the most effective
advocacy is staff-driven, and everyone can do it,
especially you.
So...frontline advocacy for libraries means using your
position as a library employee to promote your library
and encourage the support of others.
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4. How does this apply to me and my library?
Positive interactions by frontline library staff bring
about customer loyalty and support. In other words,
when people think about your library, they probably
don’t think about your director or management staff.
They think about - and interact with - you.
When they enjoy positive interactions with you, they
also form a positive impression of your library. Your
help, friendliness and personal attention make them
more likely to be a faithful library user and potentially
to become a champion of your library because of its
association with you.
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5. What’s a frontline advocacy interaction?
Good question! It’s any interaction by you that gives
you the opportunity to share information about your
library’s strengths and needs.
For example, let’s say your library manager is asking
Library Photo
for more money for online resources in next year’s from Ann
budget.
When a patron comments on the database he found
helpful, or perhaps complains about waiting for a
computer, take the opportunity to tell him, “We’re trying
add more online resources in next year’s budget. In
fact, we have a fact sheet at the reference desk that
will tell you all about it. Let me get one for you!”
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6. When your library’s evening hours are threatened, be
sure your evening users take home the book mark that
tells them who they can contact to voice their support
for keeping the library open late.
It’s tough to measure the impact your frontline
advocacy interactions make on people, but articulating
your library’s strengths and needs do make a
tremendous difference in library support.
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7. Who me?
We all have our comfort zones when it comes to
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sharing messages about our libraries and the support
they need. Your personal comfort zone may start with
talking to a family member, friend or neighbor.
Practice until you feel like stretching yourself a little bit,
then share your library’s good points and needs with
someone you know less well. Keep it short and
simple.
Your library will benefit from what you have to say and
you’ll benefit from the confidence that comes from
doing something you thought you could do.
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8. Love me, love my library
It’s easy to understand how library staff who
interact directly with customers are on the
frontline. The reference librarian, circulation
desk clerk, the person who speaks to a book
group or assists computer users are obvious
examples.
But what if your job doesn’t require you to
interact directly with library users?
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9. Don’t worry! Whether or not your duties
put you in the public spotlight, you can be
a great frontline advocate for your library.
That’s because you have friends, relatives,
neighbors and non-library colleagues who
know you work for the library and for whom
you are “the face” of the library.
Here is a video of how ALA’s 2009-1010
President, Camila Alire, explains it.
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10. You are your library’s BEST advocate
And guess what else? You’re also your
library’s best frontline advocate.
You are the person who interacts every day
with library customers and with others who
know you work at the library and associate
you with the services provided there.
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11. Whether you’ve worked at your library for 6 months or
25 years, you are an insider who knows your library
best. Because of this, you may even be the “go to”
person for your friends and colleagues who are
looking for information or advice.
Work with your library manager for ideas and
language to use to point out your library’s strengths
and needs - and to persuade others to support it.
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12. Libraries exist within communities
All libraries have communities
associated with them – towns, schools,
corporations, colleges or universities or
hospitals, for example. Libraries and
their communities enjoy a mutually
beneficial relationship.
The library supports its community by
providing important resources and
services. The community gives the
library the reason for its very existence
and devotes some of its resources to
its support.
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13. Whether your library’s community is a
neighborhood, an elementary school, a high
school, a university campus, or a historical
society, you are a member of this community
and understand it best.
Because you understand your library and its
community, you understand your library’s value
to its community best.
Shout it out like these New Yorkers.
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14. What is your library’s value?
Why does your library matter? Take
some time to think about this question.
Each kind of library offers its community
something unique and vital to the
success of that community.
If you work in a public library, is your
library the hub of your neighborhood?
Do you have wonderful job and career
resources? Are you passionate about
services to children and teens? Are your
Internet computers always in demand?
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15. If you work in a school library, what do
students enjoy most about their library time?
Do you offer excellent help teaching how to
do research?
How does your library serve teachers,
families and others?
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16. What about your college or university library?
Is it the best place on campus to study or work
on group projects? Does it offer a huge range
of databases? Does your faculty value your
library staff’s ability to acquire materials from
other libraries quickly?
Do you work in a special library, such as a
business, law firm or hospital? Does a wide
range of employees use your library? Do you
or other library staff provide personalized
research services? Do your library’s resources
help others be more successful at their jobs?
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17. Articulating your library’s value
Thinking about these kinds of questions will help you understand the value of your library,
and that’s essential before you can articulate that value to others.
Check out Harper College’s
Tour The Library video
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18. Libraries are good investments!
Businesses like to measure “return on investment” or
“ROI,” the profit that is realized from investing in a
resource. Libraries of all kinds provide a return on their
investment too; and that ROI is an important
determinant of your library’s value. Regardless of the
kind of library in which you work, your job is to
communicate its value to others whenever you can.
How is your library
valuable? Please share
Its about informing your customer and persuading that
at ALAConnect.
person to consider how your library benefits him or her,
and to feel inspired to act on your library’s behalf.
Work with your library’s management team to craft the
best frontline advocacy messages.
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19. Becoming an effective frontline advocate is easy
You’re probably thinking, “Hey, I already do
this!” But how can you do it systematically and
be more effective?
Good news! ALA has easy-to-use Frontline
Advocacy Toolkits, online resources that can
help you determine what you should tell others
about your library and how you can become an
ace at frontline advocacy. There are toolkits for
every kind of library: public, school, academic
and special...
...and they’re just a click away.
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20. Creating advocacy message
These toolkits can help you and your library management
team employ effective practices and processes for creating
messages that convey your library’s value, articulate its
needs and persuade users that you need action from them.
The toolkit will help you identify key words that come to
mind when you think about why your library is valuable.
Research help? Computer access? Job resources?
Personalized services?
Can you articulate your advocacy message in 15 words or
less? Could you say it in the time it takes to walk to your car
with someone in the parking lot? Click here to learn more.
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21. Who needs to hear your advocacy message?
Potentially everyone you know. People
who use your library, who know how they
benefit from your library’s resources, will
be a very receptive audience for your
message.
They’ll also be motivated to share your
message with others and help your library
gain the resources it needs.
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22. Some advocacy messages are best targeted to
specific audiences.
For example, business students can work through
the student government to support your college/
university library’s request for more online business
reference tools. Parents who bring their children to
story time at your public library branch should
understand why your library needs to expand its
children’s area. Corporate personnel who depend
upon your special library for a competitive edge
need to become library advocates. In all these
examples, you are the best messenger.
Click here to read more about identifying your key
audiences.
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23. Think about those who don’t use your library, but
should. Who can you persuade to try it? Start by
inviting just one person - a family member, friend
or colleague - to come for a visit.
Be persistent! And when that person comes, be
sure to take the time to show how your library’s
resources benefit him or her. Remember that Tell us with whom you share
everyone who understands your library’s value is your advocacy message.
a potential library champion.
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24. Seize the opportunity!
Don’t let opportunities to be an effective frontline advocate for your library pass you by.
And don’t wait for a crisis to advocate for your library. Practice it every day, and when
there is a special issue or concern, you’ll feel like a pro.
Here’s are two examples....
Example 1 Example 2
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25. Team up with your library management
team and other staff and brainstorm
ways to communicate appropriately the
kind of support you need. Share ideas
to place your library front and center in
a positive way.
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26. Timing is everything
It’s true. Take advantage of that timing. For example:
• What if a member of your book club has just announced she’s expecting
her first child? Tell that perspective parent about materials or
programming your library has on prenatal care. Let her know that your
library wants to add programs for toddlers.
• What about college students who are leaving to study abroad? Let the students
know what your college library has to offer to prepare them for living in their
new country, and be sure their teachers know that your library is the first place
students go to find that information.
• What if your organization has just taken a new client or partner on
board? Gather some helpful information on them and share it with your
corporate colleagues. Remind your colleagues that the resources your
organization subscribes to allow you to gather this information quickly.
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27. There are some special times to tell your
friends, relatives, neighbors and non-library
colleagues what the library has for them.
Go online to www.ilovelibraries.org or
www.ala.org and find out the dates for
National Library Week, Library Snapshot
Day, Read Across America Week, Teen
Read Week, or other celebrations, and
make use of the public awareness those
events generate.
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28. How do you get people’s attention?
Start slowly. For example:
• Send a faculty member an email inviting her to
bring her freshman class for a library tour.
• Call a neighbor and let him know that he can use the library’s
computers to write a resume and search for a job.
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29. • Tell a parent you bump into at the store that your library will
soon be open longer hours for students.
• Let a colleague in another department know that
your library has begun subscribing to a new
database he might find helpful.
See? its easy! Once those individuals realize the benefits they derive,
encourage them to step up and help your library keep those resources - and
gain new ones. Click here to learn more.
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30. Feeling more confident?
Work closely with your library manager to spread effective frontline
advocacy messages:
• Write a letter to the editor. Praise your library as a community jewel
and a great place to work and explain why it needs financial support
to remain strong.
• Start a blog about all the things that make your library “the resource
place” for everyone.” Include in your blog ways that others can
become your library’s friend and advocate.
• Design and print some simple, colorful fliers or bookmarks that
remind readers of your library’s assets or special services and let
people know which ones are threatened by budget cuts.
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31. What’s your kind of library?
Public? School? Academic? Special?
ALA’s four toolkits can be easily accessed.
Simply click on the Frontline Advocacy
Toolkit for your kind of library, and find
simple, ready-to-use tools that will make
you a frontline advocacy ace in no time flat!
• Public library
• School library
• Academic library
• Special library
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32. What have you learned?
Has this tutorial inspired you to think creatively about how you can be a
better frontline advocate for your library?
Take a short quiz and see what you’ve learned!
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33. Frontline Advocacy Quiz - Question 1 of 4
1. Which of the following are examples of frontline advocacy interaction?
A. Telling students and teachers that study groups need for the library to be open in the evenings, and their voices
need to be heard to prevent cuts in evening hours.
B. Sending a colleague, family member or friend an article you know he will find helpful, and reminding him that your
library provided this information and needs his ongoing support.
C. Being sure that a parent you know understands why your library needs to expand its space and services for children.
D. Informing a book club that meets at your library that possible cuts to your collections budget will impact your library’s
ability to have their titles on hand, then giving them contact information for the decision makers who will be
determining the library’s budget.
E. All of the above.
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34. Frontline Advocacy Quiz - Question 1 of 4
1. Which of the following are examples of frontline advocacy interaction?
A. Telling students and teachers that study groups need for the library to be open in the evenings, and their voices
need to be heard to prevent cuts in evening hours.
B. Sending a colleague, family member or friend an article you know he will find helpful, and reminding him that your
library provided this information and needs his ongoing support.
C. Being sure that a parent you know understands why your library needs to expand its space and services for children.
D. Informing a book club that meets at your library that possible cuts to your collections budget will impact your library’s
ability to have their titles on hand, then giving them contact information for the decision makers who will be
determining the library’s budget.
E. All of the above.
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35. Frontline Advocacy Quiz - Question 2 of 4
2. The person who is in a good position to be an effective frontline advocate for your library is:
A. The individual who manages your library
B. The one who handles reference and research requests
C. The cataloger or clerk who works behind the scenes
D. The staff member who works at the circulation desk
E. All of the above
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36. Frontline Advocacy Quiz - Question 2 of 4
2. The person who is in a good position to be an effective frontline advocate for your library is:
A. The individual who manages your library
B. The one who handles reference and research requests
C. The cataloger or clerk who works behind the scenes
D. The staff member who works at the circulation desk
E. All of the above
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37. Frontline Advocacy Quiz - Question 3 of 4
3. What’s an effective way to get your frontline advocacy message heard?
A. Tell your advocacy message to everyone you can think of
B. Sending an email blast with your advocacy message clearly spelled out
C. Handing out fact sheets, fliers or bookmarks that publicize your library’s advocacy message
D. Inviting people to your library to learn how they benefit from its services and resources and how they can support it
E. All of the above
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38. Frontline Advocacy Quiz - Question 3 of 4
3. What’s an effective way to get your frontline advocacy message heard?
A. Tell your advocacy message to everyone you can think of
B. Sending an email blast with your advocacy message clearly spelled out
C. Handing out fact sheets, fliers or bookmarks that publicize your library’s advocacy message
D. Inviting people to your library to learn how they benefit from its services and resources and how they can support it
E. All of the above
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39. Frontline Advocacy Quiz - Question 4 of 4
4. ALA provides easy-to-use Frontline Advocacy toolkits online for staff in which kinds of
libraries?:
A. Public
B. School
C. Academic
D. Special
E. All of the above
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40. Frontline Advocacy Quiz - Question 4 of 4
4. ALA provides easy-to-use Frontline Advocacy toolkits online for staff in which kinds of
libraries?:
A. Public
B. School
C. Academic
D. Special
E. All of the above
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41. Thank you for taking the time to learn about
Advocating for Your Library from the Frontline
Now go out and be a frontline
advocate for your library!
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