Garrett Trott: ACRL-OR Professional Development Scholarship Reflection

I just finished up John Maxwell’s online course entitled “Developing the Leader Within You.” I really wanted to take this course for several reasons, one of them having to do with some of the changes that Corban University is going through. There has been discussion of the library moving to a new building.  I was hoping that this course might enable me to lead better through that process.  While the discussion really has not developed since I applied for the scholarship (that is, there really is no more or no less certainty that moving will actually take place), I can say that this online course really developed me in several facets.

If I had to point out two particular areas where I feel I learned the most they would be as follows:

  • Attitude really makes a huge difference in many facets of life, including leadership.  In this particular context of potentially moving to a new building, seeing it as an opportunity to expand and develop the services which the library offers and not simply focusing on the work it will take to get there (and it does have potential to be a lot of work) or what can go wrong, really helps the scenario tremendously.  The VPs who are in charge of this transition see my attitude and their eagerness to provide us with what we need is in large part reflective of the attitude I carry through this scenario.
  • Personal/professional development needs to be planned out with a goal of where I want to be.  I have always enjoyed many facets of both professional and personal development, but they have often been only for the sake of the development itself, not necessarily for the sake of developing as a leader.  If I can focus on developing skills that will aid me in this particular scenario, it can be a great asset.  For example, one area that I am working on developing is my skills in conflict resolution.  I do not do this simply so I can learn, but because of the likeliness that these skills can be utilized as we discuss moving the library.

Thanks to ACRL-OR for the professional development scholarship that allowed me to take this excellent online course.

Garrett Trott
Library director, Corban University

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