Planning for Success

Welcome to the "Joy of Computing — Planning for Success," a guide for the over-worked librarian. Comprehensive in scope, this online resource brings together the most current ideas and best practices for planning, building, and managing your library’s computer technology. "Planning for Success" is not intended to turn you into a networking guru. It’s sole purpose is to give you the details you need to know to get your library’s technology up and running properly, sustain its growth, and ensure its viability. All of the information contained here is based on the real life experiences and successes of librarians across the country, and is supported by a complete set of online tools. We’ve also provided many opportunities to link to additional Internet resources so — if you are so inclined — you can learn more about a particular topic.

"Planning for Success" is organized into six key segments. You can go through these segments from start to finish, or go to only specific areas of interest. Here is a brief description of what you will find:

• Planning and Decision Making covers the ins and outs of creating a technology plan that ties to your strategic priorities and goals.
• Communication and Partnerships delves in the fundamentals of day-to-day technology communication from a “techie” and “non-techie” perspective. It also includes some important guidelines for working and collaborating with key stakeholders.
• Buying and Deploying Technology goes through some of the core actions and decisions you need to consider when planning deployments, installations, and upgrades.
• Maintaining and Sustaining Technology offers important insight into the daily management of public computers.
• Networking and Security covers some of the basic standards and practices for ensuring your library’s network security.
• Innovation highlights the true value of today’s libraries and the role in serving as the center of new community conversations via a much higher level of user interactivity and experiences. If you are ready for Web 2.0, this is a good place to start.

Joy of Computing — Planning for Success is also available in a downloadable PDF format.