Staff Meeting Notes  Wednesday August 22^nd 2018

In attendance: John Hong, Djuina Hammet, Russ Wagner, Angela Barratt, Richard Ford, Kameshia Smith, Eric Marques, Teresa Eshelman, Leona Hoegsberg,

Fairly short meeting today

1.       Incident Report Activity: 

Group activity reports were shown during meeting, staff read and commented on the  proper guidelines, and whether the reports were filed correctly and accurately, with all relevant detail possible. Reports should be sent to supervisors first for review of proper spelling and grammar and that reports are written in the past tense and in third person.

2.       Living Room updates:  Melinda and Edith are planning this event. Anyone who wishes to work the event for a few hours that day should notify John. If you haven’t volunteered to help with a committee, they could use the help.

3.       The Refugee Living room event: Photo display is up already, event will be held in November.

4.       Collection Development visit: LMS will visit Collier on September 21st. They will look at the collections and help with collection maintenance. Staff will be available to help with discards. Angela mentioned that extra book carts should be requested for this.

5.       Open Discussion:  

a.       Wand training is available through Eric if needed.

b.      Phones forwarded in the middle of the day on Tuesday due to a system glitch.

c.       Phone in staff work room at sticker label printer maybe not working right, and should be looked at by Russ, and if necessary IT.

d.      New toy placed in kids’ area; fishing pole and blue dish with laminated fish.

Staff Meeting August 15^th 2018

In attendance: Melinda Campell, Russ Wagner, Richard Ford, Alisa Baker, Teresa Eshelman, Eric Marques, Nichole Lewis, Kameshia Smith, Edith Partida, Angela Barratt

Scheduling and time at front Desk: Telephone duty? Sometimes phone calls get out of hand. Melinda asked staff to think about designating a telephone duty person per shift.

Melinda’s Book Club: May get passed on to some other staff member? Melinda’s duties are becoming heavy, and would like to pass it on.

Living Room September 15^th:  -

Guest speaker, graphic illustrator will show off art as well as photograph exhibit. Large painting to be hung in front lobby area. For now he’ll be the only guest speaker, geared towards getting kids interested in art at a young age.

 Crafts will be shifted around to direct towards guest speaker. Think about what crafts could be done for the event and pass them on to Melinda, who will tell them to Helen Chou at International Services.

                Caterer will provide enchiladas for everyone. Vegan types also will be served.

                Invitation cactuses will be handed out to invite everyone to living room part. Fliers for the event will come next week. Melinda and Edith want to invite more groups to attend and promote soccer or other sports.

Open Discussion:

Richard enquired if those scheduled to be off have to come. Melinda said attendance is optional for those scheduled to be off. Budget was $650, and food was estimated to be about $500 of that. Staff also should not use personal money or time to work on this event.

Eric is doing good work with scanning wand. It’s still giving him problems, however.

Angela has put in her two weeks  notice to leave HPL to work in South Sudan, then eventually to Dallas.

Kameshia mentions that she has only two volunteers left. She wants everyone to consider if there are any tasks to be done that new prospective volunteers can do.

Russ mentioned about laptops being turned in for staff to double check that they are shut down completely.

Teresa wants staff to be careful about current magazine copies to not be taken or damaged by customers.  Also, we should encourage people to use the xcheck machines as these will properly demagnetize the items they check out.

Staff Meeting: August 1^st, 2018

In Attendance:  Melinda Campbell, Sarah Siboldi, Malari Williams, Amber Fanning, Angela Barratt, Leona Hoegsberg, Edith Partida, Russ Wagner, Eric Marques, Alisa Baker, Kameshia Smith, Cyrano Machey, Aric Jackson, Richard Ford, Britney Scott.

No real agenda today, Celebration of Interns’ last day at Collier.

Summer almost over: SRP briefing by Angela.

-          SRP going well, kids like prizes so far.

-          Can no longer register for SRP, can still pick up prizes.

-          Family Prize packs, limited. Inform Angela when more are needed.

-          Summer lunch last day Aug 16^th,

Living Room- Saturday Day, Sep 15^th.  Celebrating Mexican Independence day.

                -Still confirming which companies to come to Collier for event.

                - Edith will distribute materials to staff for this to work on and familiarize.

                - Mexican banners will also be made and used

                - Ideas for Crafts? Inform Edith, planned for next week.

                - Artist coming next, a digital illustrator, will be a speaker for the event.

Open Discussion – Any issues to be discussed?

-          Shelves in staff area, where books are to be labelled or incomplete. Can be sent to LMS? We can label them here at Collier.

-          When checking items in, 3M pad box needs to be selected Green or Yellow, as proper. This is why items beep when customers leave the building through the gates.

-          Staff should keep track of how many items (discs) may be stolen.

-          Staff is also allowed to stop customers if we think they are taking items without checking them out at the stations.

-          Passport office beginning today will be closed every Friday due to the shortened hours (1-5).

-          Collier will be open on Mondays at 10am now.

-          Dept of State website still says no appointments needed at Collier by mistake. Richard will work on this.

-          Man who smokes weed is suspended for 90 days, and cannot be on our property.

-          Unwanted uncataloged Teen items have been removed by Angela.

Staff Meeting July 18^th 2018

In Attendance.: John Hong, Alisa Baker, Aysia Selders, Aric Jakcson, Leona Hoegsberg, Britney Scott, Edith Partida, Melinda Campbell, Kameshia Smith, Cyrano Machey, Angela Barratt, Nichole Lewis, Djuina Hammet, Russ Wagner, Eric Marques, Richard Ford, Teresa Eshelman.

1     Celebration:  Cyrano’s 30^th Birthday, Happy Birthday party and food served.

       Closure of customer interactions: Many situations around the library become almost hostage emergencies, particularly when people get our help and then spend more time rambling about non-question material

Example:

a.       Customer A requests assistance on the computer for printing documents, then talks about her chewing gum and how different the taste is now from the 1960’s, and keeps speaking about the quality and color of chewing gum.

b.       Customer B requests assistance making a passport appointment, then talks about how his bicuspid is bothering him, but how he’s too cheap to buy health insurance, plus his boss is a penny pinching crab that doesn’t pay him enough to afford it in the first place.

c.       In both cases, the library related problem is resolved, but the customers keep talking and cannot stop. Perhaps they are lonely, or paranoid, but keep talking in a more conversational way and waste staff’s time that could be better spent helping others’ needs on library related problems. A simple clean cut off is required. Staff may be able to step aside to help someone else, or refer the rambling customer to another staff member. Politeness and professionality is key to customers’ needs, but staff must also keep in mind the issue of time management.

3.       Consistency at Service Points:

a.       Drinks on the floor: water only, and should be kept under the desk.

b.       Slow times during the day: Roaming can be done, books picked up and marked as used, customers can be helped on computers, books can be shelved.

c.       Voceras: Larger locations, such as Regional libraries, are recommended to get these to call for service or for manager help in emergencies.

4.       Open Discussion:

a.       Refrigerators should be cleaned out every Friday.

b.       Security cameras? : John has requested them, but Collier is unlikely to get them. Djuina mentions that consistent incident reports filed can help to solve this.

c.       Stat Sheets: Cyrano mentions that only he should be the one to make them. If one for the assigned day is not there, he should be informed.

d.       Air Quality binder is present at the front desk if anyone asks.

e.       Collection Development wand is on the way as well.

Staff Meeting July 11^th 2018

In Attendance: Melinda Campbell, Leona Hoegsberg, Eric Marques, Russ Wagner, Aric Jackson, Aysia Selders, Britney Scott, Cyrano Machey, Nguyen, Edith Partida, Nichole Lewis, Richard Ford, Kameshia Smith.

Substance Abuse Policy:  Everyone should read and sign the substance abuse policy.

Computer Help, One to One: This is any interaction between yourself and computer users needing help. Any questions you answer should be entered according to this policy, and will be posted to the intranet by Mary Hammond in the next few days.

Examples include “Where?”, “How?”, and “What?”  “Where do I find the cookbooks?”  “How do I use the public computers?”  “Where is the Houston Chronicle online?”

All staff should read this and utilize these criteria for determining daily stats questions. These do not include tax or language based questions, these are duplicate questions also included as reference questions. Tax questions include such examples as “Where do I find the tax forms online?” This is a reference question, but not actually a computer based question.

Likewise, informing users about internet safety is a reference question, but not a computer one-to-one question.

Pay Raise:  3% pay increase beginning July 1^st pay period.

Server Room: The door to the server room should be closed at all times during operating hours, and opened up at the end of the workday.

Collier Kudos and Open Discussion:  Russ, Eric, Kameshia, Edith, and Cyrano.

-          SRP prizes: Prizes including Astros tickets. Astros tickets are for tomorrow’s game, so these should be given out today. Also, family pack prizes should be recorded, but problems have arisen while doing this. 

-          Russ will be doing a training class today and tomorrow on using Mobile Circ and Hotspots during outreaches.

-          Nichole wants staff to give any ideas and money for July birthdays, to be placed on Britney's desk in the fish box.

-          Cyrano encourages people to answer phone calls even when not on front desk.

-          Britney refers to community outreach events and the new calendar for outreach schedules on the Collier Blog on the right side under Helpful Links. Anyone who wishes to help with these events should tell Britney and put their names on these.

-          Qless is still giving issues on appointments. We should check the customers’ phones for appointments and take them back to the PP office.