Leadership Development Toolkit: Introduction

Building Strong Boards

The Leadership Development Toolkit is a three-part planning exercise developed to assist in determining your library board’s leadership and governance knowledge gaps (i.e., knowledge that you need but don’t have) and shaping its orientation and leadership development program.
The Leadership Development Toolkit is an integral part of the Leadership by Design comprehensive leadership development program developed for the Ontario Library Boards’ Association (OLBA).
The toolkit is designed to:

1. identify knowledge gaps of individual board members and the library board as a whole,
2. help your library board plan its training and development activities, and
3. build effective leadership and sound governance.

The Leadership Development Toolkit has three parts:

Part 1: Knowledge Gaps Analysis

• 7 Worksheets on Library Leadership & Board Governance correlate with “Your Board’s Path to Library Leadership by Design” chart included on the outside back cover of “Cut to the Chase: Ontario public library governance at-a-glance”
• Every board member (including the chairperson) rates his or her level of knowledge with respect to the fundamental library board areas of responsibility.

Part 2: Knowledge Gaps Profile

• Totals and averages board members’ results are using built-in formulae.

Part 3: Leadership Development Blueprint

• Charts the board’s training and development opportunities for the seven board responsibility areas following completion of the Knowledge Gaps Profile.

Each component may be downloaded to be completed on computer and/or by hand.

Please Note: The Leadership Development Toolkit is not a board evaluation tool to measure board performance. The application of the toolkit is successful when the knowledge gaps are expressed as accurately as possible. This is a key step for embarking on improved library board leadership and governance.
Since the toolkit is part of the Leadership by Design comprehensive leadership development program it is recommended that users become familiar with the other Leadership by Design program elements before completing the toolkit exercises. In particular, awareness of the variety of resources available in One Place to Look should help with identifying individual knowledge gaps.”