Thursday 17 March 2011

QUALITY ASSURANCE by Christa North

Christa took us to the journey of quality assurance in the work place. What stroked me in her presentation was the PDCA model of quality management.

What I have learned is that, managing quality is not a rocket science. All you need to know is what do you want to achieve? Have you achieved it and how do you know that you achieved what you wanted to achieve? These are the powerful questions you need to ask when managing quality. I learned that quality is measured against the organisational objective which is fitness of purpose vs. fitness for purpose.

THE STRATEGIC OGANISATION IN PRACTICE AND LOCATING THE LIBRARY ON THE MANAGEMENT RADAR SCREEN by Mar. Robert Moropa.

In this session Mr Moropa presented the University of Pretoria Department of Library Services strategic plan. What I liked the most was its vision which is redefining librarianship. Although it might sound otherwise but I think it is a simple straight forward vision I have ever seen in any library before. Looking at the programs arranged by the Centre for African Library Leadership and the research commons that are still in the making I think they are in the right direction towards achieving their vision.  

What I have learnt in that is that it is possible to change the way libraries are viewed by other professions. Us as future leaders need to follow and do things differently.

VISIT TO THE NATIONAL LIBRARY OF SOUTH AFRICA IN PRETORIA

I experience the state of the art library and the librarians are committed to what they are doing. The national library collect and preserved anything that is published in South Africa ranging from the newspapers, government publications to journals and books. I was impressed by the machine that is capable of preserving the book to its present condition for up to 100 years using chemicals. 

I have learned that the National library plays the most important roll than I thought before and that without them we will be losing a lot of our national heritage and important information.