I don’t know if I’ve had a lot of great insights over the course of my career. There are things I’ve figured out, and things that other people have figured out and explained to me, but there haven’t been many times when I’ve experienced anything that really felt like a flash of professional inspiration.

It happened once, though. The thing is, I can’t remember the circumstances in which it happened. I just know that at some point, I suddenly understood a very important principle, and an equally important corollary:

1. The farther you are from a system, the simpler it will look to you, and
2. The easier and cheaper you will expect changing that system to be.

I think that insight may have been driven by years of listening to people characterize scholarly publishing as a simple matter of “authors creating content and giving it away to publishers for free so that publishers can sell it back to them at an enormous profit.” Of course, if you have little or no experience of publishing, this is exactly what it looks like. And because we, in libraries, work so often and so closely with publishers, it’s easy for us to think that we’re closer to that system than we actually are, and that we are therefore seeing it in all its complexity. But for the most part, we aren’t, and we therefore don’t see (or overlook) the highly complicated and wide-ranging network of interlocking pieces that make up a superficially simple-looking whole.

But obviously, this is a principle that applies to lots of other systems as well – and it absolutely applies within an organization, and is especially important for leaders to understand. Anyone who has been a library leader or who has been led by one has probably seen this principle in action, for better or worse. Certainly I have fallen prey to the assumption that I understand fully a process or system within my organization that looks, from my vantage point, much more simple and straightforward than it really is, and I’ve seen other leaders do the same.

I can imagine that some readers might be skeptical – it’s understandable to assume that we understand, at least to a reasonable degree, all or most of the processes taking place within our areas of stewardship. So let’s try a quick thought experiment: imagine for yourself what is involved in withdrawing a book from your collection. (No fair if, at some point in the recent past, you yourself were in charge of withdrawals. If that’s you, then think of a different process, one for which you have not had responsibility in the past.) Chances are you’ll be able to think of several important parts of the withdrawal process: documenting the withdrawal decision; removing the book’s item record from the catalog; physically removing or effacing property marks; etc. Think of as many such steps as you can, and write them down in the order you believe they should be accomplished. 

Now make an appointment with the person in your library who is in charge of withdrawals, and compare your list with his or her actual procedures. As you do so, ask yourself questions like:

• How many steps in this process reflect legitimate organizational needs of which you were not aware?
• Were you surprised by the existence of any legal or policy requirements?
• What specialized training is needed to carry out this process? Is any of it surprising to you?
• What mistakes are you less likely to make now that you understand this process better?

As you rise in the hierarchy of an organization, it’s important to remember that your distance increases from an increasing number of organizational systems – all of which will, as that distance increases, look more and more simple to you. This means that as your scope of authority – and therefore the opportunity to make high-handed decisions without input from others – increases, your ability to fully assess the implications of your decisions within the organization actually decreases. This is one reason why epistemic humility (a healthy recognition one’s own perceptual limitations and biases) is so vitally important to leadership.

Takeaways and Action Items

• The more authority you have in an organization, the less likely it will be that you have broad, nut-and-bolts understanding of how the component programs and processes of your organization work.
• If you want to gain your staff’s confidence, demonstrate epistemic humility: acknowledge your gaps in understanding, and actively invite them to educate you about their work.
• Conduct an experiment like the one outlined above, using a program area of the library in which you do not have much direct experience. What did you learn from doing so?