Call to Action: Countdown Your Top 10 of 2017

Today’s Call to Action is important whether you use Twitter or not, so if you are not on Twitter, don’t stop reading. I promise there is literally something for every single library worker in this post.

Today begins the annual countdown of library workers' favorite titles published in 2017 on Twitter. Using #LibFaves17, everyone in library land is encouraged to tweet out their favorite books published in 2017 beginning with #10 and counting down to #1. This is a facilitated conversation so all of the Tweets will be compiled and an overall Top 10 will be announced. There will also be a list of every title that even gets 1 mention.

This last point is why I choose to use this annual countdown as a way to highlight the best horror for libraries. Like I did last year, I will tweet my top 10 horror titles that were published in 2017 for the next 10 days. [Here is the link to today’s title] When it is over, I will have the entire list on my horror blog with more commentary and links to my longer reviews. This way I an ensuring that horror has a seat at the table.

Now back to my promise about including those of you who don’t use Twitter. First, a reminder that you don’t need an account to view the tweets, you just can’t participate. Click here to view #LibFaves17.

But everyone reading this, Twitter user or not, why not use this countdown as an inspiration to get your staff to do a countdown of their favorites from 2017. Anything released in 2017 that you circulate is eligible, so for example, if someone on staff is a big movie buff, they can countdown their favorite DVD releases of the year. Or maybe someone likes multiple formats; their list can have books, music, DVDs, etc....

The simplest way to do this would be to send out an email to all staff asking them to contribute to a library wide countdown. Ask them to send you their top 10 lists [ordered] by the end of the week. Then you can unveil a library-wide top ten in the building-- make a poster and uncover the next one each day. You can also release the countdown on all of your social media.

Not only is this  a super fun way to allow all staff to share their favorites with the entire community, but it also advertises that everyone on staff cares about providing quality materials for them to checkout and enjoy.

You can do a library wide countdown, but then each department can do one too. So the AV materials with the highest votes can be unveiled in the department, the kids materials there, etc.... Heck even each staff member who wants can post theirs.

Now this works best with a staff of 20 or more, but if you have fewer people, work together to make lists for each department.

Finally, so that I leave absolutely no one out and you have NO EXCUSES for not doing this, you could simply do a top ten countdown of the items with the highest circulation in 2017.

The point here is that I am calling you to action to do something to showcase your hyper-local “best” of the year. You can use any criteria for best. Don’t get so mired in arguing about the minutia that it doesn’t get done. Just do it.

For past Call to Action Posts click here.