LIS Community Convergence

The current edition of the Canadian Library Association's Feliciter addresses the theme of convergence in the library, archives, records management, and related information management community.

IM community convergence has been given weight by last year's formal creation of Library and Archives Canada, consolidating the two former distinct organizations, and through the development of a Government of Canada IM Portal.

More recently, the Ottawa IM Summit was spear-headed by CASLIS-Ottawa President John Savage. This initiative seeks to bring together ten local information management associations to share resources and strengthen the IM community. The initial summit meetings have led to the adoption of shared resources, such as the Ottawa IM Calendar (proudly sponsored by XIST at OttawaIM.xist.com) and an effort to engage in collaborative conferences and events.

Recognizing that the IM community has been less adept than the IT community at presenting a common front -- and as such has played the poorer cousin to IT -- collaboration and a more concerted promotion of this community as a collective and cohesive entity will help raise the awareness, profile, and funding of this professional community. Such collaboration will also inevitably lead to innovative ideas on access to and sharing of information, innovative marketing techniques, and growth in the IM community membership.