What Bold Means to Us: An Exercise in Walking the Walk

Photo credit: Cristian Escobar

When we came up with the idea for Embolden by Design (ExD), we did so as a response to this moment. Not to what was happening ten years ago, or what might happen ten years from now, but to what’s happening today — in this long, drawn-out today that often seems to have no edges. 

This is a time that will be studied and written about in textbooks, a time that’s asking more from all of us than perhaps we’ve ever been asked before, not only here in the U.S. but around the globe. Recognizing that what we do now matters, the support we provide to libraries can’t just be any support. It has to be bold.

That’s right: if we’re doing this work, we have to walk the walk. We have to live and breathe boldness so we can help instill it in others. We floated this idea in our last blog, then asked ourselves the same thing: What does bold mean to us, specifically in the context of ExD? Here’s a peek behind the curtains after Stacie led us through this exercise.

Who are "we" and why did we do this?

It’s important to first explain that “we” are not a faceless monolith. We are three women with a mutual love of libraries but different backgrounds and ways of seeing and moving in the world. We are aligned on what we want ExD to be and do — yet each of us retains our own perspective on how to get there and what to emphasize along the way.

When the collective “we” is referenced here, know that it’s built from each of us (Stacie, Laureen, and Amanda) being honest and unfiltered when we did this particular exercise, and then using what came out of it to strengthen our professional alignment, recommit to our purpose, and inform the work we’re doing with ExD and our clients.

Definitions of bold

Now for the good stuff.

When thinking about what bold means to us, we came up with some obvious answers. We said things like thought-provoking, boundary-pushing, and audacious. Leaning into programs that challenge the current administration was a clear and direct nod to boldness.

At the root of boldness is a necessary confrontation with fear. So in addition to courageous, we also said bold is:

• Being scared of uncertainty and doing something anyway

• Trying a new program facilitation technique

• Being the one to convince your colleagues to try something new

• Sky, not ceilings

That last one is really about limitations: not limiting ourselves or others to a small, safe, contained room, but bursting through the ceiling when it makes sense to aim higher — whether to gain a wider vantage point or achieve an outcome that previously felt out of reach.

To be bold is also about an attitude, how we carry ourselves, the energy we bring to any situation. It’s about being joyfully defiant and unapologetic. It’s about smiles and winks. It’s about lighting sparklers instead of candles. (A candle is quiet; a sparkler dares to fizz and crackle.)

It’s fun to talk about boldness as an idea or attitude, but there’s another, more grounded side to being bold. Laureen coined it as “practical boldness,” and we outlined it as:

• Taking smart risks

• Disruption, but not for disruption’s sake

• Leading by example

• Being responsive and also clear-eyed

• Standing tall

In other words, as seemingly carefree as it is to be bold, we still need focus, intent, respect, and strategy to guide our broader vision and actions.

Applying boldness to library programming

Since a big part of ExD is collaborative program development, we dropped “bold” into that lake, too, to see what the whorls and ripples showed us. A bold program to us is:

• Creative and intentional in design, format, and outcomes

• Oriented around topics that are both global and hyperlocal

• Inclusive of different voices

• Inviting of all opinions — even ones we disagree with

For our part, we need to go into the collaborative process by asking the right questions of library staff to really get to the heart of their programming aspirations and concerns and their community’s needs. And guess what: embarking on something bold is also about being willing to do the extra work that comes with it.

Finally, we took away from the exercise some inspiration to put in our back pocket. Past initiatives like R-Squared, Outside the Lines, and lib*interactive’s work at SXSW, along with anything else that’s non-traditional, excite us and keep pushing us to create and lead with boldness, so that we can encourage our library clients to do the same.

Play along at home

We’ll ask it again: What does bold mean to you? Do our answers above resonate with you, or are you brimming with a whole bunch of other ideas we didn’t touch on?

The beauty of doing an exercise like this with your library staff is twofold:

• First, there are myriad ways to think about what it means to be bold. Each person brings their own personality and experience to it — further influenced by history, community, region, culture, and country. Individual answers are instructive and inspiring. Getting to a shared understanding of bold that reflects your library’s specific context and goals is the end game.

• Second, simply asking the question is a bold move in and of itself. Many distressing and destructive things are happening that are having a real impact on real people and require new, creative responses from many corners of society. How can your library programming contribute? Where is there room for boldness in that conversation?

Stay tuned for upcoming material on the “What Does Bold Mean to Us” exercise and how to harness its results.

And if you’re interested in how ExD can support your library through our in-person training, collaborative program development, promotion materials, and evaluation tools, schedule a conversation.