This article claims that the future success of libraries revolves around the need to allow for a “little chaos”. The author concedes that it’s hard to purposely engineer a chaotic environment but that the rewards, when this approach is embraced, is worth it.
I think that bravery based librarianship is the only future we have. At some point, we have to disrupt the patterns and set a new path. Many libraries are doing this already – our profession is, of course, much more responsive to change than most people realise. But fear-based librarianship, or at least caution-based, still seems prevalent. Many a decision is made in order not to upset the minority, rather than to potentially please a whole new majority. In many cases, this approach is taken with good reason. But we’re talking about the survival of our profession, here.