The purpose of this paper is to address the problem of firstly how we recruit Maori to our profession, train them in the range of skills required to be successful and lastly how to stop them leaving the profession. The preparation of this paper has been assisted through an informal email survey of Te Ropu Whakahau members. Comments from the survey are used throughout the presentation to illustrate a number of key issues that emerged from the survey results. Later in the presentation I will also provide examples of overseas initiatives to recruit ethnically diverse peoples to the Library profession.
This paper provides background information on the Aurora Leadership Institutes and the Aurora Foundation. The latter part of the paper focuses on the looming leadership crisis in the library profession in New Zealand and overseas and identifies several strategies that require implementation to ensure that the crisis is averted.
