Midwinter Sunday: Planning and Budgeting for the Unknown

During today’s Planning and Budget Assembly, ALA Executive Director Keith Michael Fiels and President-elect Camila Alire fielded questions from members. One ALAer representing ACRL brought up an issue that has been much commented on in Inside Scoop: What’s the future of print journals? And she wanted to know what ALA was doing about the issue of print vs. electronic association-wide, especially given the current budget climate. ALA Executive Director Keith Michael Fiels said we are making decisions on an individual basis, based on the economics of the operation. American Libraries has been working with Membership to respond to the demand from some members for an opt-out choice in the personalized membership communication preferences. That is coming. It was also clear to me that most people in the room had not noticed that American Libraries published its first-ever digital supplement this month, focused on CE and library education. We are planning another for spring around library architecture, interior design, and furnishings. We need to see how readers respond and advertisers as well. ALA Treasurer Rod Hersberger talked about the three major areas of revenue for ALA: conferences, publication, and dues, calling them “mature businesses.” That’s not a problem, he said, until you consider the amount of new money ALA needs each year. Current products are for current markets, he said, and we have to take a look at cost-cutting that could be achieved by, for example, bundling the journals. Are we going to look at new products for current markets, he asked, or current products for new markets? Do we have services and products that could appeal to other associations? Jim Neal, chair of the Budget Analysis and Review Committee, asked if ALA had a global strategy for its brand. “It’s going to require some freer thinking than we have done,” he said, adding that this involves recognizing our assets, capitalizing new ventures, and building a competitive sense. There was a good deal of complaining about the ALA website, mostly centering around the Collage CMS. “We’re not looking very nimble and agile,” said one person. Others suggested that ALA simply has to put more emphasis on IT, maybe even by outsourcing it. Collage has been a nightmare, said representatives from round tables who noted that it was a lot to expect that volunteers had to take extensive training to be able to post and then find the site down far too frequently. As an ALA insider, I can tell you that Collage has been equally frustrating for staff, especially with IT responsibility spread all over the building, involving people with varying degrees of skill. Part of the solution is no doubt to get all the Web workers on staff to talk to each other regularly and set out the week's goals in a coordinated fashion.  We are working on that in a marketing working group that is setting out goals for cross-unit collaboration under the leadership of ALA Associate Executive Director for Communications Cathleen Bourdon. Everyone is concerned about the financial outlook, that goes without saying, but while the Planning and Budget Assembly provided good guidance for staff, the future seems to be anyone’s guess. ALA Associate Executive Director for Finance Greg Calloway told me at the meeting that we will look at preregistration numbers for Annual Conference on March 1, “and that will be a key indicator of potential fiscal issues we may have to face.” Spring numbers will indicate if further cuts are necessary, he said, in addition to the 3% cut across the board (10% in Publishing) that is already being implemented. Our investment income is down” said Calloway, but fortunately we are not dependent on long-term investments for operating expenses, so the impact right now is not as great as it’s been for other organizations. “Our membership is steady at the personal dues level, and in a strained economic time,” he said, “that loyalty is a very positive note.”