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The ALIA National Policy Congress 2002: New South Wales.Report from the meeting of New South Wales ALIA groups held on 28 September, Goethe-Institut Inter Nationes, 90 Ocean Street, Woollahra (close to Edgecliff Station), Sydney, 11:00am - 4:00pm.
Representatives
Others
Welcome and apologies The meeting was chaired by Kevin Dudeney. Jo-anne reported that nine of the twelve groups operating in NSW were represented at this meeting. The Far North Coast regional group has elected to go to a Brisbane meeting, the Riverina group looks like sending a rep to a meeting in Melbourne or Canberra. Only the OPALs group has been unable to organise a rep (the group has been looking for new office bearers to take over and is in a bit of a hiatus, despite a rising membership). It was noted that if groups are unable to attend a regional meeting written responses will be accepted by National Office. These will be included in the background papers for the NPC in Canberra, together with the reports from regional meetings. Apologies were received from Helen Mandl and Rosemary McLauchlan. Background and the 2001 NPC reportKevin explained the new mode of operation for National Policy Congress. He said that members of the Board of Directors will be participating in most meetings, often as facilitators/chairpeople or as participants via teleconference. Prior to the meeting, participants were encouraged to read a number of background papers including a summary of progress since the last NPC meeting. Comments arising from the review of the 2001 progress report and the new model of regional meetings include:
The ALIA Draft Plan for 2003-2004: ALIA: Making the differenceLooking to the futureThe meeting considered the vision of ALIA proposed by the Board and generally agreed with all points in this section. However, having said that, it was agreed that priorities reflected in the draft 2003/4 plan should be reflected in a formal business plan that sets out the logic and decision drivers for the organisation. It was also noted that if the points are listed in an order reflective of their importance, the meeting strongly recommends that point 11 ('an Association whose membership is engaged and participatory') should be moved towards the top of the list. Many questions were mooted in the context of these discussions and these are reflected in the summary below:
General comments:Advised that SWOT = accumulated wisdom of the Board of Directors. Would like to see weaknesses included, though obviously some of these are covered in 'challenges'. Want research basis for this kind of analysis rather than a 'sense of things'. Strong sense that new ALIA structure has dissipated energy/diffused interests. So many non-ALIA groups forming and increasing membership. Why? What are these groups offering them or doing better than ALIA? Money, positve reputation, sectoral specific focus, networking? Vic Health chose to move away from ALIA. Very grassroots group that believed it could better and more cheaply serve its members outside ALIA. Group organises regular meetings and professional development opportunities. Not sure how it has worked out for them in the longer term? What happened to the concept of OILs (organisations in liaison)? This was a good concept. Is ALIA seen as too big with too many competing interests? Acknowledge that managing territorial interests while not merging in all ways is the Association's biggest challenge. Vision and objectives: What is meant by 'innovate' and how is the Association going to facilitate innovation? Is CILIP's mission and objectives a better way to express purpose and direction? Do we need to clarify and differentiate objectives for (a) running the Association's member services, professional competence and recompense, (b) running libraries and (c) contributing to the management of information on a national scale? Initiatives (all): Although the Association should put its members first, encourage excellence, have credibility, add value and invest in the future, it was suggested that these words are meaningless above the specific actions proposed and create unnecessary duplication. Perhaps headings like membership growth and services, governance and structure, value and role, education, research and special initiatives might be stronger and provide more coherence? Strategic focusMembers first
Membership What are the membership patterns of the past decade? Why has membership declined? Is there a review process when people don't renew? (answer unknown) Need research on why loosing members. The five actions relating to membership currently scattered under adding value and other headers might be more succinctly expressed under, say, 'Membership Services and Growth' ? Lists of new members have started to be sent out from National Office but it appears they are going to the last known secretary and that, as a number of groups no longer have secretaries, the lists are often going astray. Jo-anne will contact National Office and report of distribution and frequency.*(see below) Welcoming new members: Would like automatic addition to group e-lists with instructions on removing self if unwanted. Also automatic letters with advice on how to find out what's on for each group including how to join listserv (if applicable) and pointer to group web site (if applicable) for each group joined. Letters could include contact details for the conveners of all groups joined. Jo-anne will see if this is possible under the current system Agreed that technology provides the opportunity to push information out and that we are not doing this effectively. Currently our communication style is reactive rather than proactive. Need to change this. Some groups expressed however, concern that the reliance on e-communication is too great and is narrowing coverage of any communication with the membership at large. All representatives agreed that communication is still perceived as a problem for the Association. Local presence was discussed. Inbuilt notion of regional dynamic in the appointment of local presences was questioned. Should the option for sectoral support be investigated? Groups should have the right to massage their local presences into the form they need to support their activities. What is the role of National Office in identifying and encouraging opportunities for cross-sectoral events? OBG e-mails acknowledged as useful initiative. Sometimes scant on detail though. Should always include timelines, indication of measurements of success and relationship to business plan. National Library Technician e-newsletter currently being trialled. Aiming for quarterly production. Message on aliaLIBTEC e-list when available.
What's happening with sectoral conferences? Reps also reported that a number of members of the trade have spoken with them and said that they do not have a problem with the number of conferences. What research has been done by ALIA to find out what the trade wants/needs? Can they contribute to the discussion on the logical sectoral groupings for conferences? Groups definitely need better assistance to make linkages between them, especially now that there is no national focus for groups. Strong recommendation that ALIA National Office takes the lead. ExcellenceOdd name-would 'Education and Research' be a better descriptor? CPD increasingly important. What can ALIA do to encourage recognition of CPD by employers? Strong support for encouragement and resources for research projects. ALIA needs to act as a clearing house for information on research in the industry in Australia and should actively map what is going on. A possible member-only service could be access to LISA and other databases that relate to L and IS research. ALIA could take out membership that allowed a couple of people to log on at once-equally valuable to city and country folk. CredibilityFunny heading! Agree Association needs to be credible but ...assume means to outsiders. Agree that developing and promoting lobbying and advocacy resources for members should be a key initiative. Hope idea of libraries showcase is a prototype : useful at state level and for specific sectors (eg NSW Health, Vice Chancellors). Maybe need to employ lobbyist to help identify and plan how to lobby effectively to other targets. Great support for leadership in National Coalition for Information Literacy. Noted formal information literacy standards only adopted last year. Bringing together ICT and information literacy. Strong implications for lifelong learning as well as the obvious student connection. Is this the initiative that can deliver the chair at the information agenda table for the broader industry? Or is being part of knowledge management, information production and distribution, innovation, productivity, educational and cultural agendas more relevant in the credibility stakes? Adding valueMember only services seen as critical (recurring theme throughout discussions). Want to see more differentiation between the benefits afforded to individual and institutional members. Concern that institutional members receive all the benefits of membership without any personal commitment, therefore they are defacto personal members. Perhaps should be 3 differentials (members, institutional members, non-members) or certain services for personal members only, eg employment advice and mentoring schemes. Reiterate need for research on what people want and why people leave. Reminder about regional members. Services must be valuable to them to. Suggest that ALIA National Office identifies where communication facilities are available (eg universities) so that they can be utilised. ALIA could then advise groups of their availabilty and/or assist with identifying activities that could be suitable for sharing with regional centres. Public libraries identified as a membership target in this plan. What is ALIA's relationship to PLN? Investment in the futureReview of the Board of Directors should include an independent assessment as well. A report of the review should also be published. The Information AgendaPrior to the meeting participants had been encouraged to look at the papers from the final session of the ALIA 2002 conference and the Peak Bodies Forum. Neil McLean said in his address during the final session at ALIA 2002 that 'the current climate requires a pragmatic approach where value propositions have to be clearly defined' and we need 'a politically astute strategy on society's prevailing terms'. So what exactly is an information agenda and should we have one? Paul Bentley asserted that there is already an agenda in development (albeit couched in terms of ICT) and energies should be directed at securing a seat at this table. His e-mail to the ALIA 2002 Issues Forum e-list (also picked up by the editor of ALJ) is reproduced as appendix 1 and provides useful background to this position. Others agreed that it might be was too late for ALIA to lead the development of a National Information Agenda, so it was suggested that if this is the case, ALIA should review what's been done/discussed, find the gaps and fill them using our unique sets of skills and knowledge. If this is the direction people agree to pursue, on what basis should a seat at the table be granted? Clearly we need better information and better data in order to firm strategies to go forward. Information literacy could be the platform. There is a perception that if you have a computer you have information, but many argue that that is wrong. They say that without good information literacy skills people are unlikely to be able to access more than 1% of the available info on any given topic and certainly will be unable to assess the quality of what they do find. Linking the information literacy story to IT would, they argue, result in a real force. (Or is this a furphy? Are people instead well served by information they find on the 'net, radio and television, from newspapers and in bookshops and libraries? What does the research say...) At the end of the session there was still some confusion about the idea of an information agenda, what it might include and how it could be used. This topic might benefit from being explored at a future meeting. NPC Canberra representativePaul Bentley was elected as the Sydney region representative for the National Policy Congress meeting in Canberra in November 2002. Meredith Martinelli was elected as 'reserve rep'. Representatives were thanked for coming to the meeting and contributing to the discussions. Gudruna Papak was thanked for sharing such a lovely venue with us. The meeting closed at 4:00pm.
Jo-anne Fuller * Follow up by LPC - Welcoming new membersALIA National Office checking distribution of new member lists. Mail to conveners recommended. Lists are going to be sent out monthly, generally mid-month. List will include new members to the Association and new members to the group (from renewals). At this stage the membership system does not have the capacity to generate automatic letters for new members on a group by group basis. Request noted and will be added to wish list for new system investigations. Extracts from Paul Bentley's posting to the ALIA Issues Forum e-list on 17 May 2002, subject: Why aren't we at the table? Note: Paul will be the attending the National Policy Congress meeting in Canberra next month having been elected as the representative from the NSW NPC regional meeting. You can reach him at pbentley@idx.com.au.nospam (please remove '.nospam' from address) Information strategyNeil McLean, in his consolidation, Information Futures Professional Issues, suggests that the main focus of the conference will be "identifying strategic options for consideration by ALIA in the development of a national information agenda". It is widely accepted in the information management and technology textbooks and government guidelines that technology is an enabler, a means to an end. Just like libraries. Yet the words of a 1996 JISC report, Guidelines for developing an information strategy, continue to find expression in information project wash-ups: 'most IS/IT strategies suffer from...the following shortcomings: they tend to be technology-driven, in the understandable rush to exploit new developments and end with wish-lists for new technology...[and] they have a tendency to seek ways of using technology to improve current processes rather than to make a fundamental reassessment of the way teaching, learning and (less so) research is undertaken.' No need to dwell on the burst dotcom bubble. At the same time, information technology and technologists are often misrepresented in corridor talk and library literature as machines and techies rather than as information handling problem solvers comprising a mixture of information inventors, strategists, designers, analysts and technicians. Sometimes we even claim that they have taken over our turf - turf we never really owned. Australian information strategyAn informative summary of government approaches to information strategy in the UK, US, Canada and New Zealand was presented at Peak Bodies Forum at the National Library in February. There was some conjecture on whether information strategies really worked. Indeed, the above JISC report suggests that information strategy 'is more a state of mind'. No specific actions were decided in relation to the library sector's involvement in the development of such a strategy. Information strategy in Australia has been shaped in recent years by DCITA and NOIE plans like Networking the Nation and Backing Australia's Ability. We can probably even go as far back as the pre-Web CD ROM-oriented Creative Nation. The latest iteration, Framework for the Future, will be completed by the end of 2002. The PR material suggests that we may be given the opportunity to repeat the JISC concerns in 2003. The terms of reference send warning signals that the project is an inward-looking exercise about the ICT sector - more about boosting capability and seizing opportunities than addressing macro information management issues. Information industry definition seems to be a root problem. But maybe the language of the terms of reference belies the interests, capacity for broadness of thought and capabilities of those on the Steering Committee. The Steering Committee has representatives from Australian companies and global corporations, Australian research bodies like the CSIRO and DSTO, associations like the Australian Information Industry Association and the university sector, but no-one from the library and kindred industry sectors. Two questionsShould we be at the big table? Neil McLean, in the October 2001 issue of inCite, referring I think to another planning forum, said: 'The fact remains that very few librarians are involved in this current round of initiatives and this should be a cause for some disquiet within our ranks.' Why aren't we? Such a question calls for us to turn the Perry Como song around and accentuate the negatives rather than the undeniable positives. Are we too radical? Too disinterested? Uninterested? Seen as a bit player? Our language is too vague? Is it because we are wall flowers or something like that? Perhaps our niche is the tactics table rather than the strategy table? Dot, dot, dot. One of the Framework for the Future Steering Committee members, Dr Terry Cutler, in his conference talk, Making Australia a Knowledge Economy, will be "identifying the issues and the information requirements that need to be addressed to ensure that Australia becomes a more innovative and effective society, and what part library and information professionals can play." So maybe the answers will emerge from this talk... |
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