Tom Roper's Weblog

For this we paid £35,000?

Today CILIP published the rebranding survey[pdf]. I'll be looking critically at the methodology at the General Meeting, but it can hardly be said to justify the £35,000 fee the consultants are charging us. 

Some members, though by no means all who have a current e-mail address registered with CILIP, also had an e-mail instructing them to vote against the moti0m. Naturally, I have asked for the same access to members' e-mails to set out the arguments for the motion. Arguably, I should have been offered that before the machine sent out theirs. I think grown-up members may not take kindly to being told how to vote. 

I also came across a piece on the Manchester New Professionals Network's blog.

 

CILIP to publish rebranding survey tomorrow; and how much did the lawyers cost?

I was e-mailed this morning by a member of CILIP staff, who told me that the rebranding survey is to be made available tomorrow on the website.

I also asked how much the legal advice they sought on the call for the general meeting, and on the conduct of business at the meeting, cost. The answer is they don't know until the invoice arrives. This seems unsatisfactory and not very prudent management of our resources. Does Council not have sufficient confidence in its judgement to be able to interpret our rules without external interference? And if they did feel they needed it, surely they would have asked for an estimate of costs? Furthermore, I see that the Law Society requires that, 'a solicitor must give you a cost estimate at the outset, usually at the first interview'. Using a solicitor

Curiouser and curiouser

Now we find that the behemoth of outsourcing, Capita, familiar to readers of Private Eye under a variant of their name, claim to be sponsoring CILIP's Umbrella conference next month. CILIP deny this, saying they're just exhibiting. Who's right?

CILIP survey still secret, with fourteen days to go

It seems we're not alone. The Special Libraries Association (SLA) is also in some disarray over names and brands: read this plea to stop the name madness, on Kendra K. Levine's Library Attack.  

CILIP have not yet published the full results of the survey. I'll ask again tomorrow, but nobody's rushed to tell me that they will publish it, even if they can't do so right away. I suppose I could always ask GCHQ. They should know. 

As well as the e-mail lobbying I mentioned, I'm told by more than one source that CILIP branches and groups are being told to get the vote out to defeat the motion. To their credit, many branches and groups are trusting their members' intelligence, and not directing them how to vote. 

Will CILIP publish the rebranding survey in full?

You may have seen the somewhat polemical post by John Dolan, Chair of CILIP Council, on Phil Bradley, the CILIP President’s blog. I shan’t take issue with John’s arguments in detail here; that’s what the general meeting is for and that’s where members can exercise the ‘choice’ that he refers to.

What is perturbing is that he quotes very selectively from the rebranding survey, though it’s unclear whether he’s quoting from the first or second version, and it has been taken down from SurveyMonkey. I e-mailed CILIP this morning, asking that the full survey results be made publicly available.

I also left a comment on the blog. Comments are moderated, but it seems to be taking a long time to appear. Fortunately I took a screen shot which you can see below. [Update: my comment was approved eventually]

I hope I don’t have to fight to make the argument for publishing the survey in full. I shall only say that, given our commitment as a profession to open access and open data, it would be very unfortunate if we were not to apply those principles to our own affairs.

CILIP rebranding general meeting: change of date, and amendments forbidden

All members should by now have had a letter from CILIP giving a rearranged date for the General Meeting. If you haven't,  contact CILIP. My copy arrived on Saturday morning.

Full details of the meeting are here: http://www.cilip.org.uk/about-us/governance/pages/2013generalmeeting.aspx but to summarise:

1. Monday 8 July, 1 pm in the Ewart Room at Ridgmount Street. I hope it's big enough

2. Proxy voting is offered for those who can't attend. If you submitted a proxy form because you were unable to attend the original date, but can come on 8 July, then let CILIP know. 

3. You need to register to attend

Curiously, CILIP also seem to have withdrawn the possibility for members to amend the motion. I'm not sure why this should be. It seems a little undemocratic, and there's nothing in the bye-laws[pdf] to support this. I've asked CILIP why this might be.

There seems to be a certain amount of lobbying going on. Someone who contacted me had had an e-mail from a British Library employee, urging them to vote against the motion. I'm not sure how widespread this has been. 

CILIP rebranding general meeting: proxies and registering

There's now a page on the CILIP website devoted to the general meeting. Some key points perhaps bear repeating:

• we all need to register to attend using this form: http://fs3.formsite.com/cilip/form198/index.html
• if you can't attend you can nominate a proxy, either the chair of the meeting, or anyone attending. Several people who can't be there have asked me to act as proxy and I'm delighted to do so for anyone else. If you fill in the form, you may need to give my address, which is Clontarf, 49 Southdown Road, Seaford, East Sussex BN25 4PG
• it is possible to amend the motion I submitted. Naturally, I consider it incapable of improvement, but if you feel so moved, you need to send your amendment to CILIP by Friday 21 June

CILIP rebranding: more news on the format of the General Meeting and le rebranding-gate

Today I had more news from CILIP about the format of the meeting on 28 June. 

'In accordance with Bye-law 29, the meeting will be chaired by the President of CILIP, Phil Bradley. The usual process would be for the motion to be proposed and seconded and for someone to speak for and against it before discussion and then going to a vote. However, at this stage we are unaware of whether we will receive any counter motions or amendments to the motion which would also need to be dealt with.'

I also had more information about the commissioning of the rebranding:

'In respect of the re-branding, as per www.cilip.org.uk/rebrand the entire project has a budget of £35,000. Consultation costs form one part of the budget. The budget includes:

· Consultation costs
· Logo concepts and development
· Consultancy fees
· Legal costs
· Implementation of new brand

The pitch process to select the brand consultant began with desk research – including investigating other charities, professional bodies and not for profit organisations that have rebranded in the past few years. We had communication with a number of other organisations that have recently rebranded about their experiences and the consultants they used. We ran a process of inviting pitches from a number of consultants. A staff project team reviewed the pitches and selected Spencer du Bois based on a range of criteria, including relevant experience and understanding of and ability to meet the brief.'

Further questions elected the information that no elected officers or trustees were part of the selection.

Elsewhere, the news seems to have crossed the Channel, and I found this, though I doubt if the Académie française has sanctioned the term le rebranding-gate. Ned Potter talks a lot of sense, though I feel he may aim his fire at the wrong target from time to time in his post, The only way we will definitely be screwed is if we screw CILIP.

One e-mail exchange is telling. Someone contacted me, complaining about the time and place of the General Meeting. I'm not unsympathetic to these arguments, but I think that, having forced a meeting to be held, our task should be to encourage the maximum attendance. 'After all', I said, 'you can always appoint a proxy.' 'Oh no', came the reply, 'I'm not a member.'  

CILIP rebranding: we have a meeting

The following e-mail went out to all CILIP members this afternoon:

Notice of General Meeting of CILIP

A General Meeting of the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals will be held in the Ewart Room at CILIP, 7 Ridgmount Street, London WC1E 7AE on Friday 28 June at 1.00 pm to discuss the motion:

“This General Meeting believes the current rebranding exercise should be halted, believing it to be a distraction from the urgent tasks of advocacy for the profession, and a waste of scarce resources.”

This meeting has been called and the motion submitted under Bye-law 22 by a requisition of Individual Members of CILIP.
Amendments to motions

Any Member wishing to move an amendment to the motion must send it in writing to the Chief Executive at [email protected] by no later than 1.00 pm on Friday 21 June 2013.
Voting at the General Meeting

All Individual Members whose subscriptions are not in arrears are entitled to vote at the general meeting.

Under Bye-law 35, each Member entitled to vote may appoint a proxy to vote at the General Meeting on their behalf. You may elect the Chair of the meeting to act as proxy or any other Individual Member attending in person who is eligible to vote. The proxy voting form and more information about the business to be discussed will be emailed to you shortly. Proxy voting forms must be submitted no later than 1.00 pm on Wednesday 26 June 2013.

 

I'm not sure a Friday lunchtime is the best time, and the Ewart Room doesn't hold a huge number of people, but we have the meeting. Some members have contacted me asking me to act as their proxy. I'm very happy to do so. E-mail me, if you would like me to act as yours.

 

Elsewhere, a new survey on the name has been launched, which allows members to make their own suggestions. Read John Kirriemuir's post, then do fill it in.

 

I'm very grateful to everyone who supported the call for the General Meeting. Thank you. Now the task is to maximise attendance, and make sure our chance to debate the issue democratically is not wasted. 

 

Tags: #cilip, #rebranding

 

 

CILIP rebranding: call for General Meeting, success and submission

Thanks, everyone who signed the call for a General Meeting on this subject. We easily reached the necessary hundred signatures and I submitted it to Annie Mauger, Chief Executive Officer of CILIP, on Friday afternoon, who tells me she will respond next week. I'll publicise the time and date as soon as it's known. May I ask everyone who signed or has taken part in the debate here and elsewhere, to do their utmost to attend and contribute, and to encourage others to?