By Bridget MacMillan, Former Treasurer of SLA Illinois and Librarian Relations Consultant, LexisNexis, and Karen Trimberger, Secretary of SLA Illinois and Director of Knowledge Management, Arc Worldwide

Who belongs to the SLA Illinois Chapter, and what do they want from their professional organization? This is what the Board was interested in uncovering with a membership survey this past summer. The five part survey addressed the following areas: General Information, Communications, Chapter Meetings, Additional Events, and Final Information. Karen Trimberger and I chaired the effort to create, disperse and tabulate the various parts of the survey. The last time the entire chapter had been surveyed was in 1997 – 98. We wanted to collect demographic details about the chapter membership, high level views of the chapter, and insightful opinions about specific activities and events. We were thrilled with the participation and interest from the 539 members! Overall we received 504 responses. The results were presented to the Board at a meeting in September, and used by the Program Planning Committee in setting the calendar for 2005 – 2006.

Here are some highlights from the survey:

What do you perceive as the biggest challenge for our profession?

• “Showing value. Having great ways to talk about what we do and how it fits into our organization’s goals.”
• “Transitioning from gatekeepers to analysts.”
• “Not being viewed as irrelevant because of the Internet—emphasizing other roles of importance, such as those relating to competitive intelligence and training.”

What do you perceive as the biggest challenge for SLA IL?

• “Meeting the needs of an incredibly diverse group of librarians and information specialists in a rapidly changing information environment.”
• “Staying relevant to members, particularly given the geographical location of members.”
• “Keeping the entire chapter involved, despite the geographical dispersion.”

When asked for feedback about the SLA IL Cares initiative, here are some responses?

• “The inclination is a good one, but it shouldn’t come at the expense of the professional goals of the organization. Not every meeting needs an SLA Cares event. Also, as worthy as these causes are, I don’t need a daily e-mail about such-and-such an event. It leads to compassion fatigue.”
• “I think it is the best thing to come out of SLA-IL in years! However, they need to promote the “leaving of spare change” thing more because I attend the meetings but wasn’t aware of it.”

What are you passionate about in terms of SLA IL?

• “The need to network and exchange ideas with other professional librarians without going to large conferences.”
• “Everything. We are so rich in great members, enthusiastic volunteers, expertise, diversity of ideas, backgrounds and settings. Need to find even more ways to tap that power and leverage it.”
• “In keeping the group on the bleeding edge of changes within the info industry – really letting go of the past and forging new paths for us.”

The Board will continue to consult the survey results for guidance and insight as they plan the future of the chapter. Karen and I wish to thank each of you who participated! We learned a lot from this project, not only about the chapter, but about using an online survey tool, constructing survey questions and answers, and the timing of a survey. If you have any additional suggestions about the survey, or if you are interested in seeing more results, please contact one of us.

Contact Bridget MacMillan at bridget.macmillan@lexisnexis.com [1] and Karen Trimberger at karen.trimberger@arcww.com [2].