Reflecting back over my six years with the IBPA Board of Directors (four years as a director and two years as board chair), I feel immense gratitude.

I joined the board in July 2018, so my service has included pre-pandemic years; navigating the challenges of the pandemic and its effects on our lives, businesses, industry, and world; and the somewhat phoenix-like recovery and rising up stronger as an independent publishing community.

I’ve been part of the development, implementation, and support of two three-year association strategic plans, a DEI strategic plan, and the staff’s strategic business plan. Although the composition of IBPA’s leadership altered, we continued to make forward progress because of our collective commitment to IBPA’s vision and the mindset of strong leaders to be intentional about actionable, systemic, sustainable change.

It’s hard to go through growth and change. Sometimes when we’re close to the work, the incremental change of an annual highlight reel can seem like it’s not enough, or it’s too slow. It’s good to step back and look at transformation over a longer period of time.

So, I’d like to recognize—and celebrate—IBPA’s “growing up” over the past six years. We’ve come a long way!

Advocacy, Legislation, Standards, and Thought Leadership

I remember a conversation at one of my first board meetings in which the board brainstormed ways IBPA, with its thousands of members, could speak louder as a collective voice on key issues impacting independent publishers. At the time, the Advocacy Committee was still in its infancy. Conversations about publishing standards and being a thought leader sparked the beginning of more actively taking a stand in legislative issues.

We’ve since formed strong industry partnerships, influenced legislative outcomes, developed and published additional standards and educational materials to support multiple publishing models, and more.

In fact, our advocacy work has grown so significantly, the board voted to split the Advocacy Committee into two committees for next year: the Legislative and Standards Committee and the Industry Advisory Committee.

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI)

During the board’s strategic planning session in August 2019, we set out to be more intentional about our DEI goals. In 2020, a DEI Task Force of the board developed a DEI Strategic Plan to make more explicit IBPA’s commitment to fostering DEI within its leadership, policies, practices, publications, and membership, as well as its desire to contribute to a more inclusive industry.

As part of that initial work, the task force developed a DEI Resource Center, established the first DEI Committee, and hired DEI consultants to guide and support our efforts. It has been some of the most meaningful work I’ve participated in and continues to be as we apply this commitment across the association and into our industry outreach.

In 2022, as the board planned its next three-year strategic plan, we kept one strategic goal focused completely on DEI, while also fully integrating the DEI Strategic Plan into each of our four strategic goals.

We’ve since offered multiple forms of DEI training for staff, volunteers, and members. We recently defined learning outcomes for ongoing annual training to make that process more consistent and sustainable in future years.

We continue to update our definitions and resources, advocate for more diverse BISAC codes, roll out new innovative programs, and make adaptations to existing programs to make them more accessible and inclusive.

We’ve also been intentional about inviting, encouraging, developing, and supporting leaders from a variety of communities at all levels of the organization, resulting in our most diverse slate of volunteer leaders in IBPA’s history.

On July 1, Tieshena Davis will become IBPA’s first Black woman board chair. Tie is a strong leader who has brought disciplined business management skills to the boardroom and has served on a variety of executive-level committees and task forces.

Intentional Governance

New this year, the IBPA Governance Committee is in the process of transforming our board candidate selection process from a passive application period in the fall to year-round recruitment, with skills assessment, mentorship, leadership development, and succession planning.

The development of this committee supports IBPA’s DEI commitment to ensure opportunities for diverse and inclusive leadership and decision-making at all levels of the organization.

Process Improvement

Underlying all this work has been a tremendous effort to review and document IBPA’s operating procedures, roles and responsibilities, and processes. All committees now have updated charters and handbooks, onboarding for new members, and templates for minutes and board reports.

We’ve more closely tied the strategic plan goals to committee working group projects. Each committee reports progress against the initiatives for board review and discussion at every board meeting. Our committee chairs recently further clarified roles and strengthened professional development for committee members. These are not small things. And the list is so much longer.

In addition to reaching milestone achievements we report, much effort goes into nurturing ongoing relationships, supporting existing programs, helping new publisher members start strong while meeting the needs of growing and established publishers, and continuously improving processes while being flexible enough to respond to changes in the industry and world.

We’re creating meaningful, sustainable change, that has progressed through multiple boards and committees, and over the course of multiple strategic plans.

Community-led Transformation

Over these past few years, it is our community, and the way we have come together to support each other, learn from each other, and move forward together, that has made this transformation possible.

Collaboration and knowledge sharing as a community will help individual publishing companies succeed, help our association mature effectively and efficiently, and help us create changes in our industry that are needed to support independent voices and publishers into the future.

These milestones are examples of progress over time, but they are also examples of work that will never be finished. We must continue to proactively identify and respond to opportunities to advocate for independent publishers. We must continue to invite and support members from all communities to bring together diverse perspectives, not only in personal characteristics but also business models and areas of expertise.

I’m excited for IBPA’s continued evolution under our next board chair. Tie brings so many wonderful talents, especially in data, metrics, and process improvement. Thank you to IBPA’s amazing staff, board of directors, committee members, and other volunteers for your passion and service. It has been my honor to lead this incredible team of professionals!

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