Building an Effective Board

Ever felt frustrated with your governing board? Although the board may not be of your design, there’s still much you can do to shape an effective board that truly adds value to execution of your business strategy and mission. Read on to find out how!

University Press Books We Loved in 2016

As a follow-up to the chef’s best books read during 2016, I’m happy to present a selection of our favorite university press reads of 2016 (and thanks to one of our commenters for the suggestion!). We tend to think of […]

Working Effectively with Consultants

Why and how do organizations hire consultants? What are some of some the of the traps and limitations to using RFPs? What are some alternatives? Based on a panel discussion at this year’s AAUP meeting, this post explores these and other topics related how to work effectively with consultants.

Revisiting: The Editorial Fallacy

Revisiting Joe Esposito’s 2010 post on the disruptive publishing environment, in which publishers cannot rely on a purely editorial strategy, as many of the issues now facing them are not editorial in nature.

The Early Career Professionals are All Right: Discussing the Findings of the 2016 SSP Early Career Professional Survey

Ever wondered what early-career publishing professionals are worried about, wishing for, and planning to do–and how you can encourage them to keep doing those things within your organization? The Society for Scholarly Publishing wondered, too, and deployed a subcommittee of professionals (early-career and otherwise) to find out. Here are some of their findings, presented by Early Career Subcommittee co-chairs Emma Brink and Matt Cooper (both of Wiley).

Curation Nation: Thoughts on the Future of Textbooks

Is there a role for a curated, remixing approach to developing next generation textbooks. Robert Harington investigates the role of curated open textbooks in teaching today’s students, looking at some of the available tools, the way in which instructors utilize such tools, and issues around fair use of content.

Is the Proposed Merger of IDPF and W3C Good for Publishers?

The IDPF and the W3C recently announced they were making plans to merge. Will this merger be good for publishers by integrating them more closely into the community that manages the web infrastructure? Or will the merger result in diminishing publisher control over one of the important distribution standards for digital texts? The past five years of experience doesn’t give reason to be reassured of the outcome.