Studies show 60% of the scholarly publishing workforce is female, over 85% is white, and 60% of the leadership is male… The WE Survey hopes to gain some insight into why.
Interview with Susan Spilka
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Publishing in the last few years has acquired a healthy appetite for collecting data that reveal the buying and reading habits of us, its customers. Yet publishers rarely collect data on themselves – and even more sparingly do they ever share it.
The independent, non-profit Workplace Equity Project (WE) explores workplace experiences, practices, and opportunities in scholarly publishing. Its first initiative is the WE Survey, underway through March 14, 2018. The 12-minute online questionnaire will discover how – and how well – publishers and related organizations are addressing equity and diversity issues, according to WE co-founder Susan Spilka.
“Our industry is known to have a majority female workforce, male-dominated leadership, and a striking lack of ethnic diversity,” she tells CCC’s Chris Kenneally. “Studies show that around 60% of the workforce is female, over 85% is white, and 60% of the leadership is male. I think the WE survey is going to find that the imbalances persist. We hope to gain some insight into why and identify some of what’s reinforcing the status quo.
Spilka adds, “We chose our acronym — WE — to reinforce the notion that this change can only happen if people of all genders, ages, ethnicities, sexual orientations, disabilities, and geographies participate in the effort.”
Workplace Equity Project co-founder Susan Spilka led Corporate Communications at Wiley for two decades during a period of tremendous company and industry change. She now provides provide strategic communications, public relations, business development, and research services for an array of scholarly publishers and technology services clients. Throughout her scholarly publishing career, Susan Spilka played a role in many pioneering initiatives, including promoting Knowledge Unlatched to North American librarians and helping to build CHORUS as its Communications & Marketing Director.
