Dear ARLIS/NA members,

Please join me in welcoming McKenna Management as ARLIS/NA's new management company and Cambria Happ as Executive Director. You will have a chance to meet Cambria and the staff from McKenna in the coming days and weeks as they take on the role of supporting ARLIS/NA with customer care, conference and meeting management, membership services, and technology support for ARLIS-l, the ARLIS/NA website, and other ARLIS/NA-hosted sites and lists. New contact information for ARLIS/NA headquarters is in the message sent to members earlier this morning from Cambria and on the ARLIS/NA website here: https://www.arlisna.org/organization/headquarters. Don't hesitate to get in touch with them, or to get in touch with me, if you have any questions.

This change in management companies is the result of careful consideration and review over the past 12 months by the board and the two task forces formed to perform the work. Last fall, then President Laura Schwartz proposed a task force to make recommendations for a new management contract and a review of the current management company's performance. In October 2019, I convened the ARLIS/NA Management Review Task Force as then vice president and chair. In December 2019, the task force recommended to the board that ARLIS/NA engage consultants Bloch & Reed, experts in the field of association management, to perform an assessment of AEG, the current management company, and ARLIS/NA's management company needs moving forward. In June 2020, after a survey of the membership and interviews with ARLIS/NA leaders, Bloch & Reed presented their report to the task force. Based on the outcomes of the survey, the report, and the task force's discussions, the Management Review Task Force recommended to the board that ARLIS/NA end the contract with AEG and retain Bloch & Reed to facilitate a search for a new management company. The board respectfully acknowledges the work AEG has done for the organization over the past 12 years and thanks our most recent executive director, Nancy Short, for all her efforts on behalf of ARLIS/NA.

In July 2020, the Management Search Task Force was convened and co-chaired by Past President Laura Schwartz and Secretary Rachel Resnik. The task force worked with Bloch & Reed to develop an RFP and identify priorities to look for in an association management company for ARLIS/NA. Five firms responded to the RFP and four were interviewed. Task force members reviewed and rated each firm based on how well they met the criteria for the identified priorities, including member engagement, operational excellence, support for diversity and inclusion, and strategic management. In September 2020, the task force unanimously recommended McKenna Management, Inc. to the board. The board reviewed McKenna Managment's proposal and approved the task force's recommendation. McKenna Management's track record of successful association management, their high level of service, and their commitment to equity and diversity factored in to the task force's recommendation and the board's selection of the firm as the next association management company for ARLIS/NA.

There are many to thank for their roles in the process. Thank you to the members of both task forces and to the board for their work over the past year, especially as the COVID-19 pandemic made that work even more of a challenge. Thank you to the ARLIS/NA members who took part in the survey distributed earlier this year as part of the process that helped identify ARLIS/NA's priorities for an association management company. Thank you to Larry Caniglia of Bloch & Reed who facilitated the review, the development of the RFP, and the many details of the search. Finally, thank you to Laura Schwartz for starting the entire process last fall, which provided time for a careful and thorough review and a well-planned and implemented search. Each step and each contribution helped lead us to this point, just over one year later, when ARLIS/NA begins its partnership with McKenna Management. I look forward to working with Cambria and the McKenna staff, and I look forward to seeing what ARLIS/NA and McKenna Management will accomplish together.

Best,

Amy