This is one of several questions that came up during roundtable discussions at the SLA Leadership Symposium last month in New Orleans. Good leaders are always thinking ahead and seeking new opportunities and paths to success, so envisioning how SLA can best serve the information professionals community in the years ahead—and under what name it can best do so—was certainly a worthy topic for a leadership meeting.

It was also a topic that resonated with many Leadership Symposium attendees. At table after table, SLA members questioned whether the name Special Libraries Association—which has served us well for the past 110 years—can continue to attract and represent information professionals who increasingly are using skills and tools and performing tasks that bear little resemblance to those used and performed 50, 25, or even 10 years ago.

The discussions at the Leadership Symposium reached no conclusions, but there was broad agreement that this is a conversation that needs to be had, sooner rather than later. The information environment is changing almost daily, thanks to new technologies, new information usage behaviors, new economic pressures and social forces, and so on. Given these changes and the groundswell of interest in exploring whether our name will continue to serve our interests going forward, the SLA Board of Directors wants to hear from you, the membership, about the name of your association.

Please complete this survey by Friday, March 8. We are excited to hear your feedback and will collect and share this information with membership as we explore a name change for the association that is more inclusive and representative of our community.