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11 PLL Persp. 1 (1999-2000)

handle is hein.lbr/aaplper0011 and id is 1 raw text is: -PLL THE QUARTERLY OF THE PRIVATE LAW LIBRARIES SIS OF THE AMERICAN ASSOCIATION OF LAW LIBRARIES Volume 11 IssuePE R S P E C T IV E S NOCALL AD HOC COMMITTEE ON THE ALA SALARY SURVEY by Nancy Adams, Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton, LLC, San Francisco, CA n October 1998, the Mid-Size Firm Librarians Group of San Francisco law librarians decided that they had spent enough time bemoaning the low levels of and inequities in their salaries. A number of us had tried to approach our office administrators with data from the AALL Salary Survey in an effort to have our salaries adjusted, only to be rebuffed with the dreaded Association of Legal Administrators Salary Survey. The ALA salary survey is done annually in the San Francisco Bay Area and in the past has included only three categories: Head Librarian, Assistant Librarian (hourly), and Library Technician. Group members had said at several meetings that they thought the ALA salary figures were highly inaccurate and that the job descriptions did not match the reality of law firm jobs, so we decided to do something to improve the situation. As a first step, we decided to do a survey among our members. At the meeting, we each filled out a questionnaire that asked for salary, bonus, professional degrees, years of experience, and number of years in current job. We also tallied the number of attorneys supported, number of persons supervised, number of offices supervised, and other responsibilities (conflicts, records, etc.). All the survey information was written on a large white board, where we were able to see for the first time just how comparable our situations were. Interestingly, our salaries did not seem to correlate to years of experience, number of attorneys supported, recent job changes, or other responsibilities. They also bore little relationship to the salaries quoted in the ALA survey. We decided to form a committee to look at the ALA survey to see if we could help shape it to better reflect our jobs and more appropriate salaries. Mark Mackler, Marlowe Griffiths, Cynthia Papermaster, and I met several times to determine our course of action. 'The NOCALL Board gave us the go-ahead to act as an ad hoc committee. We contacted the local ALA chapter and found that each chapter does its own salary survey, and the contents of each survey are determined locally. With this knowledge, we gathered job descriptions for librarians and paraprofessionals from our group and then removed any identifying information from them. We also retrieved the sample job descriptions that were prepared by the PLL Committee on Private Law Librarian Standards in 1996. A call to AALL revealed that these job descriptions had never been given to ALA. I then called the local ALA survey chair and invited her and her co- chair to lunch with Mark and me. We had a lovely lunch at a local restaurant, and we explained that our goal was to help them make their survey more accurate and representative. They were receptive to our help and expressed appreciation for the sample job descriptions. Neither had ever worked in a firm that had a librarian, so their perception of a librarian's job was a little unclear. The question I remember most was, So, do most librarians have a college degree? They were surprised to hear of the existence of the M.L.S. degree and were not aware of the significant differences between professional and paraprofessional jobs. A few weeks later, the survey chair sent Mark and me their revised job descriptions for the survey and asked if we had any suggestions or revisions. We made some minor changes and returned them. Last week, Mark called the chair to see if she had any further questions. She told him that the 1999 survey had just gone to press and that it includes an expanded section for library employees with more detailed job descriptions and more levels of responsibility. Now we just have to wait until the survey results are collated and published. Even if there is no noticeable change in our individual salaries, the ad hoc committee has had a positive effect. At the very least, we have forged a positive relationship with the legal administrators. We were very careful to make our contacts with them in the context of helping them produce a better, more accurate survey, not as an effort to get our salaries increased. They appreciated our help and expressed a wish that other professional groups would do the same. Taking positive steps to improve our profession doesn't have to be an overwhelming project. Some committee meetings, a pleasant lunch, and some friendly persuasion were a1 that were required in this case. We hope that other local chapters of AALL will follow our lead and contact their local ALA chapters to help make their local salary surveys more representative. is i I FALL 1

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