Webinar Preview: Hiring the Next Generation of Publishing Professionals

The Society for Scholarly Publishing (SSP) will present its first webinar of the year, Hiring the Next Generation of Publishing Professionals, on Tuesday, March 14, 2017, from 11:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. eastern time. Registration for the event is now open, with a discount available to SSP members.

This webinar will help early-career professionals identify the skills that will serve them as they build their careers, and help managers support the professional development of their young employees, as well as open a conversation about how to build a diverse and skilled workforce. As the industry demands a more inclusive community, three panelists with experience bringing new talent to the industry will share what they have learned. The panel will discuss how they make hiring decisions, how they encourage and influence early career professionals, and how to make more diverse and inclusive hires.

Jessica Loayza, Web Publications Coordinator for the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA), will moderate the event, and is joined on the panel by:

• Meredith Adinolfi, Director of Production, Cell Press

Meredith manages a team of copyeditors, managing editors, and designers and broadly oversees online and print production for a collection of 38 research and review titles. She has mentored both internally at Cell Press and externally within the STM field, and runs internal programs to increase management effectiveness and bolster career-development opportunities.

• Jeff Lewandowski, Senior Publisher, IOP Publishing

Lewandowski started as an Editorial Assistant at IOP Publishing in 2006, and his role has increasingly required more and more managerial responsibilities. After holding a variety of positions at IOPP over the past decade he is now Senior Publisher with a regional focus on the Americas.

• John Rodzvilla, Graduate Program Director, Masters program in Publishing and Writing, Emerson College

Rodzvilla has seen thousands of students walk into his program and out again into the publishing industry, as he oversees and teaches in the graduate program in Publishing and Writing at Emerson College. Prior to working in academia, he worked on a variety of editorial, production, and subsidiary rights endeavors in publishing.

We asked Loayza to elaborate more about the webinar:

Who is the intended audience for this seminar and why should they attend?

Anyone who considers themselves an early career professional or a manager that supports them should attend. The speakers will be identifying skills that will help early career professionals in the beginning of their careers or even before their careers have started. Managers will hear from other managers about how they frame their entry-level positions around publishing and making sure everyone is involved in the publishing process in some form or fashion.

What can attendees expect from the seminar?

Expect the speakers to cover topics such as:

• Characteristics and skills managers look for when they hire and new team members
• How managers make sure they are hiring diverse and inclusive candidates
• How they have transformed positions to be more involved in the publishing process
• How higher education directors prepare their students for the publishing world
• How managers encourage their early career hires to grow and what skills they should have beforehand and maintain even afterwards

Why do you think this topic is important and timely?

Diversity is always a topic of discussion and publishing tends to be a field many “fall into.” How can we better support our early career professionals so they can be better prepared for the future of their publishing career? How can managers make a more diverse and inclusive team? These are all topics that the speakers will cover.

What do you hope attendees will take away from the seminar?

I hope early career professionals will come away from this webinar getting a solid idea of the skills hiring managers look for in the industry. I hope managers get great ideas for how they can improve their hiring process to be more diverse and inclusive, and how to prolong the early career support of their staff.

No matter where you are in your career, be sure to sign up for this webinar.

By Elizabeth Ralls, Communications Committee