The Evergreen Project Sound Governance and Strategic Planning Retreat

Ruth Frasur

Funding Area: Community governance / Gobernanza comunitaria

Problem Statement: The Evergreen Project does not have a strategic plan that sets a clear path for its long-term sustainability. Carving out a sustainable and focused area in the virtual and collaborative workspace has been ineffectual for our needs. The Evergreen Project (TEP) is at a critical juncture with a recent change in its governance structure that arose through its incorporation as a 501(c)(3) in 2018. TEP supports the open-source Evergreen Integrated Library System (ILS), developed in 2006, which serves as an entry point for individuals seeking information from their libraries. Thriving open-source software is essential to libraries’ ability to continue to provide information to their users in a secure manner that does not infringe on user privacy. Evergreen ILS adeptly supports library consortia easing the discovery by and delivery of materials from multiple libraries for researchers. The ILS is used in over 50 library organizations serving more than 2,100 locations worldwide. Adoption of Evergreen ILS continues to grow but newer users are less likely than early pioneers to contribute code, documentation and other needed resources. Dedicated TEP staff could assist in these areas, but the project has no funding model to pay wages or salaries. The objective of the retreat is to convene key project leaders for an in-person retreat to set goals, including identifying potential funding models, to ensure the project’s sustainability.

Proposed Activities: The Evergreen Project will hold a two day retreat in late winter 2024 to bring leaders in its open-source community together for focused discussion and planning to create a strategic plan to serve as a community steering document for 2024-2026 and become a precedent for future goals and activities. Organizers of the retreat will identify and retain an individual with expertise in strategic planning for non-profit organizations to facilitate the discussion, planning, compilation, and release of the strategic plan created from this event. The Evergreen Project will rely on professionals within its community specializing in project coordination and organizational administration to determine a venue and accommodations and develop a schedule of events for the retreat. These individuals will also generate a description of the event including a statement of intent and procedures to provide participants of the retreat with information to make plans for their attendance. Initial planning will occur in September and October 2023 and will include setting the event date, securing a venue, selecting accommodations, and retaining a strategic planning facilitator. Discussions with the strategic planning facilitator will commence upon their retention to determine any community engagement activities that should be completed prior to the retreat. In November 2023, formal invitations will be sent to board members for The Evergreen Project and Interest Group Leaders along with instructions and itinerary for attendance. Final preparations including procurement through purchase or in-kind donations of supplies and equipment will occur in January 2024. The 2-day TEP Strategic Planning Retreat will occur in Late February/Early March 2024. During this retreat, participants will develop the following: A 3-year strategic plan for The Evergreen Project Board and the formal community surrounding the open-source library management system, Evergreen. A sustainable framework for annual review, evaluation, and reporting results of activities related to The Evergreen Project Strategic Plan as well as regular updates to the plan itself. The 2024-2026 Strategic Plan will be released prior to the 2024 Evergreen International Conference via press release through several channels. During the conference, to be held In late April 2024, select participants from the retreat will lead a session detailing the strategic planning process and its outcomes. This session will invite attendees to participate in creating the next steps to plan the actions that will allow for the actualizations of the objectives and goals of The Evergreen Project as outlined in the strategic plan.

Openness: The Evergreen Project has always operated in an open and transparent manner. All code from the project is available in a publicly-available git repository and freely licensed under GNU GPLv2 or later and the documentation is made available under the Creative Commons BY-SA 4.0 license. The retreat, while bringing together a select group of participants in the Evergreen open source community, will function to establish documented modes for practical participation in the community by stakeholders as well as set strategic goals to further reinforce the community’s infrastructure for continued growth and sustainability. The strategic plan will articulate, as core community values, broad-based transparency and inclusivity of stakeholders at all levels of participation and will include accountability measures to preserve those values. During the strategic planning process, the Board will seek input from the larger community through surveys and community meetings and will solicit feedback on the draft plan with the entire community before formally adopting it. Broad community participation will be necessary in order to get the buy-in required for the plan to become a success. The Evergreen Project will regularly review, evaluate, and report progress toward goals and objectives to its project community stakeholders as well as the broader open-source world using, minimally, press releases, annual reports, and annual conference sessions.

Challenges: Based on the knowledge we have, we do not anticipate significant challenges to the planning, implementation, and publishing results from The Evergreen Project Strategic Planning Retreat. Some invited individuals may experience scheduling conflicts, and others may require supervisory approval if this work is done as part of their employee responsibilities. Because of the advance notice, we believe that most (and possibly all) scheduled conflicts can be avoided. In the same manner, employees who might attend as part of their work responsibilities, should have adequate time to receive any necessary approvals to travel and attend. For those individuals who may not travel because of varying circumstances, we also have the tools available to provide for remote participation. In terms of securing a venue and accommodations, we do not foresee challenges because our stakeholders are located very disparately and provide us with access to many cost-effective options to satisfy the requirements for retreat activities. Perhaps the biggest challenge to this project has to do with any preliminary community engagement activities leading up to the retreat. A key strategy to mitigate this challenge will be to identify our facilitator as quickly as possible and determine a course of action outlining and scheduling preliminary activities.

Neglectedness: The Evergreen Project has some funds from previous conferences, but is setting aside some funds to commission a Voluntary Product Accessibility Template (VPAT), which will need to be updated twice per year. With no significant funding model in place, the project also needs to conserve funds as it builds a reserve for future projects and potential staffing. The project is not aware of other sources of funding for this retreat.

Success: Success for this work will be determined by several measures. 75% of the invited stakeholders will attend, in person, the 2-day strategic planning retreat. By the end of the retreat, the final draft of the strategic plan document will be prepared for release for community review and TEP Board adoption. By the end of the retreat, a mechanism for annual review, evaluation, and reporting on strategic plan activities will be developed and prepared for approval to adopt as part of The Evergreen Project governance documentation. The results of the strategic planning retreat and the 2024-26 TEP Strategic Plan will be shared with the Evergreen community at the 2024 Evergreen International Conference and to a broader audience through press releases via official and partner channels. Key outcomes from the development of the 2024-26 TEP Strategic Plan will be strategies to maintain, promote, and grow community engagement; create a sustainable funding model to support community activities; and establish administrative practices to streamline TEP governance and oversight. To measure the success of the strategic planning process, a survey will be released to the Evergreen Community to gather feedback. The strategic planning process will be considered successful if 75% of respondents indicate an overall confidence, based on a rubric, in the direction mapped out by the finalized TEP 2024-26 Strategic Plan.

Total Budget: $14,450

Affiliations: The Evergreen Project

LMIE Carveout: We have not determined whether or not our organization fits within this category and so will indicate "no" for the purposes of this request.

Team Skills: The Evergreen Project Board and community leaders are composed of individuals with experience and expertise spanning a broad range of disciplines to manage library resources and operations. Participants in the retreat include representatives from individual libraries, library consortiums, and support vendors. Individuals include library catalogers and collection specialists, consortium leaders, project managers, software developers, systems administrators, data specialists, software and library systems training specialists, and help desk support personnel with the skills required for their roles and the desire to learn and contribute back to the open source project. Many of the participants have participated in the building of The Evergreen Project from its original form as a loose collaboration of users and developers to its current iteration as a fully independent 501(c)3 open source project with demonstrated community participation ensuring quality software for libraries and those they serve. It is also notable that while several individuals have been involved with The Evergreen Project for a decade or longer, others have begun their participation in the community and subsequent leadership roles within the past five years. The integration of individuals with less experience in the community but no less expertise in their respective disciplines continues to broaden and refresh our perspective and infuse our community with new enthusiasm, talent, and skills.

Submission Number: 151