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ClimateQUAL®: Organizational Climate and Diversity Assessment—Call for Participation 2013

rainbow-over-peckham-library
image © Julian Burgess

ARL invites participation in the ClimateQUAL survey in 2013. The online survey collects information about: (a) library staff perceptions of the organization’s commitment to the principles of diversity, (b) staff perceptions of organizational policies and procedures, and (c) staff attitudes. The survey addresses such issues as diversity, teamwork, learning, fairness, current managerial practices, and staff attitudes and beliefs.

ARL, in partnership with the University of Maryland Industrial/Organizational Psychology (I/OP) Program, offers the ClimateQUAL protocol to the library community. The team is currently seeking eight to ten additional US, Canadian, and UK institutions to participate in 2013. Please note that participants need to survey at least 50 part-time or full-time employees, possibly including student workers.

Benefits of Participation

ClimateQUAL is an effective management tool that uses deep assessment of a library’s staff to plumb the dimensions of organizational culture important for a healthy library. The survey is grounded in the participation of 47 libraries to date. Active participation since 2007 has enabled the ClimateQUAL research in developing a model of the healthy organization. Using normative scales and institutional survey results effectively, significant improvements can be achieved. Effective techniques for remediation engage the entire staff. The tool is a must-do during the first 100 days for an organization with new leadership, as it provides useful baseline information.

Participant Responsibilities

Each library participating as a 2013 partner is asked for the following support:

  • Submit the enrollment fee ($5,000 per participant).
  • Assign a contact person to work with the ClimateQUAL team throughout the project in 2013 and 2014.
  • Commit for the contact person to attend group meetings held in conjunction with American Library Association (ALA) Annual Conferences.
  • Commit to repeat the survey periodically to measure the impact of improvement strategies over time.
  • Commit to work with ClimateQUAL community members to share strategies for using evidence-based methods as a tool for organizational and service improvement.

More Information

Detailed information about the ClimateQUAL protocol and its background is provided on the ClimateQUAL website, including recent articles, FAQs, a 20-minute video describing the theory behind ClimateQUAL, reports on the University of Maryland Libraries’ survey results for 2000 and 2004, and a bibliography of relevant research publications.

Potential participants may meet with ARL staff in June during the ALA Annual Conference in Chicago.

For more information or to express interest in participating in 2013 or spring 2014, please send an e-mail to climatequal@arl.org.


The Association of Research Libraries (ARL) is a nonprofit organization of 125 research libraries in the US and Canada. Its mission is to influence the changing environment of scholarly communication and the public policies that affect research libraries and the diverse communities they serve. ARL pursues this mission by advancing the goals of its member research libraries, providing leadership in public and information policy to the scholarly and higher education communities, fostering the exchange of ideas and expertise, facilitating the emergence of new roles for research libraries, and shaping a future environment that leverages its interests with those of allied organizations. ARL is on the web at https://www.arl.org/.

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