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DIGITAL MONOGRAPH COST BUILDER INTRODUCTION & DEMO
Nancy Maron, BlueSky to BluePrintKim Schmelzinger, MeanLine Publisher ServicesDemo - WebinarJuly 28, 2016
TODAY’S WEBINAR WILL…
Offer a short overview of the aims of this project Provide a demo of the tool, including
The “quick start” method, and A more detailed approach
Suggest applications and next steps
OVERVIEW
THE COSTS OF PUBLISHING MONOGRAPHS (2016)
A study of 20 presses, 20 titles each Onsite visits to gather staff-level
data Data on all stages of the publishing
process… including staff, direct and overheads.
Conducted by Ithaka S+R, with generous support from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
Available at: http://www.sr.ithaka.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/SR_Report_Costs_Publishing_Monographs020516.pdf And at http://dx.doi.org/10.3998/3336451.0019.103
WE SHOWED AVERAGES… AND COST DEFINITIONS
WHAT TO KEEP AND WHAT TO CHANGE?
What presses loved…
Knowing range of costs Seeing costs, particularly staff time,
broken out by department and activity Staff-level discussions about process,
obstacles, and perceived value were very revealing and useful for both directors and staff
and didn’t Too complicated at the staff level :
Staff found the questions difficult and some more comfortable estimating than others
Time consuming to engage staffers in 5 key departments
NEW P+L TOOL…
• Mellon-funded project with AAUP to create a simple tool so that presses can determine cost per book for themselves
• Offers clear, easy-to-digest outputs to help presses make use of this data
• Provides options: business managers can complete with or without staff participation.
GATHERING THE DATA
Lots of questions Staff completed sheets, on
paper, Excel, etc… Output difficult to visually
interpret 20 titles, strict definition of
“monograph”
ORIGINAL STUDY
Fewer questions Staff or Business Manager
may complete Results will be clearly
displayed 10 or fewer titles; press can
establish its own definition, based on the data they require
NOW
TWO FINAL OUTPUTS
Synthesis of data captured at staff, departmental, and press level
Snapshot of average costs Visualizations of key
measures
DASHBOARD
A per-title cost estimate template
Useful when seeking subsidy Should be easy to read,
transparent, and clear to those not necessarily in publishing
COST STATEMENT
THE TOOL ENCOURAGES PRESSES TO UNDERSTAND
Staff time Direct (book-specific) expenses Department overheads Press-level overheads In-kind costs
IT DOES NOT INCLUDE
• Time from staff who work on no monographs
• Costs related to print only• Paper
• Printing
• Warehouse, shipping
• Costs related to sales• Royalties
• Commissions
DATA GATHERING WILL INVOLVE
• Director • Business manager or CFO• And, to the extent that you desire, staff in
key departments• Though the “timesaver” option allows
you to handle the staff costs centrally, without needing to consult directly with staff.
Acquisitions
Manuscript Editorial Design Production Marketing
Sales, Distributio
nCopyediting
Proofreading
Project management
Permissions mgmt.
File pre-processing
Indexing
Copyright registration
Cataloguing
Author support
Selection process
Conferences
Peer Review
Publication Board
MS Development
Author support
Display markup & composition
Interior Design
Illus. preparation
Suppl. materials prep
Cover design &
Image permissions
Author support
Digital file prep
Digital asset mgmt.
File conversion
File distribution
File preservation
Author support
Catalog preparation
Advertising
Publicity
Catalog and jacket copywriting
Website, e-marketing
Title-specific e-marketing
Social media
Discovery metadata
Review copy admin
Awards admin
Conferences, exhibits
Direct Mail (print/ Email)
Author support
THE APPROACH FOCUSES ON CERTAIN KEY PUBLISHING FUNCTIONS
THE DEMO
TO GET STARTED…
• SOME KEY IDEAS• WALK-THROUGH EXAMPLE• THEN, the “TIME SAVER” version
THIS COSTING TOOL…
• Can gather data on up to 10 titles• Works best in sequence; this will help
make sure to avoid any double-counting. (Each tab is numbered.)
• Makes use of standard AAUP Statistics terminology and formatting, wherever possible
• Color coding tells you which fields to enter and where you can copy/paste to save time
YOU WILL NEED TO…1. CHOOSE YOUR TITLES!2. ADD GENERAL PRESS INFORMATION3. MIX IN SOME PRESS-WIDE G&A4. STIR IN THE TITLE-SPECIFIC EXPENSES5. FOLD IN DEPARTMENTAL EXPENSES6. AND ADD STAFF SALARIES AND TIME
1. CHOOSE YOUR TITLES
?Will you use the
same “monograph”
definition?
What year will you focus on?
2. ADD GENERAL PRESS INFORMATION
Tip:Most important is
to include total number of books and total number of monographs published in the
target year
3. PRESS-WIDE G&A (GENERAL & ADMINISTRATIVE COSTS)
Tip:When considering cost for the director, ask if that person also does editorial work. (To avoid
double-counting, either include time here OR on the staff page, not
both)
From the AAUP Stats:
4. DIRECT COSTS
Tip:Fill out as much as you can on a per-title basis. Can you estimate
conference expense per title? Advertising? Great! Put that here.
Anything that you just cannot include as an accurate title-level
expense should go (in the aggregate) on the departmental
tab. But always try to come up with a good title-level figure first.
5. DEPARTMENTAL EXPENSES (IN THE AGGREGATE)
Tip:Think of this as “departmental overhead” and only include those things that need to be counted – T+E, for example – but are not possible to break out at the title level.
The total “departmental” costs will be added to the Press-Wide G+A to arrive at
the “overhead” allocation.
If you can arrive at a title-level allocation, use that instead and leave the line here
blank.
6. STAFF SALARIES AND TIME
Tip:Meet with staff to talk about work processes BEFORE asking them to think about their
time.
It will help to have a list of all monographs published in that year available to consult
Reassure staff that estimating is OK!
(If they don’t, someone will be doing it for them.)
Books that Are Not
Monographs30%
General Admin
Tasks19%
Monographs51%
How Much Time Do You Spend on Monographs?
Monographs Published After 2014: 13%
Monographs Never Published: 3%
Monographs Published in 2014: 25%
Monographs Published Before 2014: 10%
How Much Time Do You Spend on Monographs?
WHEN MEETING WITH STAFF…
• We held meetings with 3 groups: Acquisitions, EDP, and Marketing
• The sessions started with a discussion:• How do you do your work?• What can happen in the process that ends up driving costs?• What aspects of your work do you feel are the most valuable to
the final quality of the work?
• Then, with those ideas in mind, we started answering some questions.
TWO SOMEWHAT DIFFICULT QUESTIONS
• How would you say you typically spend your time in a given week?
• Monographs
• Journals, trade, textbooks, or other publishing
• General office work
• Thinking ONLY about MONOGRAPHS, how much time do you typically spend on books that are
• Publishing that same year
• Already published (backlist)
• Will publish in future years
• Will never be published
WHEN THINKING ABOUT TIME…
• Share a clear definition of the “population” of books you are assessing. Share lists of the included titles for staff to review.
• Encourage staff to discuss the time estimates together. Within a department, this can help the group to calibrate their responses.
• Have staff write down their estimates in the meeting; they can be revised later as needed.
• With laptop in hand, the business manager can enter estimates in real time into the “STAFF_ALL” sheet.
6. STAFF SALARIES AND TIME – EFFORT SPENT BY BOOK
Books that Are Not
Monographs30%
General Admin
Tasks19%
Monographs51%
How Much Time Do You Spend on Monographs?
Monographs Published After 2014: 13%
Monographs Never Published: 3%
Monographs Published in 2014: 25%
Monographs Published Before 2014: 10%
How Much Time Do You Spend on Monographs?
Tip:Have staff consider how much time
each book took, relative to a “typical” book. The spreadsheet will calculate
the percentages
Books that Are Not
Monographs30%
General Admin
Tasks19%
Monographs51%
How Much Time Do You Spend on Monographs?
Monographs Published After 2014: 13%
Monographs Never Published: 3%
Monographs Published in 2014: 25%
Monographs Published Before 2014: 10%
How Much Time Do You Spend on Monographs?
This title took less time than the “normal” or “average titleThis title took a “normal” or “average” amount of time
This title took more time than the “normal” or “average” title
6. STAFF SALARIES AND TIME – EFFORT SPENT BY BOOK
6. STAFF SALARIES AND TIME – EFFORT SPENT BY ACTIVITY
Tip:Staffers can indicate ANY activities
they participate in.
All numbers must add to 100%
TIMESAVER METHOD!
This method is similar, but with one key exception:
Staffers do not come up with their own estimates
Just the CFO or other knowledgeable person will develop and enter the data
And we’ll skip a step or two.
35
NOW… CHOOSE A METHOD OF ALLOCATING OVERHEAD
AND ONCE IT IS FULLY BAKED…
37
DASHBOARDSHOWS AVERAGES BY ACTIVITY AND DEPARTMENT
38
COST STATEMENTSHOWS DETAILED COSTS BY BOOK
POTENTIAL USES AND NEXT STEPS
USES FOR THE TOOL Development of title-based costing, to use to seek subvention
This shows activity-based detail Overheads can be customized to suit the press Will make any request more transparent
Management tool Easier to see how costs are aligning with expectations and … revenue.
NEXT STEPS
Final adjustments to the tool and guidance Distribution via AAUP in early August Your feedback is always welcome! Presentation and discussion at Charleston in November (Lively Lunch)
