Volume 2, No. 22. November 26, 2002
IAAPA Report
A
different animal
Any professional
or political association, however gilded in camaraderie it may be, is prone
to internecine conflict. How an association handles those divides is the mark
of that association’s viability, relevance and ultimate success.
In
the attractions industry, one of the deepest and oldest rifts runs through the
zoo community, what current American Zoo and Aquarium Association President
Mark Reed calls the “animal side versus the dark side.” That would
be the husbandry and conservation professionals against the business managers
comprising accountants, marketers and guest services professionals.
Reed, executive director of the Sedgwick County Zoo in Wichita, Kansas, feels
the schism is not nearly as pronounced as it once was, citing himself as an
example of a current financial and management professional who started his zoo
career on the animal side. Nevertheless, a rapt audience of about 200 zoo professionals
sat through a seminar last Monday titled “Culture Shock: Bridging the Gap
Between the Business and Non-business Sides of Zoos and Aquariums.”
One of the session’s speakers, Beth Stephens, vice president of Disney’s
Animal Kingdom and animal programs, summed up the situation facing zoo professionals
today as she provided a laundry list of “keys to bridging the culture.”
“I could really be here doing a diversity training,” she said. “It’s
the same thing.”
Pointedly, this session was part of IAAPA's seminar program. Reed fielded requests
from audience members to repeat the seminar at next year’s AZA annual conference,
and he expressed a keenness to see that happen.
IAAPA plays an interesting part in the animal vs. business equation. With AZA
traditionally focusing on its animal exhibitry, husbandry, breeding and conservation
programs, the business and guest services personnel at zoos have increasingly
turned to IAAPA for their professional education. It is an emigration AZA not
only endorses but encourages. “Right now, we look at the relationship between
IAAPA and AZA as a strong one,” said Reed, who at the session announced
a collaboration of the two organizations on a state-of-the-industry survey.
“There’s an awareness of AZA directors that more and more of them
need to get down here. It’s just keeping up with the industry. IAAPA is
providing something that we can’t. We can’t do it all.”
However, a group of guest relations and operations professionals at zoos want
the AZA to do at least a little more. They are petitioning AZA to create a committee
dedicated to that side of the zoo profession, just as organization has committees
for marketing, public relations, education and development. “The list of
committees that are non-animal is constantly growing,” Reed said, including
a trends committee that met at IAAPA. The petitioners’ argument is that
while IAAPA and other professional associations provide viable education and
networking opportunities, they lack a key ingredient in their mindset: namely,
animals. Operations at zoos are unique in the attractions industry because they
must perforce put animal welfare and the conservation mission ahead of all other
concerns.
Reed is willing to listen to the petitioners. He has asked them to provide more
information on “interest, desires, what they want to put in, what they
want to see out of it. We’ll see where it goes from there.” He said
he will move cautiously, however. One of the first tasks in his one-year tenure
as AZA president was to assign more than 250 members to various committees.
“That’s just vacancies and re-ups and new committees,” he said.
“Part of my theme (for the presidency) is accountability of volunteers.
Our association is what it is because of the passionate professional volunteers
we get. We’re getting close to being stretched too far on how much we can
demand out of our volunteers. Anything I’m looking to add has to have a
reason for it. That’s the bottom line.”
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