LISA's Mission

The newly appointed LISA Board members believe that LISA’s goal is to promote the entire globalization industry at a high level. We believe that this can be done best by being a nexus of communication between many entities including individual customers, customer organizations, government agencies, standards bodies, consultants, tools developers, service providers, and most importantly other GILT organizations. At our General Assembly meeting I asked everyone to convey a message to their non-LISA colleagues of our sincere eagerness to collaborate with other GILT teams. My fellow board members and I strongly stated that we do not believe we are in competition with any of these organizations. Our goal is to work with them to help them achieve their goals. We believe we are in a very strong position to be able to further the industry as a whole. We are a not-for-profit organization and must behave like one, but we must also be fiscally responsible to ensure that we have sufficient funds to do our job.

The remainder of this article reflects my own views (and mine alone), not those of LISA or its board.

W.J. Sullivan's Personal Views

As LISA’s Chief Strategist (and Grand Panjandrum) I have contacted a variety of people in the industry and have some observations about our industry, LISA, and other organizations to make based upon my conversations with these individuals.

First, I heard a disappointing collection of comments about LISA. The people who were frank enough to share them with me had my full attention. Sadly, quite a few of the comments I heard were unattributable and strongly based upon innuendo, very old data, incorrect facts, or opinion cited as fact. I have a theory about this: our “industry” is very immature. In fact it may be premature to refer to it as an industry at all. The players on the field need to differentiate themselves to make their mark. But because of the immaturity of the industry itself there is really very little to use as differentiators, so many others have created a bete noir out of LISA. Either overtly or surreptitiously, they pass the word that they are “not LISA.” I want to make it very clear that I personally am not upset about this – it is an understandable tactic, albeit a sad and unproductive one for the industry as a whole. Anyone who stoops to that runs the risk of tarnishing all of us.

Secondly, I found that “promote the entire globalization industry at a high level” means a variety of things to different people. It became clear at our GA meeting, for example that there are still people in the industry who think that “promoting the industry” means promoting the services and tools providers who are members of LISA and offering them a venue for contacting and attracting customers. Those who still believe this have: (a) not been listening,(b) believe we have failed in so doing, or perhaps (c) want to keep saying “LISA failed” for the reasons stated above. I have tried to make it clear that LISA is not responsible for the revenues of its members—they are responsible for their own success. We are responsible for preparing the soil, and of course we do want things to grow, but we do not own the crop. It was true that at one time LISA did have such a charter. As I told our GA in December, there is an organization that promotes individual companies — GALA. I wish them all the luck in the world and would welcome them as true partners. Their work is important, and they and LISA are not in competition.

Thirdly, I frequently heard, and once even saw in print, the now famous refrain that “LISA is not (or at does not behave like) a non-profit organization.” There is a grain of truth in this, even though it has been repeated with a touch of malice. However, anyone who has seen our books would instantly concede that we are demonstrably not a profit-making organization. Healthy? Yes, in many ways. Well-recognized by outside organizations and governments? Indeed yes! Profit-making? No. I need not elaborate. But I must confess there have been times when we behaved like one, especially when it came to “reciprocal courtesies” and other exchanges. We must be frank: people want to dislike LISA, and they would like to use LISA to advertise their efforts or distribute their brochures or piggy-back on events, and they would like that for “free” (not “free” in the monetary sense, but rather free from the obligation to return the favor by linking to the LISA website, distributing LISA brochures, or even doing something as simple as saying something nice about LISA in public. Personally I think that is rather unfair.

I believe LISA is a good, valuable, and constructive partner, and that banding together with LISA will benefit everyone and hurt no one. As an industry observer (quite apart from my LISA role) I can tell you that this industry is perceived by customers as splintered and one where a customer cannot get a truly unbiased answer. We could all fix that if we really wanted to.