Though he majored in chemistry in college, Brian O’Leary always knew he wanted to be in publishing, and so, while still in school, he added some creative writing courses. After a few jobs, O’Leary went to business school, where he developed an appreciation for “looking at things from back to front—breaking things down to see how the process works,” he explains. “I liked looking at how we could do things a little bit differently.”
That perspective helped him get a job in operations with Time Inc. and later with Hammond, and set him up for a long run as a sought-after book consultant before he was named executive director of the Book Industry Study Group in 2016. O’Leary will retire from that role at the end of June. As he enters his final six months, Publishers Weekly is honoring O’Leary with the Frederic G. Melcher Lifetime Achievement Award. Presented annually and selected by senior PW editors, the award recognizes individuals who have had tremendous impact on the publishing business over the course of their careers.
Volunteers have always played a major role in the success BISG has had, O’Leary says, noting that the number of core committee members stands at about 125. Though the organization is the only one that aims to bring together all parts of the book publishing ecosystem, it has always been “lightly funded,” O’Leary says. The current staff, including O’Leary, is three.
O’Leary understands it can be difficult for companies to wrap their heads around what BISG is all about. Founded in 1976, BISG grew out of an effort by book printers to gather more information about the industry they were working in. With the digital revolution of the late 1990s and early 2000s, BISG’s mission shifted to the development of standards, best practices, and a slew of unsexy things such as ONIX and BISAC. At that point, O’Leary says, BISG’s focus changed from collecting data to solving industry problems. Its work played an important role in keeping the supply chain functioning during the Covid pandemic, when demand for books was at a record high—an achievement that industry members appreciate.
“Brian’s crystal-clear understanding of the book publishing industry and its struggles, accumulated during his many decades of hard work and dedicated service, has made him an indispensable resource to BISG,” says Joshua Tallent, director of education and sales at Firebrand Technologies and a former BISG chair.
As sales of digital products have become more important to publishing, the industry’s issues have become more complex, according to O’Leary. “What worked for a print-based industry doesn’t work for one with more digital components,” he says. And again, industry members point to his ability to stay cool in the midst of widespread change.
“What I love about Brian is how deeply he engages with the details that are the backbone of our industry,” says Dominique Raccah, CEO of Sourcebooks and a former BISG chair. “Brian isn’t afraid of complexity; he embraces it, and that has made all the difference.”
Consolidation has also had a tremendous impact on how BISG works. “It used to be a many-to-many business when you had a large group of publishers, hundreds of distributors, plus lots of independent retailers, and Barnes & Noble and Amazon,” O’Leary says. Now, he adds, the business is “few to a few,” with some of the biggest players happy to work out issues among themselves. Still, he insists, there remains a real need for industry standards and best practices.
O’Leary has led BISG longer than anyone other than Sandy Paul, who was the organization’s first director. Given the many challenges, O’Leary says he is proud that “nothing broke on my watch,” but he wants to leave behind something the next generation can build on to survive the many looming tech changes.
To that end, in 2024, he started the Book Publishing Next program. The goal is to get industry players together to try to figure out what the supply chain needs to look like over the next five years. O’Leary says he has talked to hundreds of people with diverse perspectives. In his view, the priority is updating systems that were put in place in the print-based 1980s and are ill-suited to the way the industry works today.
Despite frustrations in gaining a consensus over some industry issues, O’Leary has very much enjoyed his time at BISG. “The job has been the capstone of my career,” he says.
