Continuing with our new series of special Editorials, named ‘Interviews’ introduced in Annals of Applied Biology in 2020, I am pleased to talk to Mrs Carol Millman (Figure 1) who has been with the Association of Applied Biologists (AAB) and our journal Annals of Applied Biology since 1989. I and my fellow colleagues, Profs. Martin Parry and Bill Davies from Lancaster University, UK, and Prof. Nigel Halford from Rothamsted Research, UK, have prepared some questions to ask Carol about her activities.

When I asked Prof. Simon Leather, Annals Editor-in-Chief (2015–2020) in his interview in 2020 (Azevedo & Millman, 2020), for advice, as I was taking the job as the new Editor-in-Chief of Annals from 2021, he wisely said: ‘Listen to Carol’. I guess that if I had asked former EiCs of Annals that would certainly be the unanimous advice I would receive; Simon expressed how much we all value her support, experience and guidance.

Carol retired as Executive Officer from the AAB this May and, as commented by the AAB President Prof. Christine Foyer in her ‘Strategic Priorities—AAB 2021–2022’, ‘The retirement of the current Executive Officer, Carol Millman, will undoubtedly provide challenges to office organisation and operation.’; the same would be true for Annals, nonetheless, and before my fellow Annals' Editors begin to lose sleep and pull their hair out, I am happy to let you know that Carol will continue with the journal for at least another 2 years.

I hope you enjoy reading this article, which I feel is very interesting and almost a guide to those involved with the activities carried out by Carol over such a number of years. If you want to know how to be an efficient Executive Officer, reading this article is a must.

Q: Tell us a bit about you.

I started work after leaving school in 1969 with IBM at Hursley, near Winchester, UK, in their Patents Department, which proved to be a good experience working with Annals papers, as everything had to be 100% accurate. This was followed by working for one of their Executive Department heads, who travelled extensively throughout the world. He would come back and throw his receipts and any money left from his trips onto my desks (this was before the days of the Euro) and let me sort out his expenses. This was invaluable when working out loss on exchange on various currencies during my role at AAB. After that I ran the computer tape library at IBM, leaving in 1981 for the birth of my first child, followed by another in 1982. In 1985, we moved to Connecticut, United States, for an assignment with IBM (I've Been Moved—my husband also worked at IBM), and spent 3½ very happy years there with our two children. We came back to UK in 1988, and I went back to IBM as a temporary employee (they were not taking on permanent employees at the time), but then I saw the advertisement in the local newspaper for a job at the Association to manage the Editorial Office for Annals and assist the then Executive Officer, Roger Rooke, with the AAB's conference programme. On Roger's retirement in 1997, I was appointed as his successor.

Q: You have been with the AAB as the Executive Officer since 1997; tell us about your activities/responsibilities.

At this point, I had no choice but to relinquish my responsibilities for running the Editorial Office for Annals, as the Executive Officer role would take up all of my time, although I was ultimately still responsible for it, as with AAB membership, and always maintained a keen interest in both. I managed the AAB Office and staff and reported directly to the Council to implement the decisions they made at their various meetings, for example, Council, Conveners, AGM, etc. I also represented the office at the meetings with our publisher, Wiley, for Annals, and later Plant Biotechnology and Food and Energy Security Journals. At this point, I also took over full responsibility for organising the Association's conference programme.

Q. What are the main challenges you ran into as an Executive Officer?

Juggling all the balls in the air to make sure everything is performed on time—journals published, ensuring conferences and workshops run smoothly and their related publications were ready in time for the conference.

Q. What are the main challenges you run into in the Editorial Office of Annals?

A few editors do not respond when I'm chasing them on manuscripts; usually the ones who have not dealt with the papers, sometimes over a long period. Also, authors refuse to act as reviewers and are then surprised if we have difficulty finding reviewers for their manuscripts!

Q. Any secrets you have you want to share with us about running an efficient Editorial Office?

Having a good relationship with the Editorial Board, and especially the Senior Editors, and good communication. I really enjoy the interaction with the authors, and I have been very lucky with organising conferences, as I've met many scientists who are also Annals' authors.

Q. Can you also share with us any key moments or decisions in all these years that you reckon were important for you, AAB and Annals?

I think the key moments for the Association would be the Association's centenary in 2004 and Annals centenary in 2014.

We held three major conferences in 2004, the biggest of which was at St. Catherine's College in Oxford; it attracted over 300 delegates. We also held a meeting at the Linnean Society on the actual anniversary of the incorporation of the Association, where people who had been important to the Association over the years were invited—it was a fabulous event for me, meeting old friends and others who loved the Association as much as I did.

For Annals, we held a major conference at Rothamsted Research, with whom we have always had a special connection. We had some very interesting speakers from all over the world, and Editorials and Reviews for the centenary were published in issues throughout the year and into 2015. In fact, Ricardo Azevedo (our current Editor-in-Chief), along with the other Senior Editors, Prof. Jari Valkonen (former Editor-in-Chief), and I, were the authors of the first centenary Editorial in the first issue of the year (Azevedo et al., 2014).

Q. Do you regret the selling of FES—was it selling the family silver? (Martin Parry)

No, I do not regret the selling of Food and Energy Security journal. The sale has put the Association onto a very healthy financial footing and has solved the problem of conflict of interest for the President, Prof. Christine Foyer, also being the Editor-in-Chief of that journal.

I think that over the last few years the Association's mission and aims have moved away from those of the publisher and that was starting to cause some problems. My own personal view is that many of the papers submitted to the journal come from China. China has been buying up publishing houses in recent time, and I can see in the future, that they may insist on scientific papers from Chinese authors being published by their own publishers; this will have a big impact on the journal. However, I wish them success with the journal.

This may give the Association the opportunity to launch another journal in the future, better matching their own aims and mission, which could help scientists who are not able to take advantage of publishing open access (OA).

Q. Has the advent of OA publishing changed things for better or worse; can Annals survive in an OA world? (Nigel Halford and Martin Parry)

I certainly believe OA publishing has changed things, but for better or worse – that's a difficult one. Clearly, better for those scientists who can take advantage of grants, etc. to pay for OA for worldwide free access to their papers, but what about those scientists who do not have access to this, and have to pay the OA fees from their own budgets, excepting those from third world countries ‘on the free or 50% discount list’? Certainly not better for them. I did worry that submissions to Annals would go down as a result of this, but the journal is going from strength to strength. We had more submissions than ever before in 2020, and the trend is continuing in 2021. The Impact Factor (IF) increased substantially for 2020, even with the new ways of measuring the IF, and the Senior Editors are working hard to keep this trend moving upwards. Yes, I think Annals will survive—we have a wide author base from many different countries—and I think that is one of our strengths. The latest initiative of publishing new Descriptions of Plant Viruses in the Annals will also build our author base.

Q. Given the range of global challenges where biological scientists can make a major contribution, what do you see as the major opportunities for AAB in the years to come? (Bill Davies)

The COVID pandemic has been an area where biological scientists and, in particular, virologists have made a huge impact on our knowledge of this dreadful virus. Our Virology Group, in particular, with Dr Miguel Aranda, one of the Annals Senior Editors and Virology Group Convener, has been actively involved in advice, outreach, detection activities and specific research projects directly related to the COVID-19 disease and/or the causative virus SARS-CoV-2.

As plant virologists, they can make some important contributions to support the International efforts in tackling this pandemic resulting from the SARS-CoV-2 virus, for example, using plant-based vectors for the expression of SARS-CoV-2 antigenic peptides, vectors that are potentially useful in both diagnostics and the development of future potential vaccines.

Another big challenge will be moving conferences into a virtual/hybrid mode of operation. The Association has already made big strides in this area during the pandemic, and it could increase conference attendance hugely, as delegates do not have to travel. One example was the webinar organised by Dr Miguel Aranda on ‘Tomato brown rugose fruit virus and Cucumber green mottle mosaic virus, two emerging tobamoviruses threatening tomato and cucurbit crops worldwide’ held in November 2020, where over 250 delegates attended from all over the world. It was a huge success, and conferences/webinars similar to this, where we can have a hybrid model with delegates choosing to attend face to face or virtually is definitely the way to go I think.

Q. Carol, if you could pick three things (whatever they may be) from your experience and time with AAB and Annals, or choices you made in life, what would they be?

The first would be ‘treat everyone the same’. I have met many people during my time at AAB, from Ministers, Heads of Organisations, Researchers, Farmers and Students. I believe that everyone, whomever they are, need to be treated with respect. The first person I make contact with at a university venue is the porter—he is always the person to go to if you need help!

Make time for myself. It is difficult when you are working full time with a young family and related commitments, to do this, but it is very important. At times, I have spent 80–90 h per week over a short period working on conference proceedings, Annals, etc. when there have been strict deadlines to meet, but it is very rewarding. Someone at a conference once said to me, ‘we realise how much time it takes to produce this book, but you didn't do it just for AAB did you—you did it because you didn't want to let your friends down’. He was absolutely right.

Work at a job you love. Even after 32 years, my enthusiasm for the job and AAB has never waned. I've met so many different people over the years, most of whom I've liked, and have made many friends during that time. I will be keeping in touch with many of them.

Q. What are your plans for the next few years apart from staying with Annals?

At the end of May, I moved permanently to Alanya in Turkey, currently living 5-min walk from the beach in a very pleasant apartment, while I look for a more permanent home (hopefully a villa, or a large apartment with plenty of outside space facing the sea). I plan to travel extensively around Turkey, my first destination hopefully being Cappadocia. I will go back to England to visit my son and his family and to Australia to visit my daughter and her family although I suspect they will be visiting me more than I will be visiting them! As I've been coming to Turkey on and off for almost 7 years, there are some places which I know well.

Hopefully the pandemic will pass, and I will be able to travel as well as receive visitors here. Keep in touch!

Thank you, Carol!