Professional Prectice Committee Update Jan 97

First, for SIOP members who may not know, Vicki Vandaveer's business activities have been so successful, she had to step down as Professional Practice Committee Chair after last April's SIOP Annual Conference to give full attention to her growing company. Vicki has provided many hours of volunteer support to SIOP over the years, which we all appreciate. Continued success, Vicki!

For those who may have forgotten, the Professional Practice Committee is a little over a year old, and has as its mission "addressing issues relative to professional practice, developing relationships with other professional groups, business and government leaders, and the public in general in order to advance the professional practice of I/O psychology." Our work is conducted primarily through five subcommittees: Ethical Affairs, Public Affairs, Professional Association Affairs, International Affairs, and Environmental Scanning. Following are highlights of current Committee activity.

ETHICAL AFFAIRS Subcommittee--Rodney Lowman, Chair

Thanks to Walt Tornow for chairing this Subcommittee for the first year. Rod Lowman is our new Subcommittee Chair. The primary activity of this subcommittee is publishing a new edition of the I/O Ethics casebook, which currently has a working title of *The Ethical Practice of Psychology in Organizations.* Rod Lowman is Editor for the casebook, with Scott L. Martin and Larry Fogli as Section Editors. Excellent progress has been made. A draft of the casebook has been finished, reviewed, and revisions are being made. For more information contact Rod Lowman at (318) 257-4315 (or e-mail at rlowman@vm.cc.latech.edu).

PUBLIC AFFAIRS Subcommittee--Dianne Brown, Chair

The SIOP Member Referral System is coming along, slowly but surely. The subcommittee is re-conceptualizing the project so that it can rely on the existing membership database. That will eliminate the need to create another database which would have to be maintained by the administrative office. The system will still be primarily a user-friendly system with non-technical terminology, but will be linked to the 48 key interest areas already obtained through SIOP's membership renewal and maintained in the membership database. For more information, contact Dianne C. Brown at (202) 336-6000 (or e-mail at dcb.apa@email.apa.org) or Walt Freytag at (206) 883-9272.

PROFESSIONAL ASSOCIATION AFFAIRS Subcommittee--Donna Denning, Chair

This subcommittee has two distinct foci: a) regional I/O groups and b) personnel generalist organizations. For regional I/O groups, the emphasis is on reciprocal assistance to achieve the common goals of SIOP, largely through activities such as information exchange, referrals, co-sponsorship of activities, and joint publicity. For personnel generalist organizations, the emphasis is on developing relations to pursue joint interests, increase the visibility of SIOP, advance sound personnel management practices, and share intelligence about major issues that affect the practice of I/O psychology. For more information, contact Donna Denning at (213) 847-9134.

INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS Subcommittee--Richard J. Ritchie, Chair

A reminder--as noted in President Jim Farr's column in the July 1996 TIP, the 24th International Congress of Applied Psychology will be held in San Francisco in August 1998, just before APA also is held in San Francisco. Plan now to take advantage of this opportunity to meet our colleagues from around the globe. For more information on the International Affairs subcommittee, contact Dick Ritchie at (201) 898-8527 (or email at rjritchie@attmail.com).

I'll report on the work of the Environmental Scanning Subcommittee in the next TIP. For more information on this subcommittee and its activities, contact Jim Sharf at (202) 223-0673.

CALL FOR INTERESTED MEMBERS

As addressed by Heather Roberts elsewhere in this issue of TIP, the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 will expire in September 1997. Various provisions of this act affect SIOP members' practice. I'm looking for members who have expertise in this area and an interest in working on SIOP's behalf during the coming year. If this is YOU, please let me (Cathy Higgs) know at (415) 833-6260 (or email at chigg@allstate.com [note, no 's' on last name in e-mail address]).