A Message From Your President
Kurt Kraiger
Were you one of thousands who suffered from the seasonal disorder, the Post SIOP Blues? With so many excellent sessions, outstanding keynote speakers, and a wide range of entertainment and networking opportunities, it’s no wonder that many of us had problems returning to everyday life. Did you know that this year’s conference attendance was the 4th highest ever? With the economy in the tank and companies and universities cutting back on travel budgets, that’s a remarkable achievement. Kudos to Conference Chair Julie Olson-Buchanan, Program Chair John Scott, and to Dave Nershi and the Administrative Office staff for a well-run, stimulating conference!
What’s Percolating?
Below I discuss some of my personal initiatives for the upcoming year. These are just some of the many activities SIOP’s Executive Board will be focusing on. Here are a few other hot button issues.
By now, you should know that SIOP will be holding an online vote on changing our name. There have been multiple initiatives to change the name of our field—and SIOP—over the past 30 years. As noted by Scott Highhouse in a 2007 TIP article, the most recent effort occurred in 2004 when 554 members voted for a name based on a choice between five alternatives, including the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology, the Society for Organizational Psychology, and the Society for Work Psychology. As Scott noted, “although there were more votes from the membership to change the name than to retain the I-O label …, no name change occurred.” That is, SIOP was retained as the name for our Society, even though it received less than 50% of the votes.
The goal this time is to hold a vote between just two names, the Society for Industrial-Organizational Psychology and a second name focused on organizational psychology.
If you have not brought yourself up to speed on the name change, or weighed in with comments, be sure to go to the SIOP Exchange and review the name change FAQ posted there. The vote will be held over a 1-month period and should begin around August 1.
Another issue facing the Executive Board is licensing. In December, an APA task force drafted a revised Modeling Licensing Act (MLA). Once approved, the MLA can influence state licensing boards. SIOP was well represented on the task force by Judy Blanton and Vicki Vandaveer, who did an amazing job of influencing the final version of the act. Although not all members will agree with all of the provisions of the draft MLA, the act is more aligned with how we practice psychology than the prior version. There is even a provision in it that health care providers must be trained in I-O before they can provide the services we do. There is a period of commentary and review for the MLA before it goes to the APA Council of Representatives for a vote. The Executive Board will be monitoring the review so that we do not lose any of the progress we’ve made to this point.
What’s Next?
At the closing plenary, I showed a picture of a Milt Hakel bobblehead and introduced my three goals for the upcoming year: to make SIOP louder, more global, and more accessible. The first goal is to make SIOP “louder.” One of SIOP’s four strategic initiatives is to become the advocate and champion of I-O psychology to policy makers. This includes increased efforts to obtain federal funding for I-O research and increased efforts to monitor and influence policy and legislation affecting human behavior at work. Through the fall of 2006, a task force identified multiple audiences for advocacy efforts (e.g., APA, the federal government, major funding agencies) and several innovative strategies for influencing decision making in each sector. However, little work has been done since then, as SIOP leadership has focused on other initiatives, particularly visibility. It’s clear to me that we need to integrate our advocacy efforts with our governance structure, so I have appointed a new task force, headed by Janet Barnes-Farrell, to review the prior advocacy initiatives and assign them to existing SIOP committees, as well as advise the Executive Board on whether we need an advocacy committee (as we have with visibility).
We are also going to be working more closely with the Federation of Behavioral, Psychological, and Cognitive Sciences. The Federation represents a coalition of scientific societies and communicates with policy makers and the public about the importance and contributions of basic and applied research in these sciences. Look for several events in Washington in the coming year intended to demonstrate the value of I-O psychology to the workplace.
My second goal is to make SIOP more global by continuing to work towards development of the global Alliance of Organizational Psychology. Most of the groundwork for the Alliance was done by Milt Hakel, Gary Latham, José-Maria Peiró, and Franco Fraccaroli. The alliance between SIOP, the European Association of Work and Organization Psychology, and the International Association of Applied Psychology, Division 1 was announced at this spring’s SIOP conference and again at the EAWOP congress in Spain. The signing was an important first step, but more work needs to be done before SIOP members can reap the benefits of the alliance. Although all three organizations will contribute to the Alliance, SIOP’s resources and incredible volunteer network position us to contribute greatly to the Alliance’s development.
Why should SIOP members care about the Alliance? There are several reasons. One is related to the advocacy goal. Just as SIOP hopes to have more influence on federal policy makers, a global alliance can influence policy makers at an international level by advocating to organizations such as NATO and WHO. The Alliance will also strengthen the already great quality of our program by ensuring that each conference includes workshops and addresses by up-and-coming researchers from other countries. In addition, there are plans for joint projects such as global test standards, a Web-based international knowledge base, cross-cultural research projects, providing support for moving or having to do project work abroad, and other networking and professional development opportunities.
My third goal is to make SIOP smaller, that is, to make it more accessible to individual members. Our fourth strategic initiative has been to become the organization of choice for I-O professionals, which includes the subgoals: increased enjoyment and satisfaction of members, and increased support for SIOP members in their efforts to study, apply, and teach the principles, findings, and methods of I-O psychology. My vision here is that SIOP provides the tools and information that SIOP members can use in their every day work lives. And, in doing so, that SIOP provides the tools to keep us better connected with each other.
The new SIOP Exchange, launched this spring, is an important first step. It allows members to read about and weigh in on emerging ideas, hot issues, and decisions facing the Executive Board. I want to publicly thank Ted Hayes and his team for their hard work launching the Web site. I have asked Ted and his team to continue working on new ways for Society members to network and share information with other members. This could include expanding the I-O Teaching Wiki and the launching of one or more practice wikis. The practice wikis could contain nonproprietary information that members could use at work such as sample proposals, assessment center exercises, report templates, onboarding programs, and the like. By encouraging more members to network through a social media platform like LinkedIn, we can create ways for members to learn about what others are doing and to post questions and receive rapid help on job-related issues. Finally, I am encouraging SIOP members to follow me on Twitter (K_Kraiger).* I frequently post updates on what I am doing for SIOP or what SIOP is focusing on, and, as more members follow me, I can use Twitter to quickly get the pulse of SIOP membership on emerging issues. Just as last year Gary Latham set a goal of making SIOP the go-to organization for SHRM, I want to make it the go-to organization for our own members!
*To follow me on twitter, register at twitter.com. Once registered, click on “Find People” and enter either Kraiger or K_Kraiger, then click the “Follow” button beside my name.
I am excited for the opportunity to serve as your president, and I am looking forward to this year. Please feel free to contact me with questions, concerns, or comments either by e-mail (kurt.kraiger@colostate.edu) ...or, just send me a tweet.