The Joys of Serving SIOP as President
Gary Latham
University of Toronto
The joys I derived from serving as president of SIOP are too numerous to cite in a TIP column. Thus, I will only highlight six of them with the hope that I will convince one or more of you to run for president.
First, there is the moment before delivering the presidential address to several thousand SIOP members. Standing behind the podium, as I prepared my thoughts, I saw an individual who is not only one of my coauthors, but in addition has been the “apple of my eye” for 29 years—my son, Brandon. Just seeing him puts me in a great mood. I also saw the faces of life-long friends. Among them was our newly elected representative to APA Council, Ed Locke. He and I coauthored our first paper in 1974; it was published in JAP a year later. We currently have three papers in press. The likelihood that we will continue to be research partners is very high because every paper we have coauthored has been published in a top-tier journal. As is the case with most coauthors, we have had our share of arguments over who should be first author. The “twist” in our relationship is that he has argued that I should be first author while I have insisted that the honor should be his.
A second highlight for me was attempting to walk in the shoes of our past presidents, four of whom have been role models for me since my days as a graduate student. Ed Fleishman is a pioneer in the empirical study of leadership. He has been publishing his research since the late 1940s. It is he who figured prominently in the famous Ohio Sate Leadership Studies. It is he who developed scales for assessing a person’s leadership style (The Leadership Opinion Questionnaire) and the reactions of subordinates to a leader’s style (Leadership Behavior Description Questionnaire). Little wonder that he was elected president of Divisions 5 (1978) and 19 (1977). He was even elected president of the International Association of Applied Psychology (IAAP) in 1974. In 1973, he was our president. I can still see him surrounded by admirers at the opening cocktail hour at the very first Division 14 conference I attended. I will never know how he could deal with the complexities of serving as president of Division 14 AND simultaneously be the editor of JAP. I only know how thrilled I was when he accepted my very first paper that I submitted to that journal.
I served as president of the Canadian Psychological Association (1999–2000) prior to serving in this capacity for SIOP. Yet my elections and my research pale next to Ed Fleishman’s.
Lyman Porter, known affectionately around the world as Port, was president-elect of the Academy of Management (AoM) when I attended my first AoM conference (1973). The huge respect he commanded as a behavioral scientist left a lasting impression upon me the following year when he was also elected to serve as our president (1976). At this point in time, he is the only person to have served in these two positions. What held me in awe of him even more was his ongoing mentoring of people who have subsequently become highly influential leaders in our field. One such scientist–practitioner is Ed Lawler, this year’s SIOP recipient of the Raymond Katzell Award.
In 1968 Port, along with Milt Hakel, founded the Summit Group. Membership is by invitation. There are approximately 10 people who identify themselves primarily as scientists and 10 who see themselves primarily as practitioners. I was invited to join in 1975. Consequently, I have benefited from Port’s skill as a mentor for 34 years. In addition to my biological children, I adore my present and former doctoral students. Their number, however, pales in comparison to Port’s. Nevertheless, I was deeply touched when my former students successfully lobbied this past year for my receiving the mentoring award from the HR division of the AoM.
John Campbell, in addition to being our past president (1977), is also a past editor of JAP. His breadth and depth of knowledge of organizational psychology and his ability to communicate that knowledge in thought-provoking ways both verbally and in writing awes me. It is he who wrote my “academic bible.” The year I entered the PhD program at the University of Akron, Managerial Behavior, Performance, and Effectiveness appeared. The authors were Campbell, Dunnette, Lawler, and Weick. Gary Yukl assigned it to us as “must” reading; Ken Wexley also made it mandatory reading. By 1973 I knew this book backwards and forwards. I loved it then and I love it now. Year after year I have taken it on vacation with me to reread. That book provided me the insight to determine whether the benefit of employee participation in goal setting was largely cognitive rather than motivational. John is also the first person to be asked to write a chapter for the prestigious Annual Review of Psychology (ARP) on training and development. It appeared in 1969. I have yet to write a book with as much impact on our field as Managerial Behavior, Performance and Effectiveness, but I did receive the honor of following in John’s footsteps by writing the third chapter on training for ARP (1988).
I may be the first person living outside the U.S. you have elected to be SIOP president, but the first Canadian to be elected to this office is my fellow countryman, a long-time professor at Yale, Victor Vroom (1980). He revolutionized the mostly atheoretical work in our field on work motivation. As an assistant professor, he created expectancy theory, among the most empirically researched theories of motivation in organizational psychology. Yukl required us doctoral students to read every paper that existed in the 1960s–1970s on this topic. What you may not know is that this theory was in danger of never being developed. Vic’s highest score on the Strong Vocational Interest Test was music. His second highest score was psychology. Fortunately for our field, Vic’s vocational counselor convinced him to pursue his second interest. Fortunately for all of us who were at our opening plenary session in New Orleans this past April, Vic never abandoned his desire to be a musician. None of us are likely to forget his joining me on the stage to play “When the Saints Come Marching In” on his clarinet. I was selected to play the baritone in the All City Band (1958)—it was downhill shortly after that. Nevertheless, when it comes to research I have enjoyed some success with Ed Locke developing and testing goal-setting theory.
So, now you can see why these four outstanding scientist–practitioners were and are my role models, my heroes, SIOP’s icons. There are at least six other past presidents who have yet to realize that their term in office has ended. They keep on serving, and serving, and serving. Ann Howard (1988) graciously agreed to come back to serve as chair of our Fellows Committee; Paul Sackett (1993) has served as the inaugural editor of our journal, Industrial-Organizational Psychology: Perspectives on Science and Practice. This year he is turning over the reins to Cindy McCauley. Leaetta Hough (2005) served this year as my confidante. She has the knack of making me laugh heartily on those rare occasions when I thought I might tear my hair out. In addition, she is currently serving as the president of the Federation for Behavioral, Psychological, and Cognitive Science. This is a highly efficient and effective body that lobbies Congress and the granting agencies on SIOP’s behalf. Then there is the ol’ sage who doubles as my golf pro. He was my “Merlin.” He taught me the lessons of yesteryear so that I understood and hence did not repeat mistakes of the past—Paul Thayer (1977). He was always there for me when I needed advice. In 1961 Paul coauthored, with another past president, Bill McGeehee, THE book on training. I too have co-authored a book on training. It has yet to become a “THE.” Perhaps that is why I still need training, and Paul was effective in providing it. For the past 6 years, Paul also served as president of our Foundation. Finally, there are two past presidents who qualify for SIOP sainthood. Saint Nancy Tippins (2000) and Saint Milton Hakel (1983). I will provide evidence supporting their canonization momentarily. Suffice it to say at this point that these six past presidents helped ensure that SIOP experienced a highly successful year.
A third highlight for me as your president was the SIOP Executive Board. Many presidents may have enjoyed boards that were as good as mine, but none enjoyed a board that was better. No matter how thorny the issue, we came to meetings well prepared. We debated them vigorously and constructively. Never were there ad hominem remarks. As José Cortina pointed out, rarely did we need to take a vote. Almost always we reached consensus. In addition, I benefited from a wonderful president-elect. Kurt Kraiger is a true team player.
A fourth highlight came as a result of reflecting on an e-mail as to “who is SIOP?” We are SIOP—7,000 or so volunteers. We, for the most part, have full-time jobs requiring 25 hour days and 8-day weeks. Yet as volunteers, we choose to exert the effort, to persist in making SIOP the envy of other scholarly practitioner organizations. For example, 8 months ago Dr. Robin Cohen was informed by her MD that a second child will soon be here. Dr. Cohen grimaced, stared her MD in the eye and screamed: “You better not tell me I can’t go to SIOP in April.” Now that is an operational definition of SIOP engagement. Chris Rotolo, a full-time practitioner at Pepsico, chaired our Visibility Committee, a committee made up of other full-time practitioners. Julie Olson-Buchanan (2002) is a full-time academic who has to worry about “publish or perish.” John Scott is a full-time consultant. He has to worry about finding clients so that he is able to feed his family. Yet, as the conference and program chairs, respectively, they created the time to take the steps necessary to ensure we had a memorable and meaningful conference. For the first time in SIOP’s history we heard addresses from the chair of the Board of Governors of the Center for Creative Leadership, Ingar Skaug; the president and CEO of the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), Lon O’Neil; the president of APA, James Bray; the eminent social psychologist and authority on subconscious goals, Peter Gollwitzer; and the chief learning officer of Goldman Saks, Steven Kerr.
Having role models, having past presidents working beside me, having an EB that functioned as a true team, and having you as SIOP members made for a wonderful year for me as your president. The fifth highlight, however, was setting the goals for SIOP. Before I remind you of them, there is one more joy derived from serving as SIOP’s president, namely, interacting with the SIOP staff in Bowling Green, Ohio: Jen Baker, Clif Boutelle, Jeremy Hopkins, Linda Lentz, Larry Nader, Lori Peake, Stephany Schings, and Tracy Vanneman. No task was too big or too small for them to accomplish effectively and efficiently. They were led by our outstanding ED, Dave Nershi, a true friend and advisor to all of us in SIOP. I am honored to be able to say that I have worked with him.
The title of my presidential address was “Goal Setting Works Wonders.” Our superordinate goal this past year was to increase SIOP’s visibility to the public and private sectors, to position SIOP as the leading source of evidence-based practice (see the TIP January 2008 issue). We have too much empirically derived knowledge valuable to society to leave it languishing in our journals. To attain this overarching goal, the Executive Board set four specific goals.
1. Our first and arguably most important goal was for SIOP to move beyond the borders of the U.S., to place an emphasis on all of us worldwide who see ourselves as organizational psychologists, and to bring to bear our knowledge and skills as scientists–practitioners to human resource issues of global concern. Our April 2009 conference in New Orleans was a historic event. At our opening plenary session, Franco Fraccaroli, president of the European Association for Work and Organizational Psychology (EAWOP), José Maria Peiro, president of Division 1 of IAAP, and I signed a document, the Alliance for Organizational Psychology. The purpose of this alliance is to “globalize” our respective conferences and workshops, develop joint services for our respective members (e.g., reduction in membership fees), and most importantly, influence organizational decision makers (e.g., UN, WHO, Red Cross). John Scott will be representing our new Alliance to the United Nations. Milt Hakel is a SIOP saint because since leaving the presidency in 1984 he has done everything from stuffing envelopes to making this Alliance a reality. He led a task force, at my request, and this Alliance would not have occurred without his leadership.
2. Sometimes the gods do smile. The year you elected me president was the year I was elected to the Board of the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), with its 250, 000 members in over 130 countries. Hence our second goal was to bridge the gap between science and practice in HRM.
Saint Nancy Tippins was canonized because she has agreed to chair committees for countless SIOP presidents. This year she worked with our chair of Practice, Deb Cohen, who coincidentally is the chief knowledge officer of SHRM. The two of them are making this SIOP goal a reality:
(a) SHRM has agreed to showcase our Professional Practice Series, which is under the excellent leadership of Allen Kraut, at SHRM conferences.
(b) SHRM has identified six initial topics that their surveys have revealed to be important for their members needs/interests. Nancy and Deb have established an editorial board comprised of 15 SIOP members who will serve for 2 years. The board will select authors for these and other topics that will be published and distributed by SHRM to its 250,000+ members (see Figure 1).
Figure 1. SHRM topics and editorial board
(c) Independently of SHRM, we are bringing out a new book series, initiated by Ed Salas, our current president-elect. The editor is Denise Rousseau, the “mother” of evidence-based management in North America. The title is Science You Can Use: Evidence-Based Principles and Management. The publisher is the American Psychological Association. The series will be for practitioners and managers what the ARP is for scientists and academics. It too will be showcased at SHRM as well as APA and SIOP conferences.
3. To impress upon the public that SIOP is the “go-to organization” of choice for evidence-based management, our third goal is to educate them. Hence, we stole a page from the business schools—specifically, their page on executive programs. Business schools make literally millions of dollars a year from nondegree programs they offer to managers. What do B-schools teach them? Not accounting or finance. They teach what we do. So why aren’t we, SIOP, tapping into this revenue stream? As of this year, we are. We adapted the 2007 fall conference on innovation for a presentation to executives in Toronto, charging $800 to the University of Toronto alumni, $1,000 per advanced registrant, and $1,200 for those who registered on the day of the event. SIOP then split the profits with the U of T Rotman business school. We made more money that one day than we did for the 2007 Leading Edge Consortium. This year we will offer a program in the fall based on the 2008 LEC, executive coaching. Please see Dave Nershi, Kurt Kraiger, or me if you would like SIOP to partner with your institution.
Thanks to the efforts of Judy Blanton (RHR), and Becky Turner (Alliant), SIOP partnered with the California Psychological Association to present a program on April 27 of this year to 200 technology executives that was simultaneously broadcast to 16,000 business and technology viewers on the Web. The topic was “How Executives Shape Organizational Culture to Boost ROI.”
4. As I stated in the previous issue of TIP, our fourth goal was to take concrete action on the results of our practitioner survey conducted in the winter of 2008 and reported to us in TIP. Why? Because our practitioners are our face to the public. It is they who apply the findings of our research on an on-going basis in the real world. It is they who distinguish us from other scholarly societies. If the Judy Blantons, Robin Cohens, Leaetta Houghs, Ann Howards, Chris Rotolos, and John Scotts of our Society do well, SIOP will shine in the C suite. If they do not, SIOP won’t. Consequently, as I said in the last issue of TIP, the Executive Board and I have asked:
(a) The Awards Committee, in conjunction with the Professional Affairs Committee, to develop an early career professional award.
(b) Dave Nershi, beginning with our upcoming fall LEC to initiate a preconsortium event for practitioners to “share and network.”
(c) The Professional Affairs Committee to create a mentoring program for practitioners.
(d) TIP Editor Wendy Becker to create a column that shows where practitioners have been giving keynote addresses. The objective here is to showcase the value and impact of our practitioners on the private and public sectors.
(e) Our incoming program chair, Sara Weiner, to encourage sessions at next year’s spring conference that showcase ways practitioners have impacted organizations.
In addition, Kurt Kraiger, our president, will be establishing:
(f) A practitioner-oriented microsite with information that provides easy access for sharing best practices among our practitioners.
(g) Committees of interest through the use of Webinars and electronic newsletters.
(h) A menu for us to access up-to-date record search and reviews of mainstream HR/business books on the SIOP Web page.
In closing this column, I hope it is evident that I truly enjoyed serving you in the role of president—hence the title of this column. I trust that I have served you well.