This article focuses on I-O practitioners’ professional development needs identified in the 2015 survey results. In 2008, Silzer and colleagues reported that when asked about satisfaction with “SIOP support for advancing your I-O practice career,” full-time practitioners had a mean satisfaction rating of M = 2.77 (five-point scale where 5 = very satisfied). The 2015 results indicate that full-time practitioners have the same level of satisfaction on this item in 2015 (M = 2.77), despite several practitioner development-related initiatives that were implemented after the 2008 survey (e.g., Speed Mentoring/Group Mentoring, Webinars, Careers Study). Therefore, it is important to examine current practitioner needs and use that information to shape our practitioner outreach agenda so we can better support the specific needs of those who are implementing I-O science in the workplace. In this article we report on (a) resources practitioners currently use to gain professional knowledge and skills, (b) perceived value of activities that SIOP could provide to help practitioner development, and (c) perceived value of knowledge and skill training in specific topic areas. 

For far too long, the completely adequate have been ignored by TIP. We are the cogs in I-O industrial complex. No, we didn’t invent Donkey Kong, Mario Brothers, and Legend of Zelda like Aguinis and O’Boyle’s (2014) star performer Shigeru Miyamoto. We didn’t develop meta-analysis or the Likert scale. We are the unheralded who day in and day out do our job. But, our leaders now proclaim just doing your job isn’t good enough any longer. What we don’t understand is if we are required to do something other than our job, doesn’t it then become part of our jobs?  Regardless of that issue, this article isn’t for the stars or the superiors, it is for, well we guess, the proud posteriors of our chosen field. In this article we proudly represent those posteriors to the best of our adequate abilities. Unlike Lake Wobegon where all the children are above average, we all can’t be in the long right-side, heavy tail of performance. Rather, the vast majority of us are in the stacked up bunch on the left side.

You may ask yourself, “What makes these two unknowns qualified to represent me?” For one, we have a long track record of mediocre results in all aspects of our lives to back up our claim of adequisivity.1Just to be sure, though, we checked with our wives, both I-O psychologists, who confirmed that there is absolutely nothing special about us. With this, we feel we are up to the task at hand.

The number of I-O start-ups increased for decades and peaked between the years of 1985 to 2005, then began to decline thereafter. This trend complements our previous findings that mergers and acquisitions grew during this period. Thus, the field is moving towards a smaller number of large firms, which may be influenced by the political climate and economic conditions.

This February METRO, in collaboration with Hogan Assessment Systems and Right Management, is offering its third annual METRO-Hogan-Right Management Hogan Assessment Certification Workshop. People who complete the workshop are certified to use and interpret the Hogan Personality Inventory, Hogan Development Survey, and the Motives, Values, Preferences Inventory.  The opportunity to attend this workshop at a discounted price has been overwhelmingly popular. Right Management provides office space, METRO provides catering (breakfast and lunch for participants for 2 days), and of course Hogan Assessment Systems provides the workshop leaders and materials. This workshop is limited to METRO members and Right Management employees; space is limited so registration is on a first come, first serve basis, and caps out at about 32 participants.

Whether you work in academia or are a practitioner working in a corporation, an applied research firm, a nongovernmental organization, or another setting, there is a role for you. If you are a faculty member or a student, consider the words of Ramu Damodaran, chief of the United Nations Academic Impact (UNAI) Secretariat. He explains, “Any problem that the world has—and if the world has a problem, then the United Nations has a problem—can be brought closer to a solution by having the impact of academic research, academic scholarship, academic achievement, and academic integrity applied to it.” Using such research for meaningful change is a value that SIOP and the United Nations (UN) have always shared. The UN’s long history of working with nongovernmental organizations and the public sector clearly indicates the role for I-O psychology researchers and practitioners in such entities. And you private sector types are not off the hook either.