SIOP Name Change: Will They or Won't They?

The Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology (SIOP) is considering a name change. For those that don't know, SIOP is a division of the American Psychological Association and has thousands of members devoted to research into a variety of phenomena, including recruitment and assessment.

SIOP was established in 1982 and a significant number of members have been asking on and off for years whether the name continues to accurately describe what they do. The problem is mainly with the "Industrial" part--it's just not a word that gets as much attention as it used to (remember when everything was "industrial strength"?).

The name change is something they've tossed around for years, but beginning in October they're going to survey their members and ask them to consider three alternatives:

1. The Society for Organizational Psychology (TSOP) - name's okay but continues implication that focus is on cleaning our offices; acronym sounds like a rapper; oh, and URL is taken.

2. Society for Work Psychology (SWP) - a little bland but definitely simpler; how do you say the acronym? Is it like "swap"? Or maybe "swip"? Oh, and restricts the field to "work", which is a little narrow.

3. Society for Work and Organizational Psychology (SWOP) - the most complete name in terms of description; acronym easy to use but has some interesting brethren. Too bad we couldn't come up with SWOT (ya know, as in strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats). Oh, and URL is taken. Sort of.

The winner between these will take on SIOP for the final determination.

My bet? Members will split among the three, none will receive a passionate endorsement and it will lose against SIOP.

Any takers?