Reflections on the Role and Function of Managerially-Oriented Professional Societies

Most of the managerially-oriented professional associations with which TIMS members are likely to be involved do a creditable job of that which has traditionally dominated their attention---helping professionals communicate with each other. By means of journals, meetings, proceedings, tutorial seminars, and the like, these organizations make it possible for any person who, by any reasonable standard, has something to say that is relevant to these societies' interests to have his say in print or on the rostrum. Surely these activities make a substantial contribution to the development of the knowledge which the managerially-oriented professions embody and to the sense of community which their associations represent.Yet, this obsession with communication for the sake of communication seems to many to have reached the point where it has become counter-productive. For instance, most professional associations believe themselves to be irretrievably committed to having at least one, and often two or more, major meetings a year---to maintain the members' interest, so the reasoning goes. The number of parallel sessions in a meeting often seems to be more a function of the physical arrangement of the most expansive facility the organization's credit can afford rather than devolving from any particular purpose that attaches to an individual meeting. The number of speakers in many a session seems to be determined more by the number of papers that have been contributed rather than by any obligation to the speakers whose papers have been accepted. In all, these professional bazaars are the natural result of the widely-accepted notion that every member and interest group ought to have an equal right to be heard---every time.