BUILDING THE FIELD OF ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT INTO A PROFESSION

The following appears as an article in the O.D. Development Handbook:

1. In order to be a profession, you have to have an international Code of Ethics. Dr. Donald Cole, RODC wrote the first O.D. Code of Ethics back in 1981. In the Fall of 1981, Dr. Bill Gellermann, RODC accepted the task of developing a Code of Ethics for the O.D. profession worldwide. He has been most active in searching the world for objections to the current O.D. Code of Ethics and then writing revisions that would resolve those objections. The O.D. Code of Ethics is now in its 22nd Revision. It has been translated into Polish, German, Spanish, and Russian.
2. In order to be a profession you have to have a unique body of knowledge and skill. Roland Sullivan, RODC accepted the task of heading a Committee to Define the Knowledge and Skill Necessary for Competence in O.D. He and his committee have completed this task and an abbreviated version of their work is published in the International Registry of O.D. Professionals.
3. In order to be a profession you need to be concerned with something more than just making more money for your members. Every year The O.D. Institute sponsors a meeting of the international, interorganizational, interdisciplinary Research/Study Team on Nonviolent Large Systems Change. Registration is free as our contribution towards building a world more at peace. We believe thta O.D.'s knowledge and skill can be used not only to help make U.S. corporations more successful but can also be used to solve national and international problems. S o we bring people together from different nations and different disciplines and different backgrounds to see if we can make the world a somewhat less violent place.
4. In order to become a profession, some kind of minimum qualifications are needed. Not everyone who has attended a weekend workshop should be accepted as a qualified O.D. consultant. It is helpful if people who meet certain mimimum qualitifcations can be recognized by the public. Doctors use the initials M.D. to identify themselves, nurses use the initials R.N., and engineers use the initials P.E. We provide the initials RODC© (Registered O.D. Consultant) and RODP© (Registered O.D. Professional) to publicly identify those who have met certain minimum requirements.
5. In order to be a profession it is important to establish vehicles that will allow us to share information with O.D. people and O.D. organizations worldwide.
1. We publish The International Registry of O.D. Professionals and O.D. Handbook which lists not just names and addresses but includes the credentials of those registered with us so that you can easily identify people with whom you would like to make contact.
2. We publish a monthly newsletter Organizations and Change which we offer to send free to every O.D. organization in the world that would like to exchange their mailings for our newsletter.
3. We publish a quarterly journal, The O.D. Journal of over 100 pages/issue which is published four times a year in order to share current O.D. information with others.
4. We have established an annual O.D. World Congress at which anyone from anywhere can come and speak without having to write a paper in advance or have their presentation judged in advance.
5. We have established O.D. Networks Worldwide which meets every year following The O.D. World Congress to discuss how O.D. networks worldwide can be most helpful to one another.
6. We are active in organizing local O.D. networks both inside and outside the USA. If you would like to help start a local O.D. network, we can supply you with mailing labels for people in your area who are interested in O.D. and we can help publicize your meetings.
7. We have established the annual Outstanding O.D. Project of the Year Award. This forces the field of O.D. to define an "outstanding" O.D. project and provides recognition and documentation of outstanding O.D. work being done. Dr. Robert Golembiewski, RODC heads this effort. Contact him for information on the nominating procedure. Self-nominations are accepted.
8. We have established over 20 committees that are working on issues of importance in the building of a profession. It is not required that people be members of The O.D. Institute to work on most of these committees.
9. We publish E-Mail addresses and we encourage the use of this vehicle in communicating with O.D. people around the world. We also maintain a site on the world-wide web with highlights from our newsletter, conference information and registration forms, and job opportunities in the field of O.D., updated monthly. This site is at http://members.aol.com/ODInst/.
10. We have also organized O.D. Consulting Teams to world trouble spots. We have taken consulting teams to South Africa, Poland, Lithuania, Russia and China in an effort to shaare our expertise with others and learn from them.
If you would like to help build the field of O.D. into a profession, your participation is invited.