Acronyms and initialisms, singular vs plural.

I don't really know the answer but it makes me think of RBIs which is Runs Batted In. I have seen a lot of discussion about this but it doesn't change what people in baseball say, RBIs.  Also, you can't really use deer as an example because it is an exception to the rule about plural.  I have a feeling you are going to have to concede, even after you take over.

Alas, it might be true that I will have to concede Dick, but I don't have to like it.  

And yes I understand that deer is an exception to the general rule but English is rife with exceptions, and what better to take the exception than the creation of made up non-words.  RBI as a full initialism does seem different from my example SME since that is verbalized as a word rather than the initials.  

Michael Tull said

I am sure that there are many examples, but I am going with the one that started this for me.  A common acronym at my work is Subject Matter Expert, SME. (pronounced smee like the character from Peter Pan) I recently wrote a formal document that discussed the function of the people who would function in that role and I  used a sentence similar to: "The SME will receive a document to review."  I was corrected and told that I should say: "The SMEs will receive a document to review."  The person correcting me said that in this instant there is more than one SME therefore you needed to add an "s" at the end to suggest plural.

Your procedure is unclear.  If the document is about the defenestration of Microsoft executives. is the document routed first to the expert in jettison procedures, then to the expert in Microsoft, then to the expert in Microsoft?  .Or is a committee convened of those three experts so that they can review the document?  Or do you suggest that there are five experts in chucking out, seven experts in Microsoft, and eleven in executives?

And do these people receive these documents as an FYI, or are they supposed to act on them somehow?  So the various defenestration experts have to agree on which floor the the building the defenestration should occur?  What if the defenerstration SME proposes a change from the 12th floor to the 19th floor, but the building-and-grounds SME objects, saying the bodies s, a health code violation, and it would be better to use the window on the 3rd floor rear that directly overlooks the dumpster?

Wouldn't it be more expeditious to send each SME his own copy?  If you route one document and Jenson, #3 on the routing slip, is in the hospital from having been subfenestrata when a Microsoft executive was handled, documents could pile up in his inbox for six weeks, holding up the appropriate reviews.

Unless one determines whether an SME acts on his own or as a committee member, one doesn't know whether it's a collective initialism.

There once was a Southern Methodist Episcopal church.  The Methodist Episcopal church split, with the majority being anti-slave, and the SME being pro-Bible on the subject.  The ME merged with the Evangelical United Brethern in 1968, forming what is today known as the United Methodist church.  I don't know whether SMEs became UMs at some point, but by 1978, UM membership was less than either the ME or the EUB churches had claimed.  Instead of resolving their doctrinal differences, they simply included both the The Book of Discipline, claiming that there were no differences; I suspect those that thought otherwise decided to leave.

So if your organization is plagued with SME, you might want to update your resume.

Some others that came to mind are VIN, vehicle identification number, and PIN, personal identification number.  I don't have a job that regularly uses these terms so I don't know the usual way of referring to these items.  I personally own three vehicles so I have three VIN (or is it VINs) in my file cabinet.  If I ever actually said that sentence I would probably go with VINs.