I've had a bit of a Google regarding postnominals and found a couple of references which seem to be consistent with each other.
From the University of Sydney style guide:
Quote:
Order of qualifications
Qualifications should be listed in this order:- national honours (AO, AM, AC, etc); then
- degrees before diplomas, in conferring order
– from other universities first (degrees then diplomas)
– then from Sydney (degrees then diplomas).
Where another universitiy is the awarding institution, include in italics the abbreviation of that institution’s name after the abbreviation for the award. Do not include the name if the award is from the University of Sydney.- Fellowships then memberships (professional institutions and learned bodies, by election or for scholarship)
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I think the key here is that fellowships and memberships must be "professional institutions and learned bodies, by election or for scholarship". I don't believe that president of a 4WD club (someone else's example) counts as a professional institution or learned body.
The wikipedia article is much more detailed but is consistent with the quoted text above.
I know some people include things like MCSE (Microsoft Certified System Engineer) in their postnominals which I don't believe is strictly correct but if it is relevant to the job has advantages.
The impression I get is that the more (genuine) postnominals a person has the less likely they are to use them, except where appropriate (CVs etc). For the purposes of a business card I think you can dump those postnominals that aren't related to the job in question and I think you can also dump qualifications that are implicit in a higher qualification. For example, if someone has a PhD it is safe to assume they have a Bachelors degree and possibly a Masters degree.
HTH,
Matt
References:
http://www.usyd.edu.au/publications/...de/degree.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...ominal_letters
