Starting in March, I will begin a multi-year journey with the goal of becoming an Industrial / Organizational Psychologist. I have always been fascinated by motivation and performance. This journey will help me take it to the next level while providing you with significantly more advanced levels of blog posts. My gain is your gain! Hopefully you will find them of value. Back to I/O Psychology, the most common question I receive after telling someone my new path is... What the heck is an I/O Psychologist? So, here it is, everything you would ever want to know about I/O Psychologist.
From an education perspective, in order to become an I/O Psychologist, you must earn your Ph.D.. There is, however, the ability to earn a Masters in Psychology. The main difference between the two is that Masters students are not trained to create studies or develop tools as Doctoral students are. Their role is to take tools that are already developed and use them.
I/O Psychology applies psychological methods and principles to resolve organizational problems regarding human performance. I/O Psychologist (Ph.D.) are trained but not limited to:
- Conduct studies on organizational behaviors as well as the interactions between management and staff,
- Analyze culture,
- Develop employee selection techniques,
- Develop appraisal techniques,
- Assess leadership and employee motivation,
- Identify the cause of internal conflict and develop resolution,
- Adviser to management regarding psychological and social impact of policies,
- Executive Coaching,
- Training and Development,
- Improvement in Motivation, Job satisfaction, Leadership growth and even organization Development/Restructuring.
I/O Psychologists bridge the gap between the needs of the organization and the people who work in it by researching human ability, motivation, perception and learning abilities. There are many forces that affect staff performance including management directives, human capabilities, technology and even economic conditions with an I/O Psychologist will take into consideration. Also, management has been known to leave staff motivation, perception and job attitude unnoticed as they focus on other parts of business instead.
I/O Psychologist are very aware of the conflict between the needs of an organization and the needs of the people within it. Leaders of most organizations still trying to run their ship like a machine. They try to reduce human behavior to predictable patterns, like cogs on a machine. On the other hand, humans do not take well to this approach. This is one of the main areas an I/O Psychologist is trained to improve.
Some of the big organizations that employee I/O Psychologist include Yum!, Humana, AT&T, IBM, General Motors Corp., Ford Motor Co., PepsiCo, Inc.. Military agencies and the Federal Govt.. If you would like to learn more about this field, feel free to reach out to me via email at craigwillard@u-discovered.com or check out more information available online.