Recently, on a flight to Boston, I found myself immersed in thought about the psychological preferences that are categorized and defined by the Myers Briggs Type Indicator. I suppose this is what one does with their ‘off time’ when they are immersed in a doctoral program in industrial-organizational psychology. In parallel with the hum of the engines, I quietly reflected, acknowledging how many times I have taken this assessment tool over the past eight years and my subsequently varying four-letter outcomes during vastly different life experiences in that timeframe. I couldn’t help but remark and marvel at how these considerable transitions in preference underscore a woman in her doctoral journey.
Recently, I gave ideas to a journalist writing how applicants can demonstrate they are concerned with the bottom line. Granted, people will be concerned about customer service, teamwork, and doing an overall good job. However, the journalist’s angle was informing job seekers how to be seen as bottom-line applicants. Examples he provided were an employee whose role is computer work, but helping other departments by using a forklift, and a CEO modeling good behavior by using public transportation. However, I think this mindset misses a few crucial points.
In December 1912, a group of managers with different backgrounds, but with a common interest in systemizing the discipline dealing with the ‘handling of employees’ formed the Employment Managers’ Association in Boston. Their aims included “to discuss problems of employes (sic); their training and their efficiency”, and “to compare experiences which shall throw light on the failures and successes in conducting the employment department (Bloomfield, 1916; p.77). Within the next decade, similar associations had formed in most large cities in the US, and the profession of employment management – a precursor of modern day HRM – was born.
Welcome to the SIOP Sustainability Blog! We are delighted to host this forum for SIOP members who are interested in I-O-related sustainability issues, focused on both research and practice. We plan to use a variety of formats through the coming year to engage members in a productive exchange; we have a boatload of things to push at you, but we also want to pull from you in equal measure. So let’s get the conversation going!
The news stories in this column have been gathered through the use of a Google News Feed. They are neither filtered nor endorsed by SIOP but aggregated automatically using specific search terms.
