Industrial Psychology: Enhancing Workplace Disputes Since 1930s - Essay Sample

Introduction

Industrial psychology is the study of the mind state of workers to enhance settling numerous disputes within the workplace. By definition, industrial psychology is the study of human behavior within a workplace (Landy & Conte, 2016). Since the beginning of the century, industrial psychology has been developing and expanding rapidly. Since the establishment of industrial psychology in the 1930s, the phenomena have been applied to date in the business set up to settle the problems within the workplace (Landy & Conte, 2016). Psychologists and managers utilize industrial psychology to improve the working conditions, the well-being of the workers, increase their efficiency and productivity.

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According to Gardner & Widrich (2019), organizational psychology provides solutions to many problems of employees as well as motivating them to strengthen the workforce and increase efficiency and productivity. ...argues that the more employees are satisfied with the working conditions, they are likely to be more efficient and effective (Landy & Conte, 2016). There are a dozen roles and importance of industrial psychology in business management. Regardless, I chose to discuss three functions and roles of industrial psychology in organization management. Industrial psychology plays a vital role in stress management in the workplace, employee training, and development, as well as performance management and appraisal. That being said, this paper focuses on the three roles of the organizational psychology to the management of employees in the business.

For a starter, industrial psychology is essential for the management of workplace stress. By definition, stress refers to the physical and psychological state resulting from a deficiency in individual resources required to meet the pressures and demands of a particular situation (Schonfeld & Chang, 2017). Stress derives from significant events such as changing a job or moving. With a clear understanding of the concept of stress, the definition of workplace stress can be derived. It is the detrimental emotional and physical responses arising when there is a clash between the demands of a job against the control of the employee over meeting the requirements (Schonfeld & Chang, 2017). In a workplace setting, combining high job demands with reduced employee control over the situation results in stress. Workplace stress derives from a myriad of sources and affects both employers and employees alike. Low levels of stress are viewed as challenges and are considered okay. However, extreme levels of stress cannot be controlled and might result in physical and mental changes. When employees experience reduced morale, they feel powerless. As a result, the employees are complacent, and their productivity reduces (Schonfeld & Chang, 2017). Professionals in the most demanding jobs, such as middle managers and secretaries, are expected to respond to the timelines and demands of others with limited control over situations.

Secondly, industrial psychology is vital for the training and development of employees in the workplace. Industrial psychology ensures that the employees are well skilled and trained to handle their roles and tasks efficiently (Campbell & Wilmot, 2018). However, for every employee to understand the training program and get the appropriate training in the required time, the training program needs to be comprehensive. Employee training and development are effective factors for motivating employees, as well as promoting their job performances (Campbell & Wilmot, 2018). Training is an essential factor for the improvement of employee performance, hence promotes the production and performance of an organization. It is apparent that training serves to enhance the knowledge of an individual and helps them in career development. For any organization, its human resource management department is expected to be active in all training programs. These include compliance training programs. There are various ways in which the human resource department gets involved in compliance training programs.

Finally, industrial psychology is important for managing the performances of employees in their assigned tasks. Employers have always been challenged by the issue of optimizing the potential of employees for years. With the best performance from employees, organizations have the potential of increasing owner satisfaction as well as profitability (Ebner et al., 2018). As such, performance management goes beyond merely addressing poor performing employees as it is a holistic process made up of activities such as setting employee expectations, recruiting the right people, mentoring employees, and letting go of the poorly performing employees. These are the four steps involved in the process of performance management. Good performance management follows a series of steps, with each section playing a crucial part in managing the performance of employees (Ebner et al., 2018). For instance, an objective might entail providing updates to the program manager on volunteers' work. In this case, the performance measures might include a written report that is submitted quarterly.

Conclusion

In summary, industrial psychology is essential for the management of an organization, especially in the management of employee issues and problems within the workplace. This essay has discussed the three significances and functions of industrial psychology in the workplace. Organizational psychology enhances performance management, stress management, as well as training and development. Needless to say, organizations also utilize industrial psychology in other fields, marketing, and customer relation management, among others. The industrial organization focuses on the behavior of individuals in the workplace. In this context, industrial psychology offers solutions to many issues faced by employees in the organization.

References

Campbell, J. P., & Wilmot, M. P. (2018). The SAGE Handbook of Industrial, Work, and Organizational Psychology: Personnel Psychology and Employee Performance.

Ebner, K., Schulte, E. M., Soucek, R., & Kauffeld, S. (2018). Coaching as stress-management intervention: The mediating role of self-efficacy in a framework of self-management and coping. International Journal of Stress Management, 25(3), 209.

Gardner, A. K., & Widrich, J. (2019). Industrial and Organizational Psychology in Medical Simulation. In StatPearls [Internet]. StatPearls Publishing.

Landy, F. J., & Conte, J. M. (2016). Work in the 21st century: An introduction to industrial and organizational psychology. John Wiley & Sons.

Schonfeld, I. S., & Chang, C. H. (2017). Occupational health psychology. Springer Publishing Company.