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What's it like to have a low IQ? (lemmy.world)

submitted 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) by Justathroughdaway@lemmy.world to c/asklemmy@lemmy.ml

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[–] CanadaPlus 1 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (1 children)

I agree, it's a fairly productive social science, but is there actual evidence that psychology has made an impact in organisation and management?

There's plenty of anecdotes and some hard numbers that suggest management is replete with bullshit artistry. For example, most office managers rely on in-seat time as their only measure of productivity.

[–] snek_boi@lemmy.ml 1 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

I agree that there is plenty of nonsense out there. There are many interventions veiled as "scientific", and most people don't have the ability to lift the veil and recognize the pseudoscience beneath.

Unfortunately, the answer to your question is, partly, no. Psychology has not inoculated the world from pseudoscience. However, the answer to your question is also, partly, yes. There are people who have learned from the most robust evidence in psychology.

To the extent that organization and management adapt to robust findings in psychology, there are many contributions that psychology has made to organization and management.

Clear goals. Things like SMART goals, specific goals, vivid goals, implementation intentions, mental contrasting, or otherwise things that help you be clear rather than vague about your goals— all of those tend to have a moderate effect on outcomes.
CBT, ACT, and mindfulness. You will probably groan at this, because you have probably had watered down, simplified to the point of being unrecognizable versions of these. At their best, these have shown improvements in the way workers approach their work
Psychological safety. You will probably also groan at this, because ironically psychological safety interventions, when done poorly, can make some people feel unsafe. However, the correlational and longitudinal data is quite clear: psychological safety leads to better results. Unfortunately, the experimental evidence has, to my knowledge, stuck to health-related organizations, where not speaking up costs lives. I wonder if there are good studies elsewhere now.
Feedback strategies. There have been good experimental studies showing that the way you give feedback can change your organization's capabilities over time. This is similar to psychological safety but arrived at from a different lineage in the literature.
Multitasking and task-switching. This one probably goes without saying, because there has been more than extensive research on this. Minimizing distractions, focusing on one thing at a time, having a pull-based workflow…

More broadly, you could look for good resources for Evidence-Based Management.