Tips for Undergraduates Interested in a Career in Organisational Psychology: Australian Perspective

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Undergraduate psychology students often ask me about careers in organisationalpsychology.This post aims to provide a few links and resources to assist such students tolearn about the profession and the career pathways.The post includes (a) a basic description of organisational psychology, (b)links to Australian educational and professional society resources, (c)discussion of PhD and academic options, and (d) additional resources to learnmore about the profession.

Overview of Organisational Psychology

What is the profession called?

Before discussing the profession some consideration should be given to what tocall it.'Organisational psychology' goes by various names and abbreviations:

• Organisational Psychology (Org Psych)
• Industrial/Organisational Psychology (I/O or I/O Psych)
• Work Psychology
• Occupational Psychology

Different names imply both historical and present differences in focus. However, such terms are also often used interchangeably. See SIOP's 'What's in a Name?'article for an overview of various job titles.

Names vary by region.In the United States, "I/O" is preferred. In Australia, "Organisational Psychology" is arguably the more common term,consistent with the APS college name and many course names.Thus, I'll tend to use this term in this post.

What is organisational psychology?

Here are a few descriptions:

• "Organisational Psychology is the science of people at work. Organisationalpsychologists specialise in analysing organisations and their people, anddevising strategies to recruit, motivate, develop, change and inspire." -prize winning elevator pitch (APS COP)
• Industrial / Organisational psychologists "Apply principles of psychology topersonnel, administration, management, sales, and marketing problems.Activities may include policy planning; employee screening, training anddevelopment; and organizational development and analysis. May work withmanagement to reorganize the work setting to improve worker productivity. -Industrial/Organisational Psychologist job description on O*N
• "Industrial-organizational (I-O) psychology is the scientific study of theworkplace. Rigor and methods of psychology are applied to issues of criticalrelevance to business, including talent management, coaching, assessment,selection, training, organizational development, performance, and work-lifebalance." - SIOP: Student Section

The APS College of Organisational Psychology has a page that describes "What is anorganisational psychologist" and "Areas of Specialisation".

Learning more about the profession:

A good strategy for learning more about the profession is to browse the varioussociety pages:

• SIOP - Division of the American Psychological Association: The United States is huge; and I/Ois huge in the United States. The SIOP web page has heaps ofuseful online resources.
• Division of Occupational Psychology: British Psychological Society
• Australian Psychological Society: College of Organisational Psychologists

Organisational Psychology in Australia

Registration

• "Psychologist" is a regulated term in Australia. It is illegal to call yourself a psychologist, if you are not appropriately registered.
• Pathways to registration are set out by the Psychology Board of Australia.
• The traditional pathway for registration has involved first completing a fouryear accredited undergraduate psychology sequence, followed by either twoyears of supervised practice or the completion of an accredited post-graduateprogram (e.g., Masters, Doctorate, Masters / PhD).Over recent years, rules for registration have been changing. So, make sure you do your own research.
• I should also mention that even if you can't call yourself a "psychologist",completing an undergraduate major in psychology, particularly one with honoursin psychology (and perhaps also an undergraduatesubject in organisational psychology) can open doors to many roles related toorganisational psychology (e.g., HR, selection and recruitment,marketing research, etc.).

Finding organisational psychology university programs in Australia:

• The APAC accreditation site listsapproved postgraduate psychology programs.
• To find organisational psychology courses, last I checked, the followingworked
  • Click Search for courses - Australia
  • Click on the State you want to search for
  • Search for "org"

Groups and networking opportunities

The Australian Psychological Society: College of Organisational Psychologists is the main group representingorganisational psychologists in Australia.
It is made up of various state branches.
The society sometimes runs sessions suited to students wanting tolearn more (e.g., careers fairs).

A few informal online groups are also good places to learn more about theprofession in Australia. Both welcome professionals and students:

• Facebook group: Organisational Psychology inAustralia
• LinkedIn group: Organisational Psychology inAustralia

Salary Surveys

There are many reasons to find a career in organisational psychologyintellectually stimulating and meaningful.There has also often been financial reasons to find it attractive:

• Australia: A slightly dated 2006 APS COP Salary survey
• United States: SIOP Salary surveys

A career in academia

PhD on a topic related to organisational psychology or related area

• Doing a PhD on a topic related to organisational psychology can createmany opportunities.Such a PhD can open up doors to academic positions in a wide range ofdepartments including, psychology, HRM, management, business, and so on.The solid background in statistics and research methods provides aparticular advantage for an academic career.Of course, academic positions are competitive and generally require a goodpublication track record.
• Choosing a good PhD supervisor is important.In addition to supervisors in departments that offer organisational psychologyprograms, it's possible to look at supervisors in departments and universitiesthat don't offer such programs.
• The skills learnt can also readily be applied in many social science researchrelated roles in industry.

Examples of eminent organisational psychology academics

For those considering pursuing an academic career related to organisationalpsychology, the past SIOP award recipients,particularly in the categories Distinguished Scientific Contribution, andDistinguished Early Career Contribution, provide motivating examples ofsuccessful I/O psychology researchers.

Example academic websites

The following links point to examples of successful academics in I/O psychology.
I also selected these particular pages because each one provides PDFs for manyof the respective academic's publications.This can give a flavour of the kind of work, focus, and specialisation that anacademic in I/O might engage in.

• Filip Lievens
• Michele Gelfand
• Steve Kozlowski
• Michael Campion
• Adam Grant
• Murray Barrick

Journals to read

Further understanding of the research done in organisational psychology andrelated disciplines can be gained from reading some of the core journals.A good starting point can be gained by perusing the following ranked list of journals generated by Michael Zickar and ScottHighhouse back in2001 based on a survey of SIOP members:

1. Journal of Applied Psychology
2. Personnel Psychology
3. Academy of Management Journal
4. Academy of Management Review
5. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes
6. Administrative Science Quarterly
7. Journal of Management
8. Journal of Organizational Behavior
9. Organizational Research Methods
10. Journal of Vocational Behavior

Additional Resources

• Richard Landers has a series of posts providing advice on pursuing a career inI/O psychology from the U.S. perspective:
  • PhD or Masters in I/O
  • Prepping for the GRE
  • He also lists other I/O Blogs
• TIP is the official newsletter of SIOP.Current and back issues are available online and provide a good insight intothe profession including the interface between professional practice andscientific research.