What’s The Role Of Organisational Psychology In The Workplace?

Organisational psychology is often ignored when it is time to focus on optimising the business and its employees.

Certain psychological elements need to be kept in mind as a management team. If these details aren’t kept in mind, it becomes easy for everything to fall apart and for your business to struggle over the long-term. Sometimes, these issues don’t pop up right away but it becomes noticeable as the friction worsens.

So, what is the solution when it is time to improve the workplace and make it a better place for everyone?

This is where organisational psychology plays a tremendous role and can make a real difference.

What is Organisational Psychology?

Organisational psychology is a subset of psychology reserved for studying group settings in the workplace and what can be done to optimise them. This is a scientific-based approach to understanding the moving mechanisms of a workplace and how everyone works together towards a common goal. Implementing the right strategies by understanding these psychological nuances is what this subset of business psychology is all about. It’s often employed in mid to large-sized organisations to create harmony.

Benefits of Organisational Psychology

1) Improves Employee Engagement

It starts with increasing employee engagement and highlighting the importance of everyone towards the long-term goal. Imagine dealing with a sports team and certain players feeling left out of major decisions or major plays. It happens all the time and those players tend to perform far worse than everyone else on the team. It’s important to make sure everyone is doing their best and putting everything into their role and that comes by recognising certain psychological tendencies.

With organisational psychology, it’s easier to take these lessons and help boost everyone’s level of engagement. Over time, they are going to start doing more for the business and developing their skills.

2) Creates a Team-Based Structure

It’s one thing to have a team and another to make sure everyone on the team feels like a unit. There are certain businesses where there are hundreds of employees working in the same building but most are not conversing with each other or are not in sync with each other. This is a major hurdle and it is one of the biggest concerns people have as they look to do well over the long-run.

A business can only succeed when the emphasis is on establishing a team-based structure.

This is going to happen when everyone on the team feels like a unit and are in harmony with each other.

3) Increases the Number of Loyal Employees

Are employees leaving all the time? Is no one wanting to stay beyond a few years until they gain experience?

This happens for a reason and it often has to do with employees not enjoying where they are working or not seeing a way to the top. This is a major concern with certain businesses where the top positions are closed off and people can’t prosper as they need to. When an organisation isn’t growing, these hurdles tend to pop up.

Loyal employees are a must and it is all about understanding the psychology behind what makes them want to stay and do well.

4) Helps Pinpoint Concerns

There are always issues to deal with at a workplace and they are not as easy to pinpoint as one would assume. This is why a lot of businesses struggle over the long haul and don’t realise when things start falling apart. To avoid dealing with these issues, it’s smart to pinpoint concerns by understanding organisational psychology.

When these concerns start to pop out, it becomes easier to manage them and make sure the issues don’t worsen.

However, to ensure you are aware of what is going on, it is all about implementing the right strategies for sustained growth.

5) Improves Work/Life Balance for Everyone

One of the biggest issues employees have when it comes to their workplace has to do with the work/life balance. This isn’t easy to manage and a lot of businesses have to realise there is a give and take here. It is important to make sure employees get the opportunity to give a bit and make the most of their situation. Otherwise, you are not going to progress as you want to and this can lead to significant issues. The right work/life balance is a must over the long-run and will lead to better results.

6) Increases Productivity

Isn’t the goal to have productive employees willing to do more and deliver better results?

This isn’t easy without the right organisational psychology in place. The right techniques can be implemented to make sure everyone feels valued and they can do more in less time. This increase in productivity is one of the best ways to ensure the business is heading in the right direction and growing as it needs to for long-term success. Any hitches in this regard is what holds workplaces back from prospering.

Final Thoughts

These are the reasons to focus on organisational psychology and make it a part of your plan as a management team. A lot of businesses don’t think about these things until it is too late but the goal should be to remain proactive. Take action by setting up a proper strategy and pushing the team forward with the right approach to psychology. This alone can make a real difference and ensure the business progresses as a whole towards success.

Adam Hansen
 

Adam is a part time journalist, entrepreneur, investor and father.