Business Management Consultant Tips

As a psychologist and business management consultant the questions that come my way from leaders and managers are usually about why people behave the way they do. The same questions come whether I am providing team-building services, executive coaching, or conflict resolution. They are often specific to an episode or an ongoing personnel problem. 

Human behavior in organizations can be thought of as depending mainly on two factors: the nature of the work environment and the personality of the person. These two components do not operate separately; there is an interaction between the work environment and the worker’s personality.

The goal of any organization is to build a work environment that maximizes the productivity of all the diverse people involved. A key question is to determine what the fundamental principles are for building that work environment. I hear managers getting bits and pieces of advice to do this or that with their employees. Wouldn’t it be useful to have a coherent approach that has integrated principles? And wouldn’t it be necessary for these principles to stem from our latest science and business research?  We think it would be a great benefit if business managers had such a framework for working with their employees. 

This was the goal Lee Hersch and I set for ourselves when we began writing Six Psychological Principles. Understanding how to manage and lead requires a clear notion of what people are and what they need. People principles are not independent; they are an interwoven set of ideas that follow from the basic design of the human being. 

So, I ask you to think about it. What do you consider to be the most foundational notion about people for managing and leading?  I’ll tell you our formulation in my next blog.

Tom DeMaio, PhD