SCP PRESIDENT'S MESSAGE

All, I am going to use this space each month to point out incredible things SCP is doing to support you in your work, careers, and lives.  So, this month, I am highlighting our Consulting Psychology Journal and the new special issue.  It is full of cutting edge info on the fast-developing area of neuroscience.  Rob Kaiser, our CPJ Journal Editor, and Ken Nowack and Dan Redecki, the Special Issue Editors, have done a remarkable job on this.  And here is Rob’s note to you about our SCP focus on science, the Journal, and this special issue!  Enjoy!

Dale

A. Dale Thompson, PhD, President
Society of Consulting Psychology
Division 13 – American Psychological Association

SCP Journal Editor’s Message

One of the things I am very excited about in Dale’s leadership is his commitment to the science behind our practice of consulting psychology and his support for Consulting Psychology Journal: Practice and Research as a key platform for that science. His vision of increasing the relevance of consulting psychology in a world in need of change probably resonates on some level with every consulting psychologist. For what it’s worth, here is how it resonates with me.

Talent management is a growth industry. Since the global financial crisis of 2008, most industrialized economies and many industries have faced stubbornly sluggish growth. Not talent management though. According to Deloitte’s annual Human Capital Trendsreports, talent has posted persistent, year-over-year growth that would make a venture capitalist drool.

Talent is about people, and no field knows more about people than psychology. And what makes psychological approaches to talent distinctive in a crowded market is that psychology is based in science: where bold conjecture and speculation meet data and empiricism. Our strength is that our know-how is grounded in an increasingly refined and more elegant understanding of what makes people, groups, and organizations tick: a science of how to select, motivate, develop, and retain capable people and high performing teams.

Psychology is also expanding what we know about talent at work through increasingly sophisticated theory and research based on integration with other disciplines. Perhaps one of the most captivating developments here is the explosion of neuroscience research. Cue the latest special issue of CPJ, guest edited by SCP fellow, Ken Nowack, and co-founder of the Academy of Brain-Based Leadership, Dan Radecki: the Neuroscience of Consulting Psychology. (The link to the special issue: Consulting Psychology Journal: Practice and Research Volume 70, Issue 1, (Mar))

This issue showcases the science behind consulting psychology at its very best. The introductory article distinguishes between $#!+ and shinola with a thoughtful discussion of neuromythconceptions: hyped-up, overblown claims dreamt up by marketers and designed to sell organizations a bill of goods with the apparent sheen of science. In contrast, the issue goes on to summarize what we really know about how the brain works relative to coaching, goal setting and behavior change, trust-based organizations, and developing resilience. In one issue, you get a summary of the latest neuroscience research by leading scientist-practitioners—so you know it has been vetted for reliability and validity and yet also focused on what is practical and useful. And to top it off, the issue closes with commentary by the legendary Bob Eichinger, a founding father of the modern field of talent management, who explains why neuroscience may be the final frontier in understanding talent at work and how this is just the beginning of a new paradigm that is bound to change the way we bring change to a world that desperately needs it.

Rob

Robert B. Kaiser, Editor
Journal of Consulting Psychology: Practice and Research