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When you’ve made the decision to leave your career and start something new, a wealth of options become apparent to you. It might be that you’ve already decided what you want to do and are ready to climb that particular ladder, but it could also be that you simply know that you want to do something else and are unsure of what form that might take.
When searching, an option that might take your eye if you’re a person who likes psychology and helping people is that of an industrial organizational psychologist. First things first, with a job title like that, you have to understand what it all means. Then, if it appeals to you as much as you thought it did, you can begin to take steps towards it.
What Is It?
Psychology, as a subject, is something that can be applied in almost any area of human operations in order to better understand behavior, happiness, and the kinds of internal issues that people face in various environments. Your role, as a budding industrial organizational psychologist, would be to apply this to the workplace.
Working conditions are something that people have strived to understand for any number of reasons, ranging from making these spaces more comfortable for employees to finding ways to increase productivity for employers. Of course, the exact nature of the workplace might vary, which could play into your training and preferences, as these specific professional environments could greatly impact how work affects any given person.
How to Become One
Whether you’re young and pursuing your first career or you’re a little older and interested in a mid-career shift, your focus might be moving on to a role you prefer to your current one as quickly as possible. Sometimes this isn’t possible given what you need to accomplish before you can get there or the experience you need to have under your belt – but there might be methods that seem like the optimal way to go.
For example, you could look into studying online, meaning that you can undertake the process of acquiring the relevant qualifications in a manner and environment that suits you, which might come in the form of IO psychology programs online.
There might be a certain amount of self-discipline involved with learning online compared to at a physical institution, but learning how to adapt could lead to a rewarding experience. Plus, online programs are typically more affordable than their on-campus counterparts because students don’t need to quit their jobs and move away to college and rent a new place in order to study. The program takes place completely online, affording greater flexibility and convenience while allowing students to remain at home and continue working their jobs if that’s what they’d prefer to do.
Is It Right for You?
It’s difficult to tell whether or not a job is right for you without having some experience in it first, so you might have to start by judging the values of the role and whether or not that aligns with your own interests.
Beyond that, you might begin to look at the structure of a typical workday for someone in this position and perhaps even go about your research by speaking to people currently working as industrial organizational psychologists to get a more accurate picture of what the career entails.
Lastly, this, as a role, might also vary based on the industry you work within, potentially reflecting that of the people with whom you’ll be working, thus adding a whole new layer of variety to this rewarding career path. Therefore, given so many variants, it’s important to do your research and look at the different options and sectors in which you can work as an IO psychologist before making your ultimate decision to pursue this job.
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