Consulting psychology in the digital era: Current trends and future directions

David Winsborough, Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic
2013 Consulting Psychology Journal: Practice and Research  
Recent technological developments are reshaping the state of consulting, and consulting psychology is no exception. Although demand for consulting is likely to grow over the next few years, the knowledge base and tool sets most commonly used by consulting psychologists are being commoditized, while the gap between science and practice seems to be widening. Consulting psychologists can respond to these trends in 4 major ways: a) reconnect with academia to bridge the gap between science and
more » ... ce; b) focus less on problem-solving and more on problem-identification; c) build wider collaborative networks and practice to share data and crowd-source knowledge; d) engage with new technologies. The best way to predict the future is to invent it. (Alan Kay) Psychological consulting concerns applying theories and methods from psychology to the real-world problems of people (e.g., managers, teams, employees, or consumers). Consultants typically help clients improve their understanding of certain behaviors with the goal of influencing them to improve their performance. Although a significant proportion of psychological consulting focuses on organizational problems-most notably human resources (HR) or management issues-there are many other areas of consulting psychology (CP), such as advertising and marketing, humancomputer interaction, dating and relationships, forensic, educational, and clinical psychology. Given the primary emphases of this journal, we will focus our discussion on organizational matters, but first will consider some generalities about the current state of consulting.
doi:10.1037/a0035698 fatcat:lnrx2y2ubvfvxfde3n7emdnpmq