Consulting in business psychology

Almanac of the Fourth Scientific and Practical Conference "Business Psychology: Theory and Practice" November 16-19, 2017

Consulting is the most common sphere of application of the competences of business psychologists. Therefore, we could not ignore this topic in the conference program. Consulting was presented both in the keynote presentations of speakers in Plenary session  and during parallel sessions. The inevitability of changes in consulting activity was highlighted in this both formats.The trends in the consulting industry and the role of business psychology in its development were widely discussed.
During keynote speeches, various aspects of the organization and technologies of consulting were presented in the reports:
- Stephen Armstrong focused his speech on the professional development of the consultant. The speaker paid special attention to the balance of psychological and sectoral (depending on specialization) knowledge and skills of the consultant. Stephen connects the consultant's success with the prevalence of psychological knowledge, but notes that  they may not be enough in some consulting projects that require technical, or other industry expertise.
- Mikhail Ivanov in his speech focused on the trends that characterize the current state of consulting. The speaker noted that the number of international projects is increasing, the requirements to the qualifications of employees and consultants have increased significantly, and also, small business has become the object of work of consultants.
In the future, many aspects of the consultant's activity can be automated, however, according to Mikhail Ivanov, the dialogue between the consultant and the client will remain. And this is the basis of the profession.
- Takhir Bazarov presented his vision of the  business psychology's respond to the permanent crisis.
The speed of change, trends in the consulting industry and changes in the external environment set the image of a business psychologist. Now it is an expert who is able to solve problems, initiate projects and motivate people. He has the image of the final result of his own activity and can set the criteria for evaluating this result. Business psychologist is able to  change independently the content of this activity and bear responsibility for it.Tahir noted that cooperation is now one of the most important components of success. The second component can be called the ability to respond to changes and flexibility in relation to the own plans.
In the parallel session, a discussion of the paradigm of business psychological counseling as an approach to the integrated development of the organization was held.
The approach was developed in the Master's programme "Psychology in Business", and was presented by Alexander Yeliseyenko. The authors of the approach are based on the fact that the role of the consultant- business psychologist is to generate value by organizing uncertainty in the external and internal business environment. To achieve this goal, no one paradigm, or method, can be used. It is important to be able to combine heterogeneous approaches in order to achieve success in a situation of high uncertainty and complexity.
The presentation of the concept caused great discussions. However, it is important to note that this is the first presentation of the original business-psychological understanding of consulting and development of the organization.