I am still here
To all of you that have sent me an email lately; don’t worry, this blog is here to stay. In fact, as soon as I complete some extra assignments over the next two weeks you will see me post again on a more regular basis…. and i might even attempt finishing designing this blog 
Thanks again, guys, for your interest and support
Omar
A comment on Creativity and Innovation
In today’s business environment, competitive advantage becomes less and less about having unique products and/or suppliers. Rather, competitive advantage is the ability to identify and capitalise on information. Understanding what the customer wants and acting on it before anyone else, or learning a smarter way of utilising web 2.0 technology before the competitors. The two main keywords here are learning and development – that is the organisation’s capacity to learn, and the organisation’s capacity to use that learning.
There are many different concepts, theories and practices that are thought to explain parts of how to either increase the organisation’s capacity to learn, or how to use learning into developing new products or processes. We can refer to the Learning Orgainzation, Organisation Learning, Knowledge Management and so on. Two of the more well known concepts for the public are creativity and innovation, to such extent that we often refer to these as management fads. What is for certain is that there is a massive industry of consultants built around creativity and innovation – with a few serious and credible entities (e.g. Edward De Bono and IWP), but with the majority presenting quick fixes, hence becoming fads.
Now this is not going to be a post where I moan about the abundance of self proclaimed management gurus out there, don’t worry. But even amongs the more credible professionals out there, there is not always a clear cut definition and distinction between creativity and innovation. Based on my own research and experience, it is useful to view creativity as mental processes and behaviours that the individual engages in, whereas innovation is often understood to be the structures and processes at work that facilitate creativty. The “management gurus” do have one thing right, though. Everyone can be creative. However, not everyone can express it effectively, and even fewer are able to implement creative ideas. Rather than focusing on whether a person is creative or not, we need to address whether the environment, be it the personal sphere or within an organisation, allows for creativity to take place! It is not enough to hire creative people if your organisation doesn’t have processes and structures conducive and supportive for creativity to take place in the first place.
Why psychologists need to understand research
From time to time I get asked by psychology students I lecture why they need to learn about research and statistics, as after all “I am studying psychology because I want to help people.”
The answer is threefold:
1. We need to legitimise Psychology as a proper profession. Maybe you have a friend who is the source of all knowledge, who can cite matching proverbs whenever you offer some insights you gained from your psychology classes. In fact, he might even be so cheeky and say “I could have told you that without studying psychology”. Proverbs are interesting as they often describe a situation rather accurately. But it is also interesting to note that proverbs are often contradicting each other, eg “The more, the merrier” vs “Two’s company; three’s a crowd”. In fact, a funny exercise is to ask him which of these two is the right one, and you would probably see him struggling. However, with the help of research we would learn when the first proverb applies and when its opposite is true, and this would separate you from your friend.
2. We need to replicate findings from other studies. Imagine that there are two competing Burger restaurants; Big Joe’s and Big Moe’s. Big Joe’s then publishes a study saying that their hamburgers are the best in the neighborhood. Now, I would hope that the owners of Big Moe’s would challenge that by asking for details on how the research was conducted. Once we know this the next step would actually be to copy the same steps to see if we would get the same results. This is called replication. One reason to do so is to verify that the results found in a particular study would be found again should we do the study again. This is a way of ensuring that the results really are trustworthy or genuine. This is especially important if you have research done in a different country or culture, as what goes or is found in for instance in USA might not be applicable in China.
3. Finally, a part of doing research is actually to communicate your findings. Researchers have to follow an agreed structure when it comes to how to write about their research and their findings. Since this structure is standardised, it is easier to communicate the findings to interested people all over the world, ensuring that those who would be interested in the study would get to know the results. New groundbreaking results on how to treat people with schizophrenia would for instance be shared across the world and not just known to those conducting the research. By sharing the results we would also avoid spending resources on reinventing the wheel over and over again.
As you can see, part of your success in psychology depends on your ability to understand and evaluate the research done in psychology. But the same can be said about any profession, especially in the business context – something I will get back to later.
What is Research
Knowledge and information have always been seen as resource that could change the course of a war, generate great fortunes, lead to important development in medicine and so on. It is easy to take for granted the access to information and knowledge we have today in the age of Internet and computers. But while we now have access to knowledge like never before, one thing still remains: this knowledge must come from somewhere – from research.
You may think of research as something alien and strict, something that only men and women wearing white lab coats would deal with. But soon you will realise that you yourself are an active researcher. You may surf on the Internet for that great recipe that will improve your reputation as a waffle maker, or maybe you are reading computer magazines on order to know which graphic card is the better one for the latest installment of World of Warcraft. In fact, never have information and knowledge been easier to access 24/7. In many ways we can literally say that research is everywhere around us, and that understanding research methods will help you understand how we came to know things we accept as facts.
We know that doing cardio (jogging, rowing etc) regularly reduces the chance of cardiovascular heart diseases. We also know that a proper diet is important for child development, and that alcohol reduces your ability to drive safely. We may also read in the newspaper that Big Joe’s hamburgers are better than the hamburgers from Big Moe’s. But how do we know these things?
We wouldn’t know, unless someone actually conducted a study and found these findings. But that does not necessarily mean that you agree with the stated “facts”. Most of us would probably agree with the statements about cardio and the value of proper nutrition, but maybe disagree when it comes to the hamburgers. We would like to know just how the researchers found this result. Maybe they had interviewed only people who just came out of Big Joe’s. The fact that the participants of the study already had gone to Big Joe’s in the first place, could mean that they had a preference for Big Joe’s. Thus this result can hardly be surprising or fair?
These types of questions put the light on the methods the researchers used when they investigated something. And I will later show that there are a variety of techniques that people use when studying a given phenomenon, and that good research methods don’t just happen. Rather great effort is needed in order to design research to give maximum accuracy.
Psychological testing and recruitment
I was once asked whether psychological testing (cognitive/aptitude/intelligence/personality tests) is of any use for recruitment purposes. Seeing the popularity of these measures, the easy answer is yes, psychological testing or evaluation has its merits. But it depends on the purpose behind its use.
In general I would say
- The more candidates the more cost effective it becomes to use psychometric measures.
- Measures of GMA (general mental ability) will indicate the ability to learn. This is very important in today’s rapid developing and changing world, where the abilities to change and relearn are one of the greatest assets for any employee and business. There are however other indicators of ability to learn, thus one could argue whether the precision of psychometric tools are cost effective
- There are functions where certain cognitive skills are very important, e.g. spatial reasoning, numerical skills etc… in these situations, the use of psychometric testing is very cost effective.
- Measures of personality will give you a good indication of typical behaviours. That is, it will give you a good indication of how the person typically would react in different situations. However, you could argue that there not just one ideal personality profile, and therefore start questioning the cost effectiveness of using these.
- The best predictor of future behaviour is past behaviour. This is not so easily captured in psychometric tools.
Thus I would argue that psychometric tools certainly add precision to any recruitment process, but that there are questions regarding their cost effectiveness, which is higher the more candidates you have. I certainly would not rely on them alone. That being said, if used properly they add value in other areas as well – they can help a persons development, becoming an even better employee…
