The I/O Consultant Advice and Insights for Building a Successful Career

This innovative volume offers basic guidance on the fundamentals of consulting with authoritative essays by leaders in the field.

Consulting is one of the fastest growing occupations in the United States. This innovative volume offers basic guidance on the fundamentals of consulting with authoritative essays by leaders in the field. The editors and their colleagues guide their readers through a career continuum, beginning with learning about potential employers to creating and maintaining a business and watching it grow and thrive.

In chapters that combine a strong grounding in contemporary I/O research with personal accounts of their career journeys and day-to-day activities, the contributors bring the basic principles conveyed by Hedge and Borman to life. Readers hear of the extraordinary breadth of consulting experiences—in the private and public sectors, the military, and academia. The authors consider such topics as strategic planning, points of entry into the field, ethics and networking, and the advantages and disadvantages of joining a large firm versus starting up one's own consulting practice.

Jerry W. Hedge has been involved in human resource management research and application for almost 30 years. He has worked in both public and private organizations, and has been a principal in several small businesses. He is currently an independent consultant. Over the course of his career he has written more than 150 books, book chapters, journal articles, technical reports, and conference presentations. Recent books include The Aging Workforce and Implementing Organizational Interventions. Dr. Hedge is a fellow of the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology and the American Psychological Association. He received his Ph.D. in Industrial/Organizational Psychology from Old Dominion University.
 
Walter C. Borman received his Ph.D. in Industrial/Organizational Psychology from the University of California (Berkeley). He is currently CEO of Personnel Decisions Research Institutes and is Professor of Industrial-Organizational Psychology at the University of South Florida. He is a Fellow of the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology, and in 1994–95 served as President of the Society. He is currently editor of Human Performance. Finally, he was the recipient of the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology's Distinguished Scientific Contributions Award for 2003 and the M. Scott Myers Award for Applied Research in the Workplace for 2000, 2002, and 2004.