Duties and responsibilities
An orgnizational development consultants is responsible for designing and guiding restructuring activities, which aim to increase the efficiency of an organization and align department activities with organizational goals. Their typical duties and responsibilities include:
- Analyzing the organizations current culture and structure and identifying areas for improvement, in which they will base their programs on
- Organizational development consultants will work closely with organizational leaders and advise and guide them on how to make changes and grow. Organizational development consultants will have to present their ideas and plans to company executives
- Organizational development consultants will be responsible for training current employees on the new methods and programs they introduce. This can be done either one-on-one or in group sessions
- Supporting organizations when they are hiring new candidates for either new positions or key positions. Organizational development consultants are likely to be on the hiring panel
- Organizational development consultants must measure the impact of their training, development and/or restructuring programs. This helps them to keep designing better programs and helping more businesses
Qualifications
To become an organizational development consultant, you will need an undergraduate degree in psychology, or a related field. You will then need a masters degree in industrial, organizational or occupational psychology. You will then need relevant work experience in the field in things such as training, cultural development or organizational change and restructuring. This will give you the knowledge and skills you need to apply effective organizational development strategies.
Skills and relevant work experience
- Analytical thinking, as they will need to analyze information to determine areas for business development
- Research skills will also be highly beneficial as organizational development consultants will have to research companies they are working with, keep up with industry trends and apply scientific research to create effective development strategies
- Strong leadership skills are essential as an organizational development consultant will need to coordinate different teams and departments throughout the company
- Excellent written and verbal communication skills are needed to be an organizational development consultant as you will work closely with employees and executives and will have to produce precise and understandable documentation
Hours
As organizational development consultants will spend a lot of their time working face to face with businesses, you can expect to work around 40 hours per week in normal business hours (Monday to Friday, 9am to 5pm). However, you may have to spend some additional hours in the mornings or evenings prepping material and presentations.
Salary
The Bureau of Labour Statistics (BLS) does not obtained statistics for the salary or predicted growth of 0rganizational development consultants specifically. However, those in very similar positions, such as training and development consultants, earn a median annual salary of $60,360, with the top 10% each more than $102,340 per year and the lowest 10% each less than $33,150.
As most organizational development consultants will work on a freelance or contractual basis, there is likely to be significant variation in their salary.
Progression
The Bureau of Labour Statistics has predicted an 11% employment growth by 2026 for careers similar to organizational development consultants (e.g., training and development consultants). As more and more businesses are realising the competitive advantage of continuous development, it is likely that organizational development consultants will continue to be in high demand for the coming years.
There is also opportunities to specialize in a specific area of organizational development, such as training, recruitment or company culture.