Organizational Psychology

The purpose of this paper is to describe the history and methodology of the so-called “industrial” period of implementation of the Action Research Method (ARM). Employment of this method allows the researcher to solve a significant practical task and to make a contribution to science at the same time. Industrial period originated from the “field experiments” (Harwood studies), carried out in the K. Lewin’s group in US in the 1940s. The core idea of these research projects was “put the knowledge from the laboratory into real life”. Five projects were aimed at the analysis of group processes, the effects of group decision-making, the building of self-management systems, the training of line managers. The continuation of the industrial period was research projects carried out by TavistockInstitute of Human relations (UK). One of these projects (Glasier Project) was aimed at the analysis of group relations at all hierarchical levels in the private engineering company. Second, Haighmoor Project was aimed at the exploration of implementation process of innovative mining technology, allowing to reach significant growth of productivity in the coal industry without additional investments. Another notable research project of this period was the Ahmedabad (India), during which has been successfully carried out the transition from the conveyor to the production through self-managed work teams. For a long time, the center of the Action Research method was the Tavistock Institute in London. During the implementation of projects in the coal, metal and textile industry has been created and tested the concept and methodology of the ARM. The end of the twentieth century was marked by the expansion of geography and areas of the ARM application. Number of studies and projects applying the ARM methodology grew both in the UK and continental Europe as well as in the US, Canada and Australia.There was significant growth of research in different industries in those countries where has launcheda powerful movement for improving the quality of working life (Germany, Austria and the Benelux countries). However, in the beginning of the XXI century there has been an increase of ARM projects in education and medicine, and a decrease of traditional industrial ARM projects.