“Those who say theory and practice are two unrelated realms are fools in one and scoundrels in the other”, I came across this quote (from ‘Letters of Ayn Rand’) some time ago, and it reminded me of an issue that has taken up quite a bit of my psychological space over the last decade – that of integrating theory and practice in the domain of Human Resources (HR).
When I was doing my MBA in HR, there was no doubt in my mind that the theory and practice in the domain of HR, should be, and can be integrated. But, when I started working and watched ‘real’ HR professionals in action, I experienced a lot of cognitive dissonance. Most of the HR Professionals (especially, those who have taken their behaviour science education seriously), acted as if they had some sort of split-personality disorder. When they are in their Personality 1 (the dominant personality) they carry out their jobs without any application of their behaviour science knowledge and when they are in their...
