The design of technical, economic and organizational systems requires the consideration and knowledge of human characteristics and abilities, be it

• to master complex technologies, such as autonomous vehicles, robots or artificially intelligent systems,
• to lead an organization successfully, for example through healthy leadership and excellent management,
• successfully implement transformation processes, such as industrial transformation with regard to the energy transition or the UN Sustainable Development Goals,
• or making systems resilient and reliable, such as aviation, rail transport or the process industry, circular economy and waste management.

Industrial and organizational psychology imparts this knowledge. It is the scientific discipline that focuses on people and ensures the humane design of technical, organizational and social systems.

The department is represented across all faculties at the University of Kassel. In addition to its membership in Department 15 Mechanical Engineering, it also has secondary memberships in Department 16 Electrical Engineering, Department 07 Economics, Department 01 Human Sciences and the Kassel Institute for Sustainability (KIS). As a result, the department is represented in the respective degree courses and offers its research and teaching across departments:

• In the Departments of Mechanical and Electrical Engineering, in order to impart this knowledge to engineering students, as engineers design and build the technical systems that people will later have to operate.
• In the Department of Economics, in order to incorporate this knowledge into the courses of study for the design of economic processes and also in the area of vocational training and further education, because economists plan organizational processes or have to adapt them to current economic conditions and take into account psychological aspects of change management.
• In the Department of Human Sciencesas a fixed element of the Psychology course with regard to work and organizational psychology.
• At the Kassel Institute for Sustainability (KIS) in order to effectively shape transformation processes with regard to sustainability, as sustainability goals must ultimately be implemented by people.

The field of work and organizational psychology is organized in a wide variety of professional associations for issues relating to the humane design of work and systems. These include

• the Society for Occupational Science (GfA),
• the Society for the Psychology of Occupational Safety and Health (PASIG),
• the German Society for Psychology (DGP) in the chapters of engineering psychology, environmental psychology and organizational psychology,
• the Association of German Engineers (VDI) for the human reliability, safety and resilience of systems,
• the German Working Group for Repository Research (DAEF) for the transdisciplinary organization of sustainability processes in waste management.