Dear Applicant:

Thank you for your interest in our masters, pre-doctoral, or or post-doctoral training programs in organization, individual, and consulting psychology.

DRI Consulting is committed to training the scientist-practitioner with an emphasis on incorporating data-based decisions into professional practice with organizations and individuals. Some primary purposes of the internship are to help you further professional development and competence providing consulting services in the following areas: individuals (coaching, counseling, and career assessment and development), organizational development, psychological assessment and feedback, and management and leadership development.  Across all domains, we work to provide ethical services.

It is our goal to provide high quality training for practitioners.  Our training program focuses on breadth and quality of service, and we provide an atmosphere where the intern can gain exposure to the many facets of functioning as a consulting psychologist while developing a personal style as a consultant.  Further information about training program accountabilities, responsibilities and goals follow.

We are particularly proud of the following advantages of our internship:

• Opportunity to take leadership roles in projects that significantly influence clients and our own company.
• Exposure to and involvement in all aspects of a for-profit consulting business.
• Exposure to and involvement in a culture that is cutting edge and extensive in its use of the internet and other technologies for the delivery and management of psychological services.

Why we do this (since few other firms do!)

• We are good at and committed to developing professionals within the profession.
• It is a recruiting and selection method to grow the firm.  We have a career path for you here and hope many of you stay with us (pre-doc, post-doc, consultant, senior consultant, manager, partner).
• Interns are a lower cost method of delivery high quality services.  We stay competitive with clients and can reinvest in the success of the firm and its training mission.

For complete applications instructions, see our "Selection Process" below.

Consulting Psychology is an old and well-respected practice with pre-professional roots in such roles as the advisors to the Court of Queens and Kings. Professionally, it was an early division of APA at the turn of the century. Historically, it has been a second or third career for older practicing psychologists. Recently, it is evolving into a first professional career for many new psychologists at any age of entry into the field.  

The work of a consulting psychologist is very rewarding and quite challenging. It allows you to use and hone your counseling, clinical and social psychological skills to meet the needs of leaders and entire populations of people. It is based on a positive psychology of development related to the work and non-work situations faced by individuals, groups, organizations and entire communities.

I hope that you will consider submitting your application.

Sincerely,

John P. Fennig, Ph.D., L.P.

Director of Training, member of the Education and Training Committee for the  Society of Consulting Psychology [APA Division 13]

Our internship experience is based on APA's Society of Consulting Psychologists' Principles for Training in Consulting Psychology.

Practicum/Intern Role Description

Scientist-Practitioner Model

The internship is designed to provide training for entry-level professional psychology-based consulting practice. The average age of a DRIC intern is in the mid to late 30's with a wide range from the 20's into the 50's.  We excel at providing a relevant, engaging and significant training experience - matched to your previous work and life experience.  We strive to help our trainees integrate data based decision-making into practice, and we define "science" broadly, valuing attention and responsiveness to data, whether the source is a journal or a specific consumer.

Because good science and practice are tied to theory, we strive to instill an appreciation for conceptual systems. We encourage our interns to experiment with and adopt theories that are consistent with their preferences and worldviews while prompting them to identify the conceptual basis on which they base their psychological consulting practice.

We value and support the importance of identifying and aligning with the positive in the work environments. Thus, a main theme of any intervention will include positive as well as problem areas. We pay particular attention to train interns to effectively maintain an emphasis on identifying the positive in any environment.

We attempt to model and provide opportunities for trainees to critically evaluate ideas and possible courses of action. An openness to ideas and differing philosophical stances within the field will enrich practice, and we encouragement our trainees to safely consider different theoretical orientations, as well as specific interventions guided by a scholarly data base.

A related, but separate overarching aim of the internship program, is to instill a commitment to ethical and relevant practice for diverse consumers of our services. As a firm and training program we strive to be inclusive, accepting, and affirming of the full range of human diversity. This commitment requires self-examination of our own values. As with other training goals, interns are expected to be active in their own growth process.

The training center’s goal is to provide high quality training for graduate students interested in individual, career and organizational psychology. The site holds itself to the highest standards, and strives to create an environment that is both comfortable and yet challenging for everyone, student and staff alike.

The goals of the training program are as follows:

Provision of Services

The largest proportion of time is spent providing client/consumer services. Interns gain experience and training in providing services to individuals, organizations, the development of managers, the development of leadership, psychological assessments, technology integration, ethical considerations and case consultation. Interns may also provide supervision to a practicum level student.

Individual Supervision

For individual supervision, interns have a primary supervisor and an adjunct supervisor. Interns will receive one-and-a-half hours of regularly scheduled, face-to-face, individual supervision with a Ph.D. psychologist. Interns will also spend an additional half-hour designed for supervision of supervision with a mentor supervisor. Interns are expected to be active participants in negotiating the goals and process of their supervision. The primary supervisor will be licensed in the state of Minnesota, and have supervision as an area of competence with the State Board of Psychology.

All client projects are team staffed for apprentice-like learning.  We meet daily when possible as an entire staff to discuss client projects and communicate progress/needs. 

Seminars/Continuing Education

Regularly scheduled continuing education workshops and other training experiences designed by DRI Consulting staff take place monthly. Workshops topics include assessment, program and consultation, supervision, group dynamics, career counseling theory, psychology in the workplace and ethics. Each doctoral intern will make one presentation to staff and other interns, on a topic agreed upon by both the intern and supervisor.

Support of Scholarly Inquiry

DRI Consulting provides resources for research. Two hours of the workweek are allocated for professional development; interns generally use this time to work on a client project requiring in-depth research. Alternatively, interns may propose another project such as poster or paper presentations at professional conferences. Each intern has a computer with current programs available as well as connection to the Internet, and networking within DRI Consulting in order to facilitate research interests.

Attendance at annual APA convention, as well as Division 13 conferences may be supported. Each intern will be encouraged to attend and participate in these professional venues.

Developmental Sequencing

While interns function quite autonomously, the experience sequence incorporates increasing complexity of tasks and greater independence within each task over the course of the year. The developmental sequencing is incorporated in several ways.

The internship begins with a two-week orientation program. During the first week, interns spend much of their time with the Director of Training and the preceding 13 month post-doctoral intern, working to get acquainted with site policies and procedures. Interns are also given information relevant to supervision. During the second week, the emphasis is on exposure to services provided by the firm, and staff associated with these services. 

During the next month, interns are paired with a consultant-on-duty or mentor who provides modeling, consultation, and supervision for the interns’ initial provision of services. For the next 3 months, mentors work with their assigned mentees in the delivery of individual, team, and organization development services. A half-hour of supervision time is provided weekly by the mentor.

Interns may provide supervision for practicum students during the third month on site. The task of balancing client concerns with responsibility for facilitating growth in the supervisee is a highly complex task. Thus, supervision is introduced after interns are familiar with DRI.

During the third month, programming is structured and prescribed. Throughout the remainder of the year, interns initiate and develop their own programs. During the final three months, interns contract to complete a project related to product or service development. Some have opted to develop brochures, programs, or organize resources relevant to programming topics. Additionally, interns have increasing influence in the seminar topics over the course of the year.

All interns assume significant leadership roles for internal DRIC and external client projects as soon as they are ready.

The interns client responsibilities progress from individual assessment and coaching to small team facilitation/consultation to organization-wide interventions.

Interns are systematically evaluated in all areas in which they work. Interns, in turn, evaluate their supervisors and the training program. This evaluation process, including both written and oral components, takes place two times per year. 

We meet monthly as a company in order to review our goals and activities. The supervisors and staff provide feedback to the intern (and the rest of us!) to help him/her and all of us to reach our performance and development goals.

Most importantly, our clients are a regular source of feedback on intern and DRIC staff success meeting their needs.  We collect formal written (web-based) evaluations and conduct follow-up interviews.  Results are communicated to the project team involved.

Pre and post-docs are a 50 hour per week minimum commitment for 12 months.  Additional time may be required for projects, learning and travel to clients and professional meetings.

Candidates must possess or be pursuing an advanced degree in I/O, counseling or clinical psychology. Our search committee will be reviewing applicants for evidence of growth and development from practical experiences.

Our clients are typically healthy, successful adults usually in significant leadership roles seeking to optimize their future or their organization’s future. Successful candidate for this position will have:

• The maturity to work with healthy, successful individuals
• An interest in psychology applied to issues of work and daily living
• Excellent communication skills, both verbal and written
• Skills and interest to work with individuals, small groups and large groups
• A systems orientation that looks at individuals in their work and personal environment
• Acceptance of profit as necessary and good for individuals and companies with an understanding of the economic context of situations in which we consult.
• Experience and/or aptitude measuring, assessing, analyzing and reporting personality and group psychological functioning.
• An investment in self-examination of one’s own values and willingness to grow in knowledge about individuals and groups in the work place.

Application Process

1. Interested applicants should send the following to Joe Wohkittel at joseph.wohkittel@mnsu.edu

   1. Letter describing interest in the masters practicum or pre- or post-doctoral training in consulting psychology

   - include start and stop dates, special needs by your program, personal training needs

   2. Curriculum Vitae

2. Joe will contact you to schedule an initial telephone conversation to explore our mutual interests and needs and timeframes.  Depending on the outcome of the call, he may invite you to submit a brief online application (See below).

3. Given a possible match, and only as invited by staff, please anticipate the following:

1. Provide three references, with their role (i.e. advisor), address, phone number, and e-mail addresses.

2. Provide a list of psychological assessments you have administered

3. Participate in a second interview by phone with staff

4. Complete the battery of tests for DRI Consulting employees and training applicants

5. Provide a copy of official graduate transcripts

6. Participate in a final Interview and presentation to staff