Alumni Profile - Michael Cotronea

Michael Cotronea, '08

All throughout graduate school, I kept thinking to myself, "Fredonia REALLY overly prepared me!". Through my experience at Fredonia, I had fallen in love with Psychology. After obtaining a bachelor’s degree from Fredonia, I chose to pursue the avenue of Industrial/Organizational psychology in graduate school. I got into I/O psychology because it is the great realm where psychology meets business, and to be honest, I was quite pleased with that decision as it's quite broad and applicable to many aspects of life / career. If you ask me, having a background in psychology and business is incredibly relevant in any and all aspects of work/life, and it gives you a great foundation for when the rubber hits the road.

I/O was appealing to me because I'm passionate about the study of self and psyche. Knowing yourself and the dynamics of others is incredibly helpful as it helps one to navigate through a lot of business-related endeavors and personal development efforts. Applying this body of knowledge of psychology to the work-world gives you an advantage because you're more aware of the different dynamics that come into play when working in a professional setting (politics, teams and individuals, systemic thinking and understanding processes, etc.).

I currently work as a Human Resources Consultant for an HR-outsourcing company in Amherst, NY. We do a lot of work related to HR best-practices for clients across WNY, related not only to HR compliance, but also to creating "employers of choice", and implementing best-practices so that companies can grow and create value in society. It's really great because I can devote my time and efforts to working with companies to develop their cultures. I like the industry for many reasons, but a main reason is because I get to utilize my background and education toward various strategic initiatives like researching intrinsic/extrinsic motivations, employee life cycle management i.e. cradle to grave, organizational development initiatives i.e. training and development, employee relations management, and structural enhancements to support a company's strategy and objectives.

If you're trying to tie aspects of I/O psychology to the tech industry, for example, or ANY industry for that matter, you'll find that although its a growing discipline still somewhat in its infancy, major national and international companies are looking for these kinds of professionals to help them go from good to great organizations. Whether you're applying strategic and systemic improvement efforts to a company to improve their overall efficiency/effectiveness, or ensuring employee satisfaction and contentment while growing the company's bottom line through investing in its most important asset (its people/workforce), you're bound to be successful if you apply yourself and are truly passionate about these kinds of things.