Mary Parker Follet (1868-1933) was a pioneering psychologist in the theories of leadership, negotiation, power and conflict. She also did several works on democracy and is known as the mother of “management” or modern management.

In this article we will see a brief biography of Mary Parker Follet , whose life allows us to establish a double rupture: on the one hand to break the myth that psychology has been made without the participation of women, and on the other hand, that of industrial relations and political management made also only by men.

Biography of Mary Parker Follet: Pioneer in Organizational Psychology

Mary Parket Follet was born in 1868 into a Protestant family in Massachusetts, USA. At the age of 12 she began her academic training at the Thayer Academy, a space that had just opened up to women but that had been built with the aim of promoting education primarily for men.

Influenced by her teacher and friend Anna Bouton Thompson, Parker Follet developed a special interest in the study and application of scientific methods in research. At the same time, she built her own philosophy on the principles that companies should follow in the social situation of the moment.

Through these principles he paid special attention to issues such as seeking the welfare of workers, valuing both individual and collective efforts, and encouraging teamwork.

To this day, the latter seems almost obvious, although not always taken into consideration. However, around the rise of Taylorism (the division of tasks in the production process, which results in the isolation of workers), together with the Fordist assembly lines applied in the organizations (prioritizing the specialization of workers and assembly lines that allow producing more in less time), Mary Parker’s theories and the reformulation she made of Taylorism itself were very innovative.

Education at Radcliffe College

Mary Parker Follet was formed in the “Annex” of Harvard University (later Radcliffe College), which was a space created by the same university and intended for women students, who were not seen as capable of receiving official academic recognition . What they did receive, however, were classes with the same professors that educated the men. In this context, Mary Parker met, among other intellectuals, William James, a psychologist and philosopher who was a great influence on pragmatism and applied psychology.

The latter sought to give psychology a practical application for life and for problem solving , which was especially well received in the area of business and in the management of industries, and served as a great influence for Mary Parker’s theories.

Community intervention and interdisciplinarity

Many women, despite having been trained as researchers and scientists, found more and better opportunities for professional development in applied psychology. This was so because the spaces where experimental psychology was performed were reserved for men, which made them hostile environments as well. This process had among its consequences that of gradually associating applied psychology with feminine values , later discredited before other disciplines associated with masculine values and considered “more scientific”.

Starting in 1900, and for 25 years, Mary Parker Follet did community work in social centers in Boston, among other places she participated in the Roxbury Debate Club, a place where political education was given to young people around an important context of marginalization for the immigrant population .

Mary PArker Follet’s thought was fundamentally interdisciplinary, through which she managed to integrate and dialogue with different currents, both from psychology and from sociology and philosophy. From this she was able to develop many innovative works not only as an organizational psychologist, but also in theories about democracy . The latter allowed her to act as an important advisor to social centres as well as to economists, politicians and businessmen. Nevertheless, and in view of the narrowness of the most positivist psychology, this interdisciplinary nature also generates different difficulties to be considered or recognized as a “psychologist”.

Main works

The theories developed by Mary Parker Follet have been fundamental in establishing several of the principles of modern management . Among other things, her theories differentiated between power “with” and power “over”; participation and influence in groups; and the integrative approach to negotiation, all of which were later taken up by a large part of organizational theory.

In very broad terms we will develop a small part of Mary Parker Follet’s works.

1. Power and influence in politics

In the same context of Radcliffe College, Mary Parker Follett was trained in history and political science together with Albert Bushnell Hart, from whom she took great knowledge for the development of scientific research. She graduated summa cum laude from Radcliffe and wrote a thesis that was even praised by the former president of the United States, Theodore Roosevelt, who considered Mary Parker Foller’s analytical work on the rhetorical strategies of the US Congress to be valuable.

In this work, he made a meticulous study of the legislative process and the effective forms of power and influence, having made records of the sessions, as well as a collection of documents and personal interviews with the presidents of the U.S. House of Representatives. The fruit of this work is the book entitled The Speaker of the House of Representatives (translated as The Speaker of Congress).

2. The integration process

In another of his books, The New State: Group Organization, which was the result of his experience and community work, Parker Follet advocated the creation of an “inclusive process” that would be able to sustain democratic government outside of bureaucratic dynamics.

He also argued that the separation between the individual and society is only a fiction, and that it is therefore necessary to study “groups” and not “masses”, and to try to integrate the difference. She sustained in this way a conception of “the political thing” that also involves the personal thing , reason why she can be considered one of the precursors of the most contemporary feminist political philosophies (Domínguez & García, 2005).

3. The creative experience

Creative Experience, dating back to 1924, is another of his main ones. In this one, he understands the “creative experience” as the form of participation that puts its effort in the creation, where it is also fundamental the meeting and the confrontation of different interests. Among other things, Follett explains that behaviour is not a relationship of a “subject” acting on an “object” or visceversa (an idea that he in fact considers necessary to abandon), but rather a set of activities that meet and interrelate .

From there, he analyzed the processes of social influence, and criticized the sharp separation between “thinking” and “doing” applied to the processes of verification of hypotheses. This process is frequently ignored when considering that the very posing of the hypothesis already generates an influence on its verification. He also questioned the linear processes of problem solving proposed by the school of pragmatism.

4. Conflict resolution

Domínguez and García (2005) identify two key elements that articulate Follet’s discourse on conflict resolution and that represented a new guideline for the world of organizations: on the one hand, an interactionist concept of conflict, and on the other, a proposal for conflict management through integration .

Thus, the integration processes proposed by Parker Follet, together with the distinction established between “power-with” and “power-over”, are two of the most relevant antecedents in different theories applied to the contemporary organizational world, for example the “win-win” perspective of conflict resolution or the importance of recognizing and valuing diversity.

Bibliographic references:

  • Balaguer, À. (2014). History of Women in Psychology; Mary Parker Follet. University of the Balearic Islands. Retrieved 21 June 2018. Available at http://dspace.uib.es/xmlui/bitstream/handle/11201/1009/Balaguer_Planas_Agueda_TFG.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y
  • Dominguez, R. & García, S. (2005) Constructive conflict and integration in the work of MAry Parker Follet. Athenea Digital, 7: 1-28.
  • García Dauder, S. (2005). Psychology and Feminism. History of women pioneers of psychology. Madrid: Narcea