What is use of industrial psychology for engineers?

Making money for cliché-spouting management-consultants?

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Obviously if you are recruiting staff or have supervisory responsibilities, you need to be able to deal with people sensitively and treat them with respect; but otherwise it's their abilities and willingness to carry out the work that matter. Obviously too, how you treat your staff and their union will affect their performance. You hardly need to be a psychologist to know and do that - even less so, a cod-psychologist, because your shop-floor staff will see through that pretension straight away. They might not have your fancy qualifications, but they are not naïve.

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From experience, the lower their rank, the less impressed they are by managerial flannel and fads; and the older they are the more flannel and fads they have seen come and go. While they might not have the nerve to say anything, they will regard you as bonkers at best and wasting company money at worst. They look up to managers who respect them, understand the work itself and demonstrate genuine ability to win contracts and reward good staff with decent pay & conditions; not ones who dissipate their energy and company cash in glossy brochures and daft initiatives.

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Unfortunately, modern business management all too easily forgets its real role and follows fads with the zeal of fashion-conscious teenagers; whether those fads are alleged "quality" initiatives, custom-made "corporate typefaces" for the company computers, or trying to fit staff-members to high-falutin' theories!