Chapter 3

(TEXTBOOK CHAPTER 4)

Job Analysis
and Job Design

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 Learning Outcomes
After studying this chapter, you should be able to:

⚫ Job analysis process

⚫ Job analysis methods
⚫ Job design in the workplace

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 Introduction
⚫ Job – An activity people do for which they get
paid, particularly as part of the trade or
occupation they occupy
⚫ Workflow analysis – Helps a firm determine the
best processes, types, and mix of jobs, and how
they should ideally be organized to execute the
firm’s mission

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4.1 What Is a Job Analysis and How Does
It Affect Human Resources Management?
⚫ Job analysis – The process of obtaining information
about a job by determining its duties, tasks, or activities
⚫ Its basic responsibilities
⚫ The behaviors of the people who do it
⚫ The skills of the people who do it
⚫ The physical and mental requirements of the people who do it
⚫ A job analysis should also outline:
⚫ The tools needed to do the job
⚫ The environment and times at which it needs to be done
⚫ With whom it needs to be done
⚫ The outcome or performance level it should produce

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 Figure 4.1: Job Analysis: The
Cornerstone of HRM Functions

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4.1a Major Parts of the Job Analysis
⚫ Job description – A statement of the tasks,
duties, and responsibilities of a job to be
performed
⚫ Job specifications – A statement of the specific
knowledge, skills, and abilities of a person who
is to perform a job needs
⚫ Knowledge – What you know
⚫ Skills – Things you have learned to do
⚫ Abilities – Your innate aptitudes
⚫ Other attributes – Your personality, values, and so on

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Watch the video

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 4.2 Methods of
Job Analysis Information
⚫ Interviews
⚫ Questionnaires
⚫ Observation
⚫ Diaries

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qy09Ls6NqEo

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Figure 4.2: The Job Analysis Process

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 4.2c Parts of a Job Description
(slide 1 of 2)

⚫ Most job descriptions contain at least three parts:

1. Job title
⚫ Provides status to the employee
⚫ Provides an indication of what the duties of the job entail
⚫ Indicates the level of the job in the organization
2. Job identification section
⚫ Contains administration information such as a numerical code for the
job, to whom the jobholder reports, and wage information
⚫ Contains a “Purpose” statement which distinguishes the job from
other jobs in the organization
3. Job duties section
⚫ Typically arranged in order of their importance and sometimes
indicate the percentage of time devoted to each duty

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 4.2c Parts of a Job Description
(slide 2 of 2)

⚫ If the job specification is not prepared as a

separate document, it is usually stated in the
concluding section of the job description.
⚫ Covers two areas of qualifications:
1. The skills required to perform the job
⚫ Include the education, experience, and specialized training the job
requires, and the personal traits or abilities and manual dexterities it
requires
2. The job’s physical demands
⚫ Refer to how much walking, standing, reaching, lifting, bending, or
talking must be done on the job

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D2_U_vsfr6I

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 4.3 Job Design (slide 1 of 2)
⚫ Job design – An outgrowth of job analysis that
improves jobs through technological and human
considerations in order to enhance organization
efficiency and employee job satisfaction

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 Figure 4.5: Top-Down versus
Bottom-Up Job Design Approaches

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 4.3 Job Design (slide 2 of 2)
⚫ Industrial engineering – A field of study
concerned with analyzing work methods and
establishing time standards
⚫ Determines which, if any, elements of work can be
modified, combined, rearranged, or eliminated to
reduce the time needed to complete the work cycle
⚫ Time standards are then established by recording the
time required to complete each element in the work
cycle, using a stopwatch or work-sampling technique.

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 4.3a Ergonomics
⚫ Ergonomics – The process of studying and
designing easy-to-use equipment and systems
so the physical well-being of employees isn’t
compromised and work gets done more
efficiently

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 4.3b Enrichment (slide 1 of 5)
⚫ Job enrichment – Enhancing a job by adding
more meaningful tasks and duties to make the
work more rewarding or satisfying
⚫ Goal:
⚫ To enrich a job so that it is intrinsically motivating to employees
versus extrinsically motivating
⚫ Extrinsic motivators are external rewards such as money and
bonuses.

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 4.3b Enrichment (slide 2 of 5)
⚫ Job characteristics model – A job design
theory that purports that three psychological
states (experiencing meaningfulness of the work
performed, responsibility for work outcomes, and
knowing the results of the work performed) result
in a jobholder’s improved work performance,
internal motivation, and lower absenteeism and
turnover

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 4.3b Enrichment (slide 3 of 5)
⚫ Five core job dimensions produce the three psychological states:
1. Skill variety – The degree to which a job includes a variety of
activities, which demand the use of a number of different skills and
talents by the jobholder
2. Task identity – The degree to which a jobholder is able to complete a
whole and identifiable piece of work—that is, do a job from beginning
to end with a visible outcome
3. Task significance – The degree to which a job has a substantial
impact on the lives or work of other people in one’s organization or
elsewhere
4. Autonomy – The degree to which the job provides a person the
freedom and discretion to schedule his or her work and determine
how to do it
5. Feedback – The degree to which a person is given direct and clear
information about the effectiveness of his or her job performance

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Figure 4.6: Job Characteristics Model

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 4.3b Enrichment (slide 4 of 5)
⚫ Other techniques to enrich jobs include job
enlargement and job rotation.
⚫ Job enlargement – The process of adding a greater
variety of tasks to a job
⚫ Job rotation – The process whereby employees
rotate in and out of different jobs

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NTeUXTJMT9I

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 4.3b Enrichment (slide 5 of 5)
Empowerment
⚫ Employee empowerment – Giving employees the power to initiate
change, thereby encouraging them to take charge of what they do
⚫ Succeeds when organization’s culture is open and receptive to change
⚫ Must have the support of an organization’s senior managers
⚫ Workplace democracy – The utilization of democratic principles such
as voting and debate to give employees more say on how an
organization is run and the direction it will take
⚫ Job crafting – A naturally occurring phenomenon whereby
employees mold their tasks to fit their individual strengths, passions,
and motives better
⚫ Employee engagement – A situation in which workers are
enthusiastic and immersed in their work to the degree that it
improves the performance of their companies
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 4.4 Employee Teams and
Flexible Work Schedules
⚫ Increasingly, teams are how work gets done in
organizations.
⚫ Companies are seeing advantages of tinkering
with and redesigning work schedules to make
them more flexible, and adding flexibility to
where employees can work.

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 4.4a Employee Teams (slide 1 of 3)
⚫ Employee team – A group of employees working
together toward a common purpose, in which members
have complementary skills, members’ work is mutually
dependent, and the group has discretion over tasks
performed
⚫ Employees are closest to the work that’s actually being
done in an organization.
⚫ Thus, they are often in a better position to see how the work can
be done better.
⚫ Teamwork can result in synergy.
⚫ Synergy occurs when the interaction and outcome of team
members is greater than the sum of their individual efforts.

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Figure 4.7: Synergistic
Team Characteristics

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Figure 4.8: Forms of Employee
Teams

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 4.4a Employee Teams (slide 2 of 3)
⚫ Typical team functions:
⚫ Setting work schedules
⚫ Dealing directly with external customers
⚫ Training team members
⚫ Setting performance targets
⚫ Budgeting
⚫ Inventory management
⚫ Purchasing equipment or services
⚫ Dejobbing – Refers to a process of structuring
organizations not around jobs but around projects that
are constantly changing

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 4.4a Employee Teams (slide 3 of 3)
Facilitating Teams
⚫ The following characteristics have been identified with
successful teams:
⚫ A commitment to shared goals and objectives
⚫ Motivated and energetic team members
⚫ Open and honest communication
⚫ Shared leadership
⚫ Clear role assignments
⚫ A climate of cooperation, collaboration, trust, and accountability
⚫ The recognition of conflict and its positive resolution

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 4.4b Flexible Work Schedules
⚫ The more common flexible work schedules are flextime, the
compressed workweek, job sharing, and telecommuting.
⚫ Flextime – Flexible working hours that give employees the option of
choosing daily starting and quitting times, provided that they work a set
number of hours per day or week
⚫ A compressed workweek is one in which the number of days in the
workweek is shortened by lengthening the number of hours worked per
day (e.g., 10 hours a day for 4 days a week).
⚫ Job sharing – An arrangement whereby two part-time employees do a
job normally held by one full-time employee
⚫ Telecommuting – The use of personal computers, networks, and
other communications technology to do work in the home that is
traditionally done in the workplace

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 Figure 4.9: Keys for
Successful Telecommuting

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QIPq3OMv6j8

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