How ChatGPT

Can and Can’t

Help Managers
Design Better Job
Roles
Many leaders don’t know how to design healthy, productive
roles. ChatGPT proves effective here, when used wisely.

Fangfang Zhang
Sharon K. Parker

• Reprint #65215 • sloanreview.mit.edu


How ChatGPT Can and Can’t
Help Managers Design Better
Job Roles
Fangfang Zhang and Sharon K. Parker
Many leaders don’t know how to design healthy, productive roles.
ChatGPT proves effective here, when used wisely.
Carolyn Geason-Beissel/MIT SMR | Getty Images
Today’s leaders are pushing to increase employee
engagement and decrease turnover but face a harsh reality:
widespread employee burnout. To fight it, managers need
to offer employees more healthy and meaningful work. In
surveys conducted in the United States by Gallup in 2022,
40% of employees reported that their job had a negative
impact on their mental health, and around 30% said they
frequently experience burnout. Moreover, U.S. employee
engagement hit a seven-year low, with only 32% of workers
polled by Gallup saying they were engaged and 17% saying
they were actively disengaged in 2022. 1 Globally,
employees’ lack of engagement has been estimated to cost
employers $7.8 trillion — equivalent to 11% of the global
gross domestic product. 2
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The root causes of disengagement and work stress often lie
in how an organization has designed people’s jobs. Decades
of extensive research consistently link poor work design with
negative employee outcomes, including mental strain, high
turnover, job dissatisfaction, decreased productivity, and
impaired learning. 3 Many companies are now striving to
do better.
Unfortunately, our research indicates that many
managers lack the necessary understanding to design
high-quality jobs. This is where artificial intelligence
technologies such as ChatGPT could play a key role, by
bridging the manager knowledge gap and helping design
high-quality work that benefits both employees and
organizations. However, it is important for managers to
first understand the pros and cons of using ChatGPT for
work design. Let’s explore some takeaways for managers
that our research has revealed.
Managerial Challenges:
Mundane and Unfulfilling
Jobs
What factors determine whether a job is high quality? The
SMART work design model, a framework created by Sharon

K. Parker, defines high-quality work as work that is
stimulating (jobs with task variety and a chance to develop
new skills), incorporates mastery (such as role clarity and
job feedback), is agentic (such as job autonomy and change
participation), is relational (where social support and
positive teamwork are available), and is tolerable (with
manageable work hours and reasonable levels of time
pressure). 4
Despite the benefits of well-designed jobs, poorly designed
ones are still prevalent. According to the Gallup 2019 Great
Jobs Survey, only 40% of employed Americans are engaged
in jobs that possess SMART characteristics. 5 On the other
hand, 16% find themselves in jobs that lack essential SMART
characteristics, and 44% have jobs that possess only some
satisfactory SMART attributes. 6
A lack of knowledge among today’s managers about job
design might explain such findings. A study we recently
conducted explored how people design jobs for others. 7
Participants in an online simulation (Simulation 1) were
asked to design an administrative job role. The half-time
job was made up entirely of four photocopying and filing
tasks. Participants were asked to make the job full time by
selecting four additional tasks from a list of 11, including
five repetitive photocopying and filing tasks and six more-
meaningful and interesting tasks, such as greeting visitors or
helping colleagues arrange meetings.
Participants were scored on a 0 to 4 range, with a higher
score indicating the creation of a more stimulating work
design. Almost half (45%) of university-level management
students and professionals/managers working in human
services industries tended to incorporate repetitive and
monotonous work, demonstrating a knowledge gap when it
comes to quality work design.
In a second simulation (Simulation 2), participants were
asked to act like a manager and solve workforce problems
in four scenarios. In each scenario, the job role design was
clearly poor. To fix the problems, participants rated how
likely they were to adopt strategies from a list that included
both “fixing the worker” approaches, which attributed
problems to the employee, and “fixing the poor work design”
approaches, which acknowledged the poor-quality job
design.
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For example, in one scenario, a warehouse worker
consistently failed to meet 50% of the timed deadlines in
gathering products and delivering them to dispatch —
despite frequently running to pick up goods. While the
majority of participants focused on choices that improved
the work design (for example, “Involve the employee and
their colleagues in a review to identify ways in which their
work could be organized better” or “Reorganize the work so
that tasks do not need to be timed”), a surprising number of
participants (40%) still chose strategies aimed at fixing the
worker (such as “Discreetly observe the person’s behavior
to see how fast they are moving”). These findings validate
our finding that there is a lack of knowledge of work design
among managers and staff members.
Generative AI Can Suggest
Strong Work Design
In the study’s next phase, we researched whether an AI-
powered tool such as ChatGPT could help managers do
better. The short answer: ChatGPT has the potential to
enhance decision-making in work design. However, it is
important for managers to understand what ChatGPT can
and cannot do well.
We used ChatGPT to make hypothetical work design
decisions for the administrative work design simulation
(Simulation 1). We ran the simulation task 20 times, using
a new, independent chat session with the same prompt each
time in ChatGPT. The generative AI model consistently
chose enrichment tasks out of the provided list,
outperforming both students and professionals/managers in
creating interesting and meaningful work. ChatGPT’s
performance was similar to that of work design experts.
We then tasked ChatGPT to tackle Simulation 2, addressing
the four managerial workforce scenarios (including the
theoretical warehouse worker mentioned above), choosing
strategies from a list. In each scenario, ChatGPT consistently
chose strategies aimed at fixing the work design (good
strategies for employee well-being, motivation, and
performance) over those focused on fixing the worker. As in
Simulation 1, ChatGPT outperformed students, managers,

and professionals in its focus on work design to solve the
workforce problems.
However, ChatGPT did not score as well as the work design
experts in Simulation 2, suggesting that some caution is
warranted. For example, in one session addressing the
warehouse worker who was missing deadlines, ChatGPT
scored 4 overall but chose the strategy “I would give the
employee and her colleagues a bonus when they meet the
allocated times,” which ignores the role’s unreasonable time
allocation.
One Big Lesson: Specific
Prompts Are Key
To further assess ChatGPT’s ability to generate suggestions
independently, we ran the Simulation 2 work design tasks
without providing a multiple-choice solution list. We ran
each test in a new account with the chat history function
turned off and in independent new chats so that the output
of ChatGPT would not be affected by previous inputs.
To begin with, the outcome was worrying. When we simply
instructed the AI model to “provide effective strategies to
address the problem” in the missed-deadlines scenario,
ChatGPT tended to address problems by trying to fix the
worker and creating old-fashioned Taylorist approaches to
work systems, such as conducting time and motion studies.
For example, ChatGPT suggested solutions such as time
management skills and additional training to help the
warehouse employee, who we named Karen, improve her
performance (for example, “Focus on improving Karen’s
speed and accuracy in locating and gathering items from the
warehouse”). It also recommended providing performance
feedback and incentives to motivate Karen to move faster
(for instance, “By linking performance with rewards, Karen
will be encouraged to focus on improving her speed and
efficiency”). Each of these solutions implicitly assumes that
the worker’s motivation or ability is the problem rather than
the work design.
After learning that such an open-ended approach was not
optimal, we next instructed ChatGPT to address this same
scenario using specific prompts: “Consider designing a
good-quality job for Karen”; “Consider Karen’s health, well-
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being, motivation, satisfaction, and work meaningfulness”;
and “Consider Karen’s work design.” The AI model then
provided solutions related to improving Karen’s work design,
including the following:
• Reviewing time allocation and workload to set realistic
time goals.
• Involving Karen in the decision-making process and
seeking her input on ways to improve her job.
• Offering supportive feedback and recognition to enhance
employee satisfaction and motivation.
• Providing adequate training and skill development
opportunities to boost confidence and engagement.
These strategies would boost Karen’s SMART work design
characteristics, increasing the tolerability of demands,
enhancing agency, boosting mastery, and making the work
more stimulating.
ChatGPT also suggested solutions such as fostering a
supportive work environment, encouraging team support
and collaboration, offering career advancement
opportunities, and promoting work-life balance. These
solutions all align well with extensive research on work
design and well-being and would make the job “SMART-
er” and hence result in a healthier and more productive
employee.
We learned from this particular experiment with ChatGPT
that generative AI can make valuable work design decisions,
but managers need to provide clear instructions that
prioritize outcomes for the worker. For example, asking
ChatGPT to “design a high-quality job” rather than simply
requesting “good work design” can generate more relevant
and effective strategies. Therefore, to enhance the quality of
strategy suggestions generated by ChatGPT, managers need
to mention specific, desirable goals in their question
prompts, such as high-quality jobs; employees’ health, well-
being, and motivation; and work meaningfulness.
One piece of good news: Managers who do not frequently
use ChatGPT can learn how to write effective prompts via

the ChatGPT tool itself. For example, when asked, “How can
one craft a well-structured and clear prompt to effectively
address work design challenges?” ChatGPT provided a step-
by-step guide on how to write effective prompts. ChatGPT
advised us to identify the core issue and be specific —
suggestions that could be applied to work design by using
prompts such as “Design high-quality work that enhances
positive team interaction and collaboration for the sales
team” or “Design work that is meaningful to facilitate
employee acceptance of technological changes in their
work.”
The experiment also showed that effective prompts need
to be reviewed and tested. Managers who struggle to write
effective ChatGPT prompts can improve their skills by using
a prompt such as “The following is a prompt aimed at asking
ChatGPT for advice from a work design expert’s perspective.
Please analyze and suggest improvements to get actionable
and practical advice from ChatGPT.” In this case, ChatGPT
will provide more specific suggestions that drive better-
quality outputs.
Five Lessons for Managers
To address the pervasive issue of poor work role design
and its detrimental effects, embracing innovative solutions
is crucial. Based on our research, ChatGPT has emerged
as a promising AI-powered tool to help managers design
healthier and more productive jobs. But it’s not a panacea
and needs to be used wisely. Our advice for managers:
ChatGPT ccaann
nnoot rrep
epllace ttra
rainin
iningg. Managers need to be
aware that worker problems can emerge from poor work
design and that work design, in turn, can affect worker well-
being, motivation, and work meaningfulness. This means
that before using ChatGPT to design better jobs, managers
still need basic training on work design concepts. To get
started on this topic, see the related article “How Well-
Designed Work Makes Us Smarter” and the SMART Work
Design site.
Manager erss n
neeed ttoo bbee ssu
upported in tth
heir ggooal ttoo cr
creeate w
weell-
desig
designned w woork. Managers need to be motivated to create
better jobs for their staffs. This means managers themselves
need roles in which the creation of healthy employee work
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roles is seen as a legitimate and important responsibility,
versus having their sole focus be the bottom line. For
example, if managers get promoted purely on the basis of
productivity achievements, they will not have much
motivation to design SMART work for their teams.
Manager erss n
neeed h
heealthy jjoobs tth
hem
emsselves. Managers need
sufficient time to be able to pay attention to how well their
staff members’ jobs are designed. This means managers’ own
jobs need to be tolerable and not excessively time-pressured.
Managererss n
neeed ttoo le
leaarn C
ChhatGPT p
prromptin
ingg sskkills.
Managers should be encouraged to use generative AI to help
with work design challenges, but they need clear and
comprehensive instructions as to how to use it effectively.
For example, managers need to be specific and to mention
goals such as employee well-being and motivation when
seeking work design recommendations from ChatGPT.
ChatGPT w wiill aaug
ugmmen
ent,
t, n
noot rrep
epllace
ace,, p
peeople in desig
designin
ningg
bet
ettter jjoobs. Unlike simulations, real-life job design situations
are often characterized by their ambiguity and complexity,
with numerous variables that can influence outcomes. Real
situations require a deep understanding of context, human
emotions, social dynamics, and political and ethical
considerations, all of which can be challenging for an AI tool
like ChatGPT to fully grasp. We recommend using ChatGPT
as a complement to human managers rather than as a
replacement for them.
By incorporating ChatGPT’s suggestions alongside human
expertise, organizations can foster higher staff engagement,
job satisfaction, and overall performance. Achieving such a
synergy between managers and AI can pave the way for a
better future for work design and employee experience.
About the Authors
Fangfang Zhang, Ph.D., is a research fellow at the Centre
for Transformative Work Design at Curtin University. She is
also a CEPAR (Centre of Excellence in Population Ageing
Research) research fellow. Her research interests include
work design, job crafting, future of work, overqualification,
and aging. Sharon K. Parker is a John Curtin Distinguished
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Professor at Curtin University, an Australian Research
Council laureate fellow, and director of the Centre for
Transformative Work Design. She is a fellow of the
Australian Academy of Social Science and the Society for
Industrial and Organisational Psychology. She is the creator
of the SMART model and cofounder of the Thrive at Work
initiative.
3. S.K. Parker, “Beyond Motivation: Job and Work Design for
Development, Health, Ambidexterity, and More,” Annual Review of
Psychology 65 (January 2014): 661-691.
4. S.K. Parker, “Smart Work Design,” Safeguard, May/June 2022, 50-53.
5. J. Rothwell and S. Crabtree, “Not Just a Job: New Evidence on the
Quality of Work in the United States,” PDF file (Washington, D.C.: Gallup,
2019), www.gallup.com.

6. Ibid.
References
7. S.K. Parker, D.M. Andrei, and A. Van den Broeck, “Poor Work Design
1. B. Wigert and R. Pendell, “6 Trends Leaders Need to Navigate This Begets Poor Work Design: Capacity and Willingness Antecedents of
Year,” Jan. 31, 2023, Gallup, www.gallup.com. Individual Work Design Behavior,” Journal of Applied Psychology 104,
no. 7 (July 2019): 907-928.
2. Ibid.

Work Design Decision Scores in Different Groups

When participants in Simulation 1 were asked to design an administrative job role, 45% mostly chose to assign the worker
repetitive and monotonous tasks (scored from 0 to 4 indicating the number of enriched tasks selected by the participants). When
participants in Simulation 2 were asked to address problems in four poorly designed job roles, 40% chose strategies aimed at
fixing the worker rather than the poor design (scored from 1 to 5 indicating the extent to which participants will adopt the
strategies, 1=extremely unlikely, 5=extremely likely).

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