Section 9 Job Design

Managing Performance through Job Design

What makes jobs great?

The Study of Jobs- Scientific Management

A set of principles and practices designed to increase the performance of individual workers by stressing job simplification and job specialization. Job simplification: The breaking up of the work that needs to be performed in an organization into the smallest identifiable tasks. Job specialization: The assignment of workers to perform small, simple tasks. Time and motion studies: Studies that reveal exactly how long it takes to perform a task and the best way to perform it.

The Study of Jobs- Scientific Management

Pay is the principal outcome used to motivate workers to contribute their inputs.

Piece-rate pay system

Scientific management focuses exclusively on extrinsic motivation and ignores the important role of intrinsic motivation. Specific disadvantages:

Workers may feel that they have lost control over their work behaviors. Workers may feel as if they are part of a machine and are treated as such. Workers have no opportunity to develop and acquire new skills.

Transition from Scientific Management for Performance to Job Design (Hackman & Oldham) for Satisfaction AND Performance

Job Design
(Continued)

Job Characteristics Model

Nature of Job Design

Job Enlargement

Broadening the scope of a job by expanding the number of different tasks to be performed. Increasing the depth of a job by adding the responsibility for planning, organizing , controlling, and evaluating the job. The process of shifting a person from job to job.

Job Enrichment

Job Rotation

Characteristics of Jobs

Skill Variety

The extent to which the work requires several different activities for successful completion. The extent to which the job includes a whole identifiable unit of work that is carried out from start to finish and that results in a visible outcome. The impact the job has on other people.

Task Identity

Task Significance

Characteristics of Jobs

Autonomy

The extent of individual freedom and discretion in the work and its scheduling. Amount of information employees receive about how well or how poorly they have performed.

Feedback

Job Characteristics Model

How can we affect jobs?

Management strategies for affecting

Skill Variety Task Identity Task Significance Autonomy Feedback

Job Enlargement Broadening the scope of a job by expanding the number of different tasks to be performed. Job Enrichment Increasing the depth of a job by adding the responsibility for planning, organizing , controlling, and evaluating the job. Job Rotation The process of shifting a person from job to job.

Ways to Redesign Jobs

Change Made
Combine tasks so that a worker is responsible for doing a piece of work from start to finish. Group tasks into natural work units so that workers are responsible for an entire set of important activities rather than just a part of them. Allow workers to interact with customers or clients, and make workers responsible for managing these relationships and satisfying customers. Vertically load jobs so that workers have more control over their work activities and higher levels of responsibility. Open feedback channels so that workers know how they are performing their jobs.

Job Dim Inc

Skill variety Task identity Task significance Task identity Task significance

Example
A production worker is responsible for assembling a whole bicycle, not just attaching the handlebars. A computer programmer handles all programming requests from one division instead of one type of request from several different divisions.

Skill variety Autonomy Feedback

Autonomy

A truck driver who delivers photocopiers not only sets them up but also trains customers in how to use them, handles customer billing, and responds to customer complaints.
A corporate marketing analyst not only prepares marketing plans and reports but also decides when to update and revise them, checks them for errors, and presents them to upper management. In addition to knowing how many claims he handles per month, an insurance adjuster receives his clients responses to follow-up questionnaires that his company uses to measure client satisfaction.

Feedback

Advice to Managers

Realize that increasing subordinates intrinsic motivation decreases your need to closely supervise subordinates and frees up your time for other activities. To increase levels of intrinsic motivation and job satisfaction, increase levels of the five core dimensions. Do not redesign jobs to increase levels of the five core dimensions if workers do not desire personal growth and development at work. Before any redesign effort, make sure that workers are satisfied with extrinsic job outcomes. If workers are not satisfied with these factors, try to increase satisfaction levels prior to redesigning jobs. Make sure that workers have the necessary skills and abilities to perform their jobs. Do not redesign jobs to increase levels of the core dimensions for workers whose skills and abilities are already stretched by their current jobs. Periodically assess workers perceptions of the core dimensions of their jobs as well as their levels of job satisfaction and intrinsic

International Perspectives on the Design of Work

The Japanese Approach

Emphasizes strategic level Encourages collective and cooperative working arrangements Emphasizes lean production

Lean Production

Using committed employees with everexpanding responsibilities to achieve zero waste, 100% good product, delivered on time, every time

International Perspectives on the Design of Work The German Approach

Technocentric - placing technology and engineering at the center of job design decisions (traditional German approach) Anthropocentric - placing human considerations at the center of job design decisions (more recent German approach)

International Perspectives on the Design of Work

The Scandinavian Approach

encourages high degrees of worker control encourages good social support systems for workers

The Distinguishing Feature of Job Design in the Future

FLEXIBILITY

Empowerment

Peter Drucker The Practice of Management (1954) It does not matter whether the workers wants responsibility or notThe enterprise must demand it of him.

Final Comments on Job Design- Safety

Safety Awards
Question on Job Design?