Work design is important because of the impact the design has on productivity. The Job Characteristics Model includes skill variety, task significance, task identity, autonomy, and feedback as major considerations for job design. In contrast, the social information-processing model considers information from others in the organization about the work to be just as important. This chapter examines the meaning of work, four traditional approaches to job design, four alternative approaches to job design, and emerging issues in job design.
After reading this chapter, you should be able to do the following:
1. Define the term job, and identify six patterns of defining work.
2. Discuss the four traditional approaches to job design.
3. Describe the job characteristics model.
4. Compare the social information-processing (SIP) model with traditional job design approaches.
5. Explain the interdisciplinary approach to job design.
8. Discuss five contemporary issues in the design of work.
Chapter 14 introduces the following key terms:
job
work
meaning of work
work simplification
job enlargement
job rotation
cross-training
job enrichment
Job Characteristics Model
Job Diagnostic Survey (JDS)
social information-processing (SIP) model
lean production
sociotechnical systems (STS)
technocentric
anthropocentric
job sharing
flextime
virtual office
technostress
task revision
counter-role-behavior
I THINKING AHEAD: Structured Jobs and Fixed Work Schedules
II. WORK IN ORGANIZATIONS
Work is effortful, productive activity that results in a product or service. Work plays an important role in connecting people to reality. Work is organized into jobs, and people get work done through sets of task and authority relationships that make up organizations.
A. The Meaning of Work
The meaning of work differs from person to person, and from culture to culture. One recent study found six patterns people follow in defining work that help explain the cultural differences in people’s motivation to work. Nevertheless, people in many cultures seem to make a similar distinction between the nature of their work and the context in which they perform the work.
B. Jobs in Organizations
Jobs are the basic building block of the task and authority relationships that define an organization's structure. Differentiation is the process of subdividing organizational work into jobs. Integration is the process of connecting jobs into a coordinated, cohesive whole. Jobs are interdependent and require careful planning and design.
III. TRADITIONAL APPROACHES TO JOB DESIGN
Failure to differentiate, integrate, or both may result in poorly designed jobs, which may lead to performance problems. In contrast, well-designed jobs improve productivity and enhance employee satisfaction. Four approaches to job design developed during the twentieth century include scientific management, job enlargement/job rotation, job enrichment, and the job characteristics theory.
A. Scientific Management
Scientific management emphasized work simplification through job specialization. Work simplification is the standardization and the narrow, explicit specification of task activities for workers. The scientific management approach emphasized efficiency but also dehumanized labor. It undervalues the human capacity for thought and ingenuity, resulting in boring, monotonous work and lack of involvement.
B. Job Enlargement/Job Rotation
Job enlargement is a method of job design that increases the number of tasks in a job in an attempt to overcome the boredom of overspecialization. Job rotation is the systematic shifting of workers from one task to another over time. These approaches did not change the nature of the tasks performed, but did improve work with regard to repetition and the mechanical work pace. Cross-training is a variation of job enlargement in which workers are trained in different specialized tasks or activities.
C. Job Enrichment
Job enrichment designs jobs by incorporating motivational factors into them. Job enrichment increases the amount of responsibility in a job through vertical loading. Employees are given more tasks, and more freedom and control in carrying out those tasks. Job enrichment is based on an oversimplified motivational theory and does not consider individual differences among employees.
D. Job Characteristics Theory
The Hackman and Oldham model of job characteristics is a framework for understanding person-job fit through the interaction of core job dimensions with critical psychological states within a person. The Job Characteristics Model includes five core job characteristics: skill variety; task identity, task significance, autonomy, and feedback from the job itself. The model also includes three critical psychological states: experienced meaningfulness of the work, experienced responsibility for work outcomes; and knowledge of results. Unless all of the characteristics are present, the outcome proposed may only result in short-term success. The easiest aspects to enhance are skill variety and task identity. The Job Diagnostic Survey (JDS) is a survey instrument designed to measure the elements in the Job Characteristics Model. An alternative to the JDS is the Job Characteristics Inventory (JCI). Although not as comprehensive as the JDS, the JCI does measure core job characteristics.
IV. ALTERNATIVE APPROACHES TO JOB DESIGN
Limitations of the traditional job design approaches have stimulated the development of four alternative approaches. These alternative approaches to job design include social information- processing (SIP), the interdisciplinary approach, the international perspective, and the health and well-being approach.
A. Social Information Processing
The social information-processing model suggests that important job factors depend in part on what others tell a person about the job. It emphasizes the interpersonal aspects of work design and helps people construct social realities associated with their jobs.
B. Interdisciplinary Approach
This approach builds on the job design approach. The model incorporates four approaches because it asserts that no one approach is comprehensive enough. The mechanistic, motivational, biological, and perceptual/motor approaches make up the interdisciplinary model. Table 14.2 summarizes the positive and negative outcomes of each job design approach.
1. Mechanistic Approach
The mechanistic approach is patterned after the scientific approach and has its roots in mechanical engineering. Outcomes include decreased training time and less likelihood of errors, as well as lower job satisfaction and lower motivation.
2. Motivational Approach
The motivational approach draws from industrial psychology and results in higher job satisfaction and higher motivation, but also involves increased training time and a greater chance of errors.
3. Biological Approach
The biological approach results in less physical effort and fatigue and higher job satisfaction, but requires higher financial costs because of the necessity to change equipment in order to achieve those reductions.
4. Perceptual/Motor Approach
Experimental psychology produced the perceptual/motor approach that reduces the likelihood of accidents and errors, and decreases training time. However, it also results in lower job satisfaction and motivation.
C. International Perspectives on the Design of Work
Japanese work systems emphasize collective and cooperative working arrangements. The German approach to job design originally consisted of a technocentric focus on technology and engineering, but has moved to an anthropocentric, or human centered, approach more recently. The Scandinavian perspective places its emphasis on worker control and social support systems.
D. Work Design and Well-Being
Organizations should consider the effects of job design on worker health and well-being. Some ways in which organizations can impact worker health and well-being include increasing worker control, reducing worker uncertainty, and managing conflict and task/job demands.
V. CONTEMPORARY ISSUES IN THE DESIGN OF WORK
A. Telecommuting
Telecommuting involves fulfilling work responsibilities from home or other locations geographically separate from the company’s primary location. Notebook computers enable individuals to complete work responsibilities from virtually any location while traveling. Telecommuting can result in feelings of social isolation.
B. Alternative Work Patterns
Alternative work patterns allow flexibility among people and time to complete a set of tasks. Job sharing is an alternative work pattern in which more than one person occupies a single job. Flextime enables employees to set their own daily work schedules.
C. Technology at Work
The virtual office is a mobile platform of computer, telecommunication, and information technology and services that enables mobile workforce members to conduct business virtually anywhere, anytime, globally. Technostress is the stress caused by new and advancing technologies in the workplace.
D. Task Revision
Task revision involves innovative modification of incorrectly specified roles or jobs. Counter-role behavior is deviant behavior in either a correctly or incorrectly defined job or role, and results in poor performance in cases where a role or task is correctly defined. When roles or tasks are incorrectly defined, counter-role behavior is a useful way to correct for the problem.
E. Skill Development
One source of stress from new information technologies is the growing gap between the skills needed for the new technologies and the skills employees have in using the technologies. Skill development must be considered in conjunction with job design.
VI. MANAGERIAL IMPLICATIONS: THE CHANGING NATURE OF WORK
VII. LOOKING BACK: Flexible Work Schedules, Job Sharing, and a Female CEO
Different countries have different preferences for one or more of six distinct patterns of defining work.
Scientific management, job enlargement/job rotation, job enrichment, and the job characteristics theory are traditional American approaches to the design of work and the management of workforce diversity.
The social information-processing (SIP) model suggests that information from others and the social context are important in a job.
The interdisciplinary approach draws on mechanical engineering, industrial psychology, experimental psychology, and biology in considering the advantages and disadvantages of job design efforts.
The cultural values and social organizations in Japan, Germany, and Scandinavia lead to unique approaches to the design of work.
Control, uncertainty, conflict, and job/task demands are important job design parameters to consider when designing work for the well-being of the workers.
Telecommuting, alternative work patterns, technostress, task revision, and skill development are emerging issues in the design of work and the use of information technology.
1. Define a job in its organizational context.
A job is a set of specified work and task activities that engage an individual in an organization.
2. Describe six patterns of working that have been studied in different countries.
In Pattern A, the value of work comes from performance of activities for which people are accountable and self-directed. Work is devoid of negative affect. Pattern B people define work as an activity that provides a positive affect and identity. It contributes to society and is not unpleasant. Pattern C people view work as an activity where profits accrue to others by performance. Work is strenuous and somewhat compulsive. Pattern D people define work as a physical activity directed by others, and usually devoid of positive affect. Pattern E people see work as unpleasant physically and mentally strenuous activity. In Pattern F, people define work as an activity constrained to specific time periods that does not create positive affect when performed. Work is defined most positively and with the most balanced personal and collective reasons for participating in the Netherlands. In contrast, work is least positive in Germany and Japan.
3. Describe four traditional approaches to the design of work in America.
Work simplification is the standardization and narrow, explicit specification of task activities for workers. Job enlargement and job rotation involve increasing the number of tasks in a job and systematic shifting of workers from one task to another over time, respectively. Job enrichment designs jobs by incorporating motivational factors into them and increases the amount of responsibility in a job through vertical loading. The Job Characteristics Model focuses on five core job characteristics and three critical psychological states.
4. Identify and define the five core job dimensions and the three critical psychological states in the Job Characteristics Model.
The five core job dimensions include skill variety, task identity, task significance, autonomy, and feedback. Skill variety is the degree to which the job requires multiple skills and talents. Task identity is the completion of an identifiable piece of work. Task significance is the degree to which the job has a substantial impact. Autonomy is freedom and independence. Feedback is clear and direct information on job performance.
The critical psychological states are experienced meaningfulness of work (the job is valuable and worthwhile), experienced responsibility for work outcomes (personal accountability), and knowledge of results (an understanding of how well one is performing the job).
5. What are the salient features of the social information-processing (SIP) model of job design?
The SIP model has four salient features. First, other people provide cues that help workers decipher the work environment. Second, other people help workers judge what is important in a job. Third, other people tell workers how they see those workers’ jobs. Fourth, both positive and negative feedback from others helps workers understand their feelings about their jobs.
6. List the positive and negative outcomes of the four job design approaches considered by the interdisciplinary model.
Table 14.2 provides a comprehensive summary of the outcomes of these approaches. Outcomes of the mechanistic approach include decreased training time and less likelihood of errors, as well as lower job satisfaction and lower motivation. The motivational approach results in higher job satisfaction and higher motivation, but also involves increased training time and a greater chance of errors. The biological approach results in less physical effort and fatigue and higher job satisfaction, but requires higher financial costs because of the necessity to change equipment in order to achieve those reductions. Outcomes of the perceptual/motor approach include reduced likelihood of accidents and errors, and decreased training time, as well as lower job satisfaction and motivation.
7. How do the Japanese, German, and Scandinavian approaches to work differ from one another and from the American approach?
The Japanese approach to work is collectivist in nature, while the U.S. approach is highly individualized. The Japanese work system emphasizes strategic and cooperative working arrangements. Americans emphasize personal identity and social benefits of work. The German approach values a highly educated workforce and emphasizes a highly efficient hierarchical work environment. The social democratic tradition in Scandinavia stresses social concern over efficiency, with numerous laws supporting the rights and health conditions of workers.
8. Describe the key job design parameters considered when examining the effects of work design on health and well-being.
Key job design parameters include: worker control through opportunity to control aspects of work and the workplace, machine and task design, and performance-monitoring feedback systems; uncertainty reduction by providing timely and complete information, clear and unambiguous work assignments, improved communication, and employee access to information sources); conflict management through participative decision making, supportive supervisory styles, and sufficient resources; and task/job design improvement by enhancing core job characteristics.
9. What are five emerging issues in jobs and the design of work?
Five emerging issues in jobs and the design of work include telecommuting, alternative work patterns, technology at work, task revision, and skill development.
1. Is there ever one best way to design a particular job?
In the context of the existing technology at any one point in time, there may be one best way to design a job. However, rapidly changing technology and the challenges of global competition make it essential that workers and managers constantly seek to improve on whatever job design may currently be in place.
2. What should managers learn from the traditional approaches to the design of work used in the United States?
Scientific management helps us understand how to make jobs more efficient. Job enlargement and job rotation aid in understanding the importance of eliminating boredom in jobs. Job enrichment provides knowledge about how to make jobs more motivating. Job characteristics theory points out features that workers want in jobs, and links those features to important psychological states those workers experience.
3. Is it possible for American companies to apply approaches to the design of work that were developed in other countries?
It will be particularly important for American companies to consider and apply some of these approaches as (1) they continue to increase their interactions with companies in other countries, and (2) the diversity of the U.S. workforce assimilates more and more individuals from other countries and cultures.
4. What is the most important emerging issue in the design of work?
Telecommuting has eliminated the need for many people to travel to work. Alternative work patterns have made it easier for employees to manage work/home conflicts. Technostress is a phenomenon related to modern technologies, and it should be minimized in any job redesign effort. Skill development will be at a premium as employers try to minimize the gap between the skills demanded by new technologies and the capabilities of the workers.
5. Read about new approaches to jobs, such as job sharing. Prepare a memo comparing what you have learned from your reading with one or more approaches to job design discussed in the chapter. What changes in approaches to jobs and job design do you notice from this comparison?
This assignment can generate excellent class discussion as students share what they have learned about new approaches to jobs. Students may also have personal experiences with some of these new approaches that can add depth to the discussion. Additional discussion can focus on the advantages and disadvantages of these new approaches to job design for organizations and employees.
6. Interview an employee in your organization or another organization and develop an oral presentation about how the job the employee is doing could be enriched. Make sure you ask questions about all aspects of the employee’s work (e.g., what specific tasks are done and with whom the employee interacts on the job).
As students present how jobs could be enriched, challenge them to be specific about the actual job they are discussing and to explain how the enrichment recommendations they made will potentially improve outcomes for the employee and for the organization.
7. Based on the materials in the chapter, prepare a memo detailing the advantages and disadvantages of flextime job arrangements. In a second part of the memo, identify the specific conditions and characteristics required for a successful flextime program. Would you like to work under a flextime arrangement?
Students should consider the advantages and disadvantages of flextime job arrangements from both the employee’s and the organization’s perspective. Encourage any students who have worked under a flextime arrangement to share their experiences with the class.
1. Assume that a company is planning to redesign all of the jobs in one department based on the advice of a major consulting firm. Should the company discuss the job redesign plans with employees before implementing them? Should the employees have been consulted prior to hiring the consulting firm?
This situation relates to the Job Characteristics Model. The job redesign plans may affect any or all five of the core job characteristics, and may significantly affect employee motivation as a result. Consequently, the company should certainly discuss the redesign plans with employees before implementing them.
2. Assume that a company is aware of certain psychological or physical risks associated with a job, such as respiratory problems and cancer risk associated with the installation of asbestos. Assume also that the medical costs for workers will not be too great. Is it ethical not to warn employees about the possible health risks? Would it make a difference if the risks were less permanent, such as lower back tension or temporarily altered vision?
Employees must be informed about the potential health hazards of their jobs, and employers must make every effort possible to control or eliminate such hazards. This is not only an ethical issue, but a legal one as well. Failure to provide a safe work environment can result in compensation awards. Permanence of effects on worker health is irrelevant.
3. Suppose that the design of a particular job exposes employees to a health or safety risk and that redesigning the job would cost the company more than paying the medical claims if an employee is injured or hurt. Should the company tell employees doing the job about its decision not to redesign the job to make it safer? Is it ethical for the company not to redesign the job?
The company has an obligation to correct the situation. Workers have legal rights to learn about significant risks.
4. Assume that a company has many older, mature workers. Rather than retrain them in new technologies, the company wants to replace the older workers with younger ones. Should this be allowed?
Such a practice is not only unethical, but would likely expose the company to age discrimination lawsuits, as well. It has been tested recently in connection with downsizing efforts. One company reduced the number of its senior employees, while hiring less expensive, younger individuals at another site. The courts ruled in favor of the dismissed workers.
14.1 DIAGNOSING YOUR JOB
Encourage students whose jobs score low in motivating potential to consider specific changes in the design of the job that could improve the motivating potential. As an alternative, use the student’s job with the lowest motivating potential as an example for class discussion, and have the class develop specific suggestions for redesigning the job.
14.2 IS YOUR WORK ENVIRONMENT A HEALTHY ONE?
This challenge also provides an opportunity to discuss the impact unhealthy work environments have on the people who work in them. Encourage students to share examples of the impact their healthy or unhealthy work environment has had on them and/or on their coworkers.
In recent years there has been a flurry of books and articles about how organizations and the way they are changing. The questionnaire in this exercise is an entree into the new world of what managers and leaders are actually doing these days in organizations. It is titled “A Manager’s Job.” It has been administered to nearly 500 MBA students and young managers, about equally divided between men and women and for the most part between the ages of 23 and 33. About 20 percent of the respondents have been from countries other than the United States. To experienced managers, the items on this questionnaire are familiar territory. Students will have to think about it a little differently from the way that beginning managers approach it, but regardless of level of experience, the point can still be made.
The point is a simple one: we aren’t prepared for the sort of world this questionnaire portrays. The “culture” doesn’t prepare us: our management textbooks and classrooms don’t prepare us. Experienced managers, however, consistently report that this questionnaire mirrors their work environment very well.
How do respondents do on the questionnaire? One who would enjoy it very much would end up with a 4.0 average. One who finds each item “very unpleasant for me” ends up with a zero. The range is narrow, and no particular subpopulation of age, sex, experience, or nationality seems to do better or worse than any other subpopulation. The average score is between 1.5 and 1.6—a D+/C- sort of grade. The range is between about 1.0 and 2.2.
However, most young people are unprepared for life in such organizational worlds. They think management and leadership are something different from this. What do they think these are? What mythology of the managerial job do they hold?
Some myths of management that may be operating include:
SOURCE: D. Marcic, “Option B. Quality and the New Management Paradigm,” Organizational Behavior: Experiences and Cases, 4th ed. (Minneapolis/St. Paul: West Publishing, 1995): 296-297.
Instructor's Notes:
An obvious model to use is the core Job Characteristics Model. Students have a tendency to consider only one or two of the characteristics. Point out that this often leads to a more disgruntled employee than if nothing had been attempted.
ALTERNATIVE EXPERIENTIAL EXERCISE
Instructor's Notes:
Many students may be globally conscious, yet do not want to be assigned to work internationally. This exercise aids students with a dilemma that they might encounter. Students are able to share their concerns and anxieties while trying to remedy Joe's problems.
In addition to the previous questions, you may wish to have students spontaneously respond to the question about how to solve his problem with his mother, his family, and his guilt at being viewed as lacking motivation. He is living out other people's expectations, and has action anxiety.
This is a good role play exercise. Joe can interact with his supervisor, the Human Resource department, and his mother.
Adapted from Connie Bowman, Defense Logistics Agency
Joe Pratt is a manager for a major appliance manufacturer, Whirlwind Corp. His boss has just informed him that in 2 months he will be sent overseas to Singapore to head up marketing for the Washer/Dryer Division based there. His overseas assignment will last 2 years. His boss told him that he would be part of a management team of 4 managers from Germany, Singapore, and Japan. His boss also told him that he would send over the company's Overseas Assignment Orientation booklet and information about housing. If he had any other questions prior to his departure, Joe should call his boss or the Human Resource department.
After the conversation with his boss, Joe didn't know what to think. He hadn't expected an overseas assignment. He has never been overseas and his boss didn't say anything about training. An overseas assignment was not really appealing to him and he could never understand why anyone would want to spend time living anywhere but the United States. He was also worried about what his family would think, since his mother was a senior manager in another city.
Joe had secured the position without her assistance, yet he realizes that he has benefited by having such a visible name connected with her success. Joe is confused. He wanted to make a career with this company, but wonders if he has the motivation necessary. In addition, he doesn't want to disappoint his parents, since they, no doubt, will be thrilled with the advancement opportunity.
1. If you were Joe's supervisor, what information about job enrichment could you provide Joe?
2. What information about how jobs are viewed in Japan would benefit Joe in Singapore?
3. What other specific training information would be beneficial to Joe?
The following alternative exercises to supplement the material in the textbook can be obtained from:
Marcic, Dorothy, Seltzer, Joseph, & Vaill, Peter. Organizational Behavior: Experiences and Cases, 6th Ed. South Western College Publishing Company, 2001.
Job Design Exercises. p. 185-189. Time: Part A – 30 minutes, Part B – 25 minutes.
Purpose: To explore the dimensions of the job enrichment model and to consider how
jobs can be redesigned.
Emily Fife and Learning a Living. p. 191-194. Time: 60 minutes.
Purpose: To consider job descriptions and job design under conditions of continual
change and widespread interdependence of jobs.
CASE QUESTIONS: SUGGESTED ANSWERS
The students should consult Figure 14.1 in responding to this question.
The C3P system promotes skill variety, task identity, and task significance. Skill variety is enhanced because the C3P system promotes collaboration and provides the technical tools to do work in ways that were not feasible beforehand. As the case indicates, an engineer working on a project for a few hours in England is able to hand off the design to another engineer who works in Germany, who in turn works with another person in Australia. This interactive and collaborative capability accomplishes two additional things in terms of work design. First, there is a greater sense of task identity because employees are better able to see the “whole job” and to recognize their own role in that broader whole. Second, the C3P system enables employees to better recognize the complex interplay of the thousands of factors that go into the design, engineering, and manufacture of a vehicle. This can enhance task significance. Collectively, these elements enhance the extent to which Ford’s technical staff is able to experience their work as being meaningful. Also, work will more likely be perceived as meaningful when the workload is distributed effectively and when appropriate expertise is utilized. The C3P system enables Ford to do both.
Autonomy and the resulting experienced responsibility for the outcomes of work are enhanced because the C3P system enables Ford employees throughout the world to have access to the information they need in order to do their jobs effectively. Additionally, the system enables the technical staff to have more control over how they are doing their jobs.
Shared information promotes feedback and the knowledge of actual results of work activities. Feedback and knowledge of results are enhanced as well through each vehicle team’s Web site. Here, team members can post questions and progress reports, note bottlenecks, and resolve quality issues that arise in production; thereby more feedback and more meaningful feedback become available to all team members.
The personal and work outcomes for Ford employees include improved productivity and satisfaction. The technical staff is able to get more work done in less time. As a consequence, their personal satisfaction is increasing. In addition, there have been beneficial outcomes for the organization, including: the optimal use of resources from around the world for work collaboration; substantial savings due to the elimination of costly conflicts and mistakes; reduction in the amount of time it takes to get a new vehicle into full production; and the potential positive benefits for Ford’s working relationships with its suppliers.
Technology refers to the tools, techniques, and knowledge for accomplishing work. Thus, technology is inherently involved in the design of work.
Technology is a significant driving force in how work is done. Often, technology is an enabler of work. In other words, technology permits work to be accomplished in ways that it could not be done before. Technology can help to make work more efficient. Technology can also enable people to develop and use different skills.
All of the aforementioned benefits were produced by Ford’s C3P system. Effective and efficient worldwide collaboration became possible. Technical employees had greater control over how they did their jobs, and had better access to the information they needed to do their jobs. As a consequence, costly mistakes were avoided and the time to get a vehicle into full production was reduced by 33 percent.
Several useful lessons can be identified from the case. These lessons include the following:
Work design is important because of the impact the design has on productivity. The job characteristics model includes skill variety, task significance, task identity, autonomy, and feedback as major considerations for job design. In contrast, the social information processing model considers information from others in the organization about the work to be just as important. Cultural values vary greatly as to the social orientation to job design. Task revision includes innovative techniques like job sharing and flextime.
After reading this chapter, you should be able to do the following:
1. Define the term job, and identify six patterns of defining work.
2. Discuss the four traditional approaches to job design.
3. Describe the job characteristics model.
4. Compare the social information-processing (SIP) model with traditional job design approaches.
5. Explain the interdisciplinary approach to job design.
8. Discuss five emerging issues in the design of work.
The following key terms are introduced in Chapter 13.
job
work
meaning of work
work simplification
job enlargement
job rotation
cross-training
job enrichment
Job Characteristics Model
Job Diagnostic Survey (JDS)
social information-processing (SIP) model
lean production
sociotechnical systems
technocentric
anthropocentric
job sharing
flextime
virtual office
technostress
task revision
counter-role behavior
I THINKING AHEAD: Jobs, Work Rules, and the Airline Industry
II. WORK IN ORGANIZATIONS
Work is the mental or physical activity that has productive results. Although work means different things to different people, all work has common elements like organized jobs. Work is relative. Making pottery a thousand years ago was not only work, but survival. Today, many individuals enjoy making pottery as a hobby. Work has always been an element of life in all societies. As we continue to have automation fulfill human tasks, some have hypothesized that we may face the possibility of a society not based on work.
A. The Meaning of Work
The meaning of work differs from person to person and from culture to culture. One recent study found six patterns people follow in defining work, and these help explain the cultural differences in people’s motivation to work.
B. Jobs in Organizations
Jobs are defined around an organization's structure.
III. TRADITIONAL APPROACHES TO JOB DESIGN
Research has concluded that radical and new manufacturing designs have not necessarily led to changes in job designs. The historical approaches to job design were designed around the specific tasks an employee needed to perform. The design now attempts to satisfy the workers' needs as well as the organizations' needs.
A. Scientific Management
Scientific management advocated job specialization, and consequently, job simplification. Work simplification is the standardization and the narrow, explicit specification of task activities for workers. The scientific management era emphasized efficiency. However, individuals were quickly bored with the monotony and lack of involvement with their jobs.
B. Job Enlargement/Job Rotation
Job Enlargement is a method of job design that increases the number of activities in a job to overcome the boredom of overspecialization. Job rotation is the systematic shifting of workers from one task to another over time. Although this was an attempt at enhancing the work life, these two approaches did not change the nature of the tasks performed. They did not produce the expected changes in the workplace.
C. Job Enrichment
Job enrichment designs jobs by incorporating motivational factors into them. In addition to giving employees more tasks, they are also allowed to have more freedom and control in carrying out the tasks.
D. Job Characteristics Theory
The Hackman and Oldham model of job characteristics is a framework for understanding person-job fit through the interaction of core job dimensions with critical psychological states within a person. The Job Characteristics Model includes five core job characteristics: skill variety, task identity, task significance, autonomy, and feedback from the job itself. Unless all of the characteristics are present, the outcome proposed may only result in short term success. The easiest aspects to enhance are the skill variety and task identity. The Job Diagnostic Survey (JDS) is a survey instrument designed to measure the elements in the Job Characteristics Model. A counter to the JDS is the Job Characteristics Inventory. Although it is not as comprehensive as the JDS, it measure core job characteristics. Challenge 13.1 provides a short diagnostic assessment for students to complete.
IV. ALTERNATIVE APPROACHES TO JOB DESIGN
There are four alternatives to job design, including social information processing (SIP), interdisciplinary approach, the international perspective, and the health and well-being approach.
A. Social Information Processing
The social information processing (SIP) model suggests that important job factors depend in part on what others tell a person about the job. This process helps people construct social realities out of their jobs.
B. Interdisciplinary Approach
This approach builds on the job design approach. There are four approaches necessary in this model because no one approach is comprehensive enough. The four approaches include mechanistic, motivational, biological, and perceptual/motor. Table 13.2 summarizes the positive and negative outcomes of each job design approach.
1. Mechanistic Approach
The mechanistic approach is patterned after the scientific approach and has its roots in engineering. Although there is decreased training time and less errors, there could also be lower job satisfaction and lower motivation as a result of this model.
2. Motivational Approach
The motivational approach is drawn from industrial psychology and results in higher job satisfaction based on a higher motivation of employees. Unfortunately there is an increased training time, and accompanying greater chance of errors.
3. Biological Approach
The biological approach has a high financial cost because of the necessity to change equipment to decrease fatigue and physical effort.
4. Perceptual/Motor Approach
Experimental psychology produced the perceptual/motor approach that lowers accidents, error and training time. On the negative side, it also lowers job satisfaction and motivation. Because no single approach is best, an interdisciplinary approach that combines all four is recommended.
C. International Perspectives on the Design of Work
Japanese work systems emphasize collective and cooperative work arrangements. The German approach to job design originally focused on technology and engineering but has moved to a human centered approach more recently. The Scandinavian perspective places its emphasis on worker control and social support systems.
D. Work Design and Well-Being
It is important to consider the effects of job design on worker health and well-being. Worker well-being can be enhanced if redesigned jobs focus on increasing worker control and reducing worker uncertainty.
V. EMERGING ISSUES IN THE DESIGN OF WORK
A. Telecommuting
Fulfilling work responsibilities from the home are telecommuting capabilities. Notebook computers enable individuals that are traveling to complete work responsibilities in any location.
B. Alternative Work Patterns
Alternative work patterns allow flexibility among people and time to complete a set of tasks. Job sharing is an alternative work pattern in which there is more than one person occupying a single job. Flextime is an alternative work pattern through which employees can set their own daily work schedules. A useful discussion to share with students is the question of whether all jobs take exactly 40 hours.
C. Technology at Work
The virtual office is a mobile platform of computer, telecommunication, and information technology and services at the disposal of mobile workforce members to conduct business virtually anywhere, anytime, globally. Technostress is the stress caused by new and advancing technologies in the workplace. Studies have indicated that all employees are affected by changing technology, even systems designers and advocates of the changes.
D. Task Revision
Task revision is the modification of incorrectly specified roles or jobs. Incorrect definitions of roles may result in counter-role behavior, which is deviant behavior in either a correctly or incorrectly defined job or role.
E. Skill Development
One source of stress from new information technologies is the growing gap between the skills needed for the new technologies and the skills employees have in using the technologies. Skill development must be considered in conjunction with job design.
VI. MANAGERIAL IMPLICATIONS: THE CHANGING NATURE OF WORK
VII. LOOKING BACK: Good Relations and Job Flexibility at Southwest Airlines
Different countries have different preferences for one or more of six distinct patterns of defining work.
Scientific management, job enlargement/job rotation, job enrichment, and the job characteristics theory are traditional American approaches to the design of work and the management of workforce diversity.
The social information-processing (SIP) model suggests that information from others and the social context are important in a job.
The interdisciplinary approach draws on mechanical engineering, industrial psychology, experimental psychology, and biology in considering the advantages and disadvantages of job design efforts.
The cultural values and social organizations in Japan, Germany, and Scandinavia lead to unique approaches to the design of work.
Control, uncertainty, conflict, and job/task demands are important job design parameters to consider when designing work for the well-being of the workers.
Task revision, telecommuting, alternative work patterns, technostress, and skill development are emerging issues in the design of work and the use of information technology.
1. Define a job in its organizational context.
A job is the link between the tasks specified for an individual to perform and the organization.
2. Describe six patterns of working that have been studied in different countries.
In Pattern A, work is valued for its performance, and the person is accountable and self-directed. This pattern defines work as an activity of value. Pattern B people define work as an activity that provides a positive affect and identity. It both contributes to society and is not unpleasant. Pattern C people look at work as an activity where profits accrue to others by performance. This category considers work strenuous and somewhat compulsive. Pattern D people define work as a physical activity directed by others. Pattern E people see work as a physically and mentally strenuous activity that is unpleasant. In the Netherlands, work is defined most positively and with the most balanced personal and collective reasons for participating. In contrast, work is least positive in Germany and Japan.
3. Describe four traditional approaches to the design of work in America.
The mechanistic approach is similar to scientific management. The motivational approach focuses on job satisfaction. The biological approach emphasizes interaction with physical aspects, and is concerned with the amount of physical exertion. The perceptual/motor approach also emphasizes interaction with physical aspects, but also considers human factors such as ergonomics.
4. Identify and define the five core job dimensions and the three critical psychological states in the Job Characteristics Model.
To be effective, all components of the model must be considered. They include skill variety, task identity, task significance, autonomy, and feedback. Skill variety is the degree to which the job requires multiple skills and talents. Task identity is the completion of an identifiable piece of work. Task significance is the degree to which the job has a substantial impact. Autonomy is freedom and independence. Feedback is clear and direct information on job performance.
The critical psychological states are experienced meaningfulness of work (the job is valuable and worthwhile), experienced responsibility for work outcomes (personal accountability), and knowledge of results (an understanding of how well the person is performing).
5. What are the salient features of the social information-processing (SIP) model of job design?
Our views and reactions to the quality of our jobs is based, in part, on the perceptions we have of what others value or dislike about our jobs. The SIP model has four salient features. First, people provide cues that help us decipher the work environment. Second, people help us judge what is important in a job. Third, people tell us their perceptions of our jobs. Fourth, both positive and negative feedback from others helps us form our opinions about our jobs.
6. List the positive and negative outcomes of the four job design approaches considered by the interdisciplinary model.
Table 13.2 provides a comprehensive summary of the outcomes of the approaches. Where the mechanistic approach lowers job satisfaction, the motivational approach raises satisfaction. The advantage of the mechanistic model is the training time involved in relationship to the motivation approach. The biological approach has high job satisfaction as well, but also has high financial costs because of requirements in new equipment. Although the perceptual/motor approach has less likelihood of error, there is an accompanying lower job satisfaction and motivation.
7. How do the Japanese, German, and Scandinavian approaches to work differ from one another and from the American approach?
The Japanese culture work approach is collectivist, while the U.S. is highly individualized. For the Japanese worker the system would emphasize strategic and cooperative working arrangements. Americans emphasize personal identity and social benefits of work. The German approach values the highly educated work force. The emphasis on organization lends itself to a highly efficient hierarchical work environment. The social democratic tradition in Scandinavia stresses social concern over efficiency. There are numerous laws supporting the rights and health conditions of the workers.
8. Describe the key job design parameters considered when examining the effects of work design on health and well-being.
Uncertainty in the work environment can be reduced by (1) providing employees with timely and complete information, (2) making clear and unambiguous work assignments, (3) improving communication, (4) increasing employee access to information sources. In addition, conflict at work can be managed through (1) participative decision making to reduce conflict, (2) the use of supportive supervisory styles to resolve conflict, and (3) sufficient resource availability to meet work demands, thus preventing conflict.
9. What are five emerging issues in jobs and the design of work?
Alternative work patterns, technostress, skill development, the changing nature of work, and task revision.
1. Is there ever one best way to design a particular job?
Students may respond based on efficiency or effectiveness views.
2. What should managers learn from the traditional approaches to the design of work used in the United States?
Scientific management helps us understand how to make jobs more efficient. Job enlargement/job rotation aids in understanding the importance of eliminating boredom in jobs and incorporating the need for multiple skills. Job enrichment provides knowledge about how to make jobs more motivating. Job characteristic theory points out the features that individuals want in a job, and links these to psychological states that are important to people.
3. It is possible for American companies to apply approaches to the design of work that were developed in other countries?
Yes. It will be particularly important as U.S. companies interact with other countries. NAFTA agreement proponents will see the issues of job design as important.
4. What is the most important emerging issue in the design of work?
Telecommuting has eliminated the need for many people to travel to work. Alternative work patterns have made it easier for employees to manage work/home conflicts. Technostress is a phenomenon related to modern technologies, and it should be minimized in any job redesign effort. Skill development will be at a premium as employers try to minimize the gap between the skills demanded by new technologies and the capabilities of the workers.
5. Read about new approaches to jobs, such as job sharing. Prepare a memo comparing what you have learned from your reading to one or more approaches to job design discussed in the chapter. What changes in approaches to jobs and job design do you notice from this comparison?
This assignment can generate excellent class discussion as students share what they have learned about new approaches to jobs. Students may also have personal experiences with some of these new approaches that can add depth to the discussion. Additional discussion can focus on the advantages and disadvantages for organizations and employees of these new approaches to job design.
6. Interview an employee in your organization or another organization and develop an oral presentation about how the job the employee is doing could be enriched. Make sure you ask questions about all aspects of the employee’s work (e.g., what specific tasks are done and with whom the employee interacts on the job).
As students present how the job could be enriched, challenge them to be specific about the actual job they are discussing and to explain how the enrichment recommendations they made will potentially improve outcomes for the employee and for the organization.
7. Based on the materials in the chapter, prepare a memo detailing the advantages and disadvantages of flextime job arrangements. In a second part of the memo, identify the specific conditions and characteristics required for a successful flextime program. Would you like to work under a flextime arrangement?
Students should consider the advantages and disadvantages of flextime job arrangements from both the employee’s and the organization’s perspective. Encourage any students who have worked under a flextime arrangement to share their experience with the class.
1. Assume that a company is planning to redesign all of the jobs in one department based on the advice of a major consulting firm. Should the company discuss the job redesign plans with employees before implementing them? Should the employees have been consulted prior to hiring the consulting firm?
This relates to the job characteristics model. Employees are more positive when they have task significance. If they are not involved with job redesign it defies the concept of empowerment.
2. Assume that a company is aware of certain psychological or physical risks associated with a job, such as respiratory problems and cancer risk associated with the installation of asbestos. Assume also that the medical costs for workers will not be too great. Is it ethical not to warn employees about the possible health risks? Would it make a difference if the risks were less permanent, such as lower back tension or temporarily altered vision?
Employees must be informed about the potential health hazards of their jobs, and employers must make every effort possible to control or eliminate such hazards. This is not only an ethical issue, but a legal one as well. Failure to provide a safe work environment can result in compensation awards. The permanence of the effects on worker health is not the issue.
3. Suppose that the design of a particular job exposes employees to a health or safety risk and that redesigning the job would cost the company more than paying the medical claims if an employee is injured or hurt. Should the company tell employees doing the job about its decision not to redesign the job to make it safer? Is it ethical for the company not to redesign the job?
The company has an obligation to correct the situation. In addition, there are some arguments for extending the livable environment to future generations. Workers have legal rights to learn about significant risks.
4. Assume that a company has many older, mature workers. Rather than retrain them in new technologies, the company wants to replace the older workers with younger ones. Should this be allowed?
This is against the law, and is also unethical. This has been tested recently through downsizing. One company reduced the size of the senior employees, while hiring, less expensive, younger individuals at another site. The courts ruled in favor of the laid off workers. The law that is in effect on this issue is the protected class, (over 40).
13.1 DIAGNOSING YOUR JOB
If student’s jobs score low in motivating potential, have them consider specific changes in the design of the job that could improve the motivating potential. Another option would be to use as a class example the student’s job that had the lowest motivating potential. As a class develop specific suggestions for redesigning the job.
13.2 IS YOUR WORK ENVIRONMENT A HEALTHY ONE?
This challenge also provides an opportunity to discuss the impact unhealthy work environments have on the people who work in them. Encourage students to share examples of the impact their healthy or unhealthy work environment have had on them and/or on their co-workers.
In recent years there has been a flurry of books and articles about how organizations and the way we see them are changing. The questionnaire in this exercise is an entree into the new world of what managers and leaders are actually doing these days in organizations. It is titled “A Manager’s Job.” It has been administered to close to 500 MBA students and young managers, about equally divided between men and women and for the most part between the ages of 23 an 33. About 20% of the respondents have been from countries other than the United States. To experienced managers, the items on this questionnaire are familiar territory. Students will have to think about it a little differently from the way that beginning managers approach it, but regardless of level of experience, the point can still be made.
The point is a simple one: we aren’t prepared for the sort of world this questionnaire portrays. The “culture” doesn’t prepare us: our management textbooks and classrooms don’t prepare us. Experienced managers, however, consistently report that this questionnaire mirrors their work environment very well.
How do respondents do on the questionnaire? One who would enjoy it very much would end up with a 4.0 average. One who finds each item “very unpleasant for me” ends up with a zero. The range is narrow, and no particular subpopulation of age, sex, experience, or nationality seems to do better or worse than any other subpopulation. The average score is between 1.5 and 1.6 - a D+/C- sort of grade. The range is between about 1.0 and 2.2.
However, most young people are unprepared for life in such organizational worlds. They think management and leadership are something different from this. What do they think these are? What mythology of the managerial job do they hold?
Some myths of management that may be operating include:
SOURCE: D. Marcic, “Option B. Quality and the New Management Paradigm,” Organizational Behavior: Experiences and Cases, 4th ed. (Minneapolis/St. Paul: West Publishing, 1995): 296-297.
Instructor's Notes:
An obvious model to use is the core job characteristics model. Students have a tendency to consider only one or two of the characteristics. Point out that this often leads to a more disgruntled employee than if nothing had been attempted.
ALTERNATIVE EXPERIENTIAL EXERCISE
Instructor's Notes:
Many students may be globally conscious, yet do not want to be assigned to work internationally. This exercise aids students with a dilemma that they might encounter. Students are able to share their concerns and anxieties while trying to remedy Joe's problems.
In addition to the previous questions, you may wish to have students spontaneously respond to the question about how to solve his problem with his mother, his family, and his guilt at being viewed as lacking motivation. He is living out other people's expectations, and has action anxiety.
This is a good role play exercise. Joe can interact with his supervisor, the human resource department, and his mother.
Adapted from Connie Bowman, Defense Logistics Agency
Joe Pratt is a manager for a major appliance manufacturer, Whirlwind Corp. His boss has just informed him that in 2 months he will be sent overseas to Singapore to head up marketing for the Washer/Dryer Division based there. His overseas assignment will last 2 years. His boss told him that he would be part of a management team of 4 managers from Germany, Singapore, and Japan. His boss also told him that he would send over the company's Overseas Assignment Orientation booklet and information about housing. If he had any other questions prior to his departure, Joe should call his boss or the Human Resource department.
After the conversation with his boss, Joe didn't know what to think. He hadn't expected an overseas assignment. He has never been overseas and his boss didn't say anything about training. An overseas assignment was not really appealing to him and he could never understand why anyone would want to spend time living anywhere but the U.S.. He was also worried about what his family would think, since his mother was a senior manager in another city.
Joe had secured the position without her assistance, yet he realizes that he has benefited by having such a visible name connected with her success. Joe is confused. He wanted to make a career with this company, but wonders if he has the motivation necessary. In addition, he doesn't want to disappoint his parents, since they, no doubt, will be thrilled with the advancement opportunity.
1. If you were Joe's supervisor, what information about job enrichment could you provide Joe?
2. What information about how jobs are viewed in Japan that would benefit Joe in Singapore?
3. What other specific training information would be beneficial to Joe?
The following alternative exercises to supplement the material in the textbook can be obtained from:
Marcic, Dorothy & Seltzer, Joe. Organizational Behavior: Experiences and Cases, 5th Ed. South Western College Publishing Company, 1998.
Redesign Jobs. p. 227-228. Time: 30 minutes.
Purpose: To consider how jobs can be redesigned.
Design Your Own Job. P. 229-231. Time: 25 minutes.
Purpose: To explore the dimensions of the job characteristics model.
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