1.0 INTRODUCTION
The importance of work system is underscored by the
organisation's dependence on human
efforts. (i.e work) to accomplish its goals. Work design is one of the oldest fields of operations
management.
In the past, it has often
been de-emphasised in operations management courses in favour of
other topics. In recent years, however,
renewed interest has taken place, and it has
come from an entirely different direction: some of the interest has
resulted from studies that reveal a
general dissatisfaction felt by workers with their jobs. It is therefore important for management to make
design of work systems a key element of
its operations strategy. This note examines the important areas of job design as specified in the objectives
below.
2.0 OBJECTIVES
At the end of this note, you should be able to:
i) explain the importance
of job design
ii) describe the two basic
approaches to job design
iii) rationalise the
advantages of job specialisation, or its alternatives, for a particular situation.
3.0 MAIN CONTENT
3.1 Introduction to Job Design
Job design entails matching tasks or work activities to
individuals or task groups. This is
usually done by specifying a job's content, the employee skills and training needed to perform that job, and
the degree of specialisation appropriate
for the job. The ultimate intention here, is to increase efficiency of an organisation, with the parallel goal of
making working conditions more
agreeable. In addition, job design improves productivity through
consideration of technical and human
factors. It also increases the quality of the final product or service.
Let us pause for a moment to answer this question: Who are job
designers? Job designers are concerned
with who will do a job, how the job will be done, and where the job will be done. Stevenson (1969)
has suggested four parameters for a
successful job design. To him, the job design must be:
i. Carried out by experienced personnel who have the necessary
training and background;
ii. Consistent with the goals of the organisation;
iii. In written form; and
iv. Understood and agreed to by both management and
employees.
You need to realise that the factors that affect job design and
the implications of various alternatives
are often so complex, that a person without a good background in job design is likely to
overlook important aspects of it. It is also
necessary to consult workers and managers alike in order to take
advantage of their knowledge, as well as
keep them informed.
Since employees are particularly intimately involved with the
work, they are veritable sources of
ideas for job improvement. Management support for job design equally depends on the commitment and
involvement of managers. Once these two
important groups have been included in the process, it is often relatively easier for them to embrace the
design. The establishment of a written
record of the job design can serve as a basis for referral, whenever there are clarifications
to be made about it.
3.2 Approaches to the Study of Job Design
There are two basic schools of thought with respect to current
practice in job design. One might be
called the efficiency school, because it emphasises a systematic, logical approach to job design.
The second one is called the behavioural
school because it emphasises satisfaction of wants and needs. We shall now examine each of these
schools:
3.2.1 The Efficiency Approach
The efficiency approach, a refinement of Frederick Taylor's
scientific management concepts, received
considerable emphasis in the past. Taylor's
approach is based on the philosophy that any operation can be improved
by breaking it into components and studying
the work content of each component in
order to improve work methods. Taylor believed that managers should study jobs scientifically, using careful analysis,
experimentation, and tools such as flow
diagrams and process charts to find the most economic way to perform a task. Details of this will be covered under
job specialisation in section 3.3.
3.2.2 The Behavioural Approach
The behavioural approach to job design emerged during the 1950s,
and has continued to make impact on many
aspects of job design. One of the major
contributions of the behavioural approach is that it has reminded
managers of the complexity of human
beings, and that the efficiency approach may not be appropriate in ever instance. More of the
behavioural approach will be treated
under section 3.4.
3.3 Job Specialisation
A job with a high degree of specialisation involves a narrow range
of tasks, a high degree of repetition,
and presumably, great efficiency and high quality. Examples range from assembly lines to medical
specialties. Some bakers specialise in
wedding cakes; a heart specialist can diagnose and treat heart problems better than a general practitioner.
Generally, specialisation results in benefits such as:
• less training time needed per employee because the methods
and procedures are limited,
• faster work pace, leading to more output in less time, and
• lower wages paid because education and skill requirements are
lower.
However, the agreements against job specialisation suggest that
narrowly defined jobs lead to:
• poor employee morale, high turnover, and lower quality because
of the monotony and boredom of
repetitive work;
• the need for more management attention because the total
activity is broken into a larger number
of jobs for a large number of employees, all
of whom have to be coordinated to produce the entire produce or service; and
• less flexibility to handle changes or employee absences.
3.4 Alternatives to Job Specialisation
From our previous discussions in note 1, it should be clear to you
now, that people work for a variety of
reasons: economic needs (i.e. to earn a living), social needs (to be recognised and to belong
to a group), and individual needs (to
feel important and to feel in control). These factors influence how people perform their jobs.
In narrowly designed jobs
(as in job specialisation), workers have few
opportunities to control the pace of work, receive gratification for the
work itself, advance to a better
position, show initiative, and communicate with
fellow workers. Suggestions have therefore been made on how to
modify specialised jobs to provide for a
broader range of needs satisfaction. These
include job rotation, job enlargement, job enrichment, team production
and empowerment. We will look at each of
these in the sections that follow.
3.4.1 Job Rotation
Job rotation moves beyond specialisation, so that people who have
the required skills can rotate from one
job to another in order to get away from the job specialisation rut. For example, assembly
line workers may work one week on engine
mountings and then work on assembling dashboard components or tyre fixing, the following week. This process can
help to reduce the monotonous aspects of
the job. Job rotation implies multi
skills in personnel. It is not only advantageous and motivating for the employees, but it also
gives
the employer the flexibility to
adjust to client needs.
For instance, because workers learn many aspects of the job, job rotation increases the skills of the
work force, thereby giving management to
flexibility to replace absent workers, or to move more workers to different workstations as necessary. In
addition, rotation of jobs can give a
better appreciation for the production problems of others, and the value
of passing only good quality to the next
person.
3.4.2 Job Enlargement
Job enlargement is intended to avoid an employee being trapped in
job specialisation by trying to improve
the variety within a certain sphere of a
person's ability and interest. It is done by adding additional similar
tasks to workers' job. This is referred
to as horizontal job enlargement. Apart form
reducing boredom, job enlargement has the potential to increase
employee satisfaction because the
worker feels a greater sense of responsibility, pride, and accomplishment.
3.4.3 Job enrichment
This is the most comprehensive approach to job design. It involves
a vertical expansion of job duties. This
means that workers have greater control and
responsibility for an entire process, not just a specific skill or
operation. For example, a purchasing
secretary whose basic job is the correspondence for a group of purchasing people could have the job
enriched by planning the work
assignments of the group, being an intermediate in customer contact and
maybe helping in the evaluation of some
proposals. That is, the secretary's job is
enriched from being a secretary to becoming an assistant. This is what
obtains today, when many of the classic
secretarial duties are less required as more and more people have their own personnel
computers.
3.4.4 Team Production
This entails organising workers into work teams; selecting workers
and training them to work as a team;
assigning some responsibility for management of
production to teams. However, building effective work teams means more
than just grouping workers into work
groups. More still needs to be done. For
instance, team building requires training in team effectiveness,
conflict resolution, team measurement,
and motivation systems. One strong
feature of effective work teams is that they can focus on processes, instead of departments. For example, if a
team is to design and develop a new
product, the team can focus on the process of designing and developing
the new product and not be constrained
by departmental boundaries and
responsibilities.
3.4.5 Empowerment
This is an extension of job enrichment by adding to it, complete
employee trust and responsibilities not
initially associated with the job. It is basically a process of conveying authority from
management to workers. Let us see how it
works: imagine a manager tells his workers that they have authority to stop production lines whenever
the notice that product quality is
beginning to deteriorate. In this situation, workers tend to accept
responsibility for product quality and
shut down product whenever the need arises. They then come together in order to correct the cause
of low product quality. Worker safety,
maintenance problems, materials’ shortages, and other occurrences are other factors that can cause the need for
production to be stopped. Giving
workers the authority to stop production for these and other causes is perhaps the most visible conveyance of
authority to workers. This process leads
to what is now termed "internal ownership", where workers feel that
the production line belongs to them and
that they are responsible for everything
that occurs in production.
4.0 CONCLUSION
In this note, you
have learned about the importance of job designs and how you can apply this to increase the efficiency as
well as the productivity of your
organisation. You should also be able to recommend between job specialisation and its alternatives in
particular situations.
5.0 SUMMARY
This note has shown you that the importance of work system is
underscored by the organisation's
dependence on human efforts. It is therefore important for management to make design of work systems a
key element of its operations
strategy.
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