Chapter Four

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Chapter Four

Analyzing Work and Designing Jobs
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Introduction

• Key elements and their considerations are at the
  heart of analyzing work.
• Through the process of work flow design, managers
  analyze the tasks needed to produce a product or
  service.
• A job is a set of related duties.
• A position is the set of duties performed by one
  person.

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Work Flow Analysis

• Work flow analysis identifies
• The outputs of the process
• The activities involved
• Three categories of inputs
• Raw inputs (materials and information)
• Equipment
• Human resources
• Ideally, the organizations structure brings
  together people who must collaborate in order to
  efficiently produce the desired outputs. The
  structure may do this in two ways
• Centralized authority is concentrated in a few
  people at the top of the organization
• Decentralized authority is spread among many
  people

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Developing a Work-Unit Activity Analysis
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Job Analysis

• Organizations must understand and match job
  requirements and people.
• Job analysis is the process of getting detailed
  information about jobs.
• Analyzing jobs and understanding what is required
  to perform a job provides essential knowledge
  for
• Staffing
• Training
• Performance appraisal
• Many other HR functions
• A job description is a list of tasks, duties, and
  responsibilities (TDRs) that a job entails.

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Sample Job Description
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Job Specifications

• Whereas the job description focuses on the
  activities involved in carrying out a job, a job
  specification looks at the qualities of the
  person performing the job.
• A job specification is a list of the knowledge,
  skills, abilities, and other characteristics
  (KSAOs) that an individual must have to perform
  the job.
• Job specifications should reflect the unique
  requirements of the job.

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Sample Job Specifications
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Sources of Job Information

• Information for analyzing an existing job comes
  from
• Incumbents
• Observers, such as supervisors
• The government provides background information
  for analyzing jobs
• Dictionary of Occupational Titles
• Occupational Information Network (ONET)

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Position Analysis Questionnaire

• One of the broadest and best-researched
  instruments for analyzing jobs is the Position
  Analysis Questionnaire. This is a standardized
  job analysis questionnaire containing 194 items
  to represent
• Work behaviors
• Work conditions
• Job characteristics
• The questionnaire organizes these items into six
  sections concerning different aspects of the job
• Information input
• Mental processes
• Work output
• Relationships with other persons
• Job context
• Other characteristics

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Task Analysis Inventory

• Another type of analysis method, the task
  analysis inventory focuses on the tasks performed
  in a particular job.
• This method has several variations.
• Task analysis inventories can be very detailed,
  including 100 or more tasks.

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Fleishman Job Analysis System

• To gather information about worker requirements,
  the Fleishman Job Analysis System asks
  subject-matter experts, typically job incumbents,
  to evaluate a job in terms of the abilities
  required to perform the job.
• The survey is based on 52 categories of abilities
  ranging from written comprehension to deductive
  reasoning, manual dexterity, stamina, and
  originality.
• When the survey has been completed in all 52
  categories, the results provide a picture of the
  ability requirements of a job.
• This information is especially important and
  useful for employee
• Selection
• Training
• Career development

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Examples of an Ability from the Fleishman Job
Analysis System
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Importance of Job Analysis

• Job analysis is so important to HR managers that
  it has been called the building block of
  everything that personnel does.
• Almost every HRM program requires some type of
  information that is gleaned from job analysis
  Work redesign, Human resource planning,
  Selection, Training, Performance appraisal,
  Career planning, Job evaluation.
• Job analysis is important from a legal
  standpoint.
• Job analysis helps supervisors and other managers
  carry out their duties in the following ways
• Identify types of work in a unit
• Provide information about work flow processes
• Supports mangers in hiring decisions, performance
  reviews, and reward recommendations

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Trends in Job Analysis

• Organizations are beginning to appreciate the
  need to analyze jobs in the context of the
  organizations structure and strategy.
• Organizations are recognizing that todays
  workplace must be adaptable and is constantly
  changing.
• Job analysis must detect changes in jobs as time
  passes.
• Dejobbing consists of viewing organizations as a
  field of work needing to be done rather than a
  series of jobs held by individuals.
• Organizational structures require the broader
  understanding that comes from an analysis of work
  flows.

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Job Design

• Job design is the process of defining the way
  work will be performed and the tasks that will be
  required in a given job.
• Job redesign refers to changing the tasks or the
  way work is performed in an existing job.
• The four approaches used in job design are
• mechanistic approach
• motivational approach
• biological approach
• perceptual-motor approach

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Mechanistic Approach

• Has its roots in classical industrial
  engineering.
• Focuses on designing jobs around the concepts of
  task specialization, skill simplification, and
  repetition.
• Scientific management, one of the earliest
  mechanistic approaches, sought to identify the
  one best way to perform the job through the use
  of time-and-motion studies.
• The scientific management approach was built upon
  in later years and resulted in a mechanistic
  approach that calls for the job to be designed
  very simply.
• New employees can be trained to perform the job
  quickly and inexpensively.

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Biological Approach

• Comes primarily from the sciences of
  biomechanics, or the study of body movements
• Is referred to as ergonomics, or the concern with
  examining the interface between individuals'
  physiological characteristics and the physical
  work environment.
• The goal of this approach is to minimize the
  physical strain on the worker by structuring the
  physical work environment around the way the body
  works.
• Focuses on outcomes such as physical fatigue,
  aches and pains, and health complaints.

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Perceptual-Motor Approach

• Has its roots in the human-factors literature.
• Focuses on human mental capabilities and
  limitations.
• The goal is to design jobs in a way that ensures
  that they do not exceed people's mental
  capabilities.
• Tries to improve reliability, safety, and user
  reactions by designing jobs in a way that reduces
  the information processing requirements of the
  job.

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Motivational Approach

• The motivational approach to job design focuses
  on the job characteristics that affect the
  psychological meaning and motivational potential
  of job design.
• A focus on increasing job complexity through job
  enlargement, job enrichment, and the construction
  of jobs around sociotechnical systems.
• A model of how job design affects employee
  reaction is the Job Characteristics Model.

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Designing Jobs That Motivate

• Job enlargement refers to broadening the types of
  tasks performed.
• Job extension is enlarging jobs by combining
  several relatively simple jobs to form a job with
  a wider range of tasks.
• Job rotation does not actually redesign the jobs,
  but moves employees among several different jobs.
• Job enrichment is empowering employees by adding
  decision-making authority to their jobs. It
  comes from the work of Frederick Herzberg.

• A pure focus on efficiency will not achieve human
  resource objectives.
• Job design should take into account factors that
  make jobs motivating to employees.
• Job Characteristic Model describes jobs in terms
  of five characteristics
• Skill variety
• Task identity
• Task significance
• Autonomy
• Feedback

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Designing Jobs That Motivate

• Self managing work teams have authority for an
  entire work process or segment.
• Flexible work schedules offer alternatives to the
  8-5 work job.
• Flextime
• Job sharing
• Compressed workweek
• Telework

• The study of the interface between individuals
  physiology and the characteristics of the
  physical environment is called ergonomics.
• Goal is to minimize physical strain on the
  workers by structuring the physical work
  environment around the way the human body works
• 2001 OSHA regulations

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Designing Jobs That Meet Mental Capabilities and
Limitations

• Just like the body, the mind too has capabilities
  and limitations.
• There are several ways to simplify a jobs mental
  demands
• Limit the amount of information and memorization
  the job requires
• Provide adequate lighting
• Provide easy-to-understand gauges and displays
• Provide simple-to-operate equipment
• Provide clear instructions
• A recent source of job complexity is the flood of
  e-mails received.

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Approaches to Job Design