Job Design
By: Amy Medica
What Will Be Covered
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The topic
The tools
Brainstorming
Inner workings
How it works
A real world example
An exercise
Summary
What is Job Design?
• By using a variety of tools and
techniques we try to find the best way to
keep employees satisfied while
maintaining as high as possible
productivity, monetary or otherwise.
Job Design
• What is the goal of Job design?
• The goal is job satisfaction, it is the key
to successful job design. Everything is
contingent upon job satisfaction.
The Topic
• We will engineer a job design by
using previous work experiences.
• We will briefly discuss the resistance
to change. And discuss a few of the
pros and cons of our actions.
The Tools
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Job enlargement
Job rotation
Job enrichment
Skill variety
The Tools cont’
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Task variety
Task significance
Compensation
Autonomy: level of freedom
Feedback: lucid communication on
performance
Brainstorming Exercise
• Break up into groups of three to
five people.
– Designate a note taker.
– Choose one person to speak for the
group.
Brainstorming cont’
• Discuss your past jobs,
specifically those that you did
not like.
– Choose one job from the entire
group that was or is most disliked.
– That job is going to be the focal
point of your brainstorming
session.
Brainstorming cont’
• Use your imagination…
– Why did you dislike this job?
– What were some of the negative effects
of working in an unsatisfying job?
• i.e. absenteeism, tardiness, sub-parproductivity, depression, sore back, etc…
– Did other employees feel the same way
you did?
Brainstorming cont’
– How do you think your performance as
well as those around you affected the
company?
– What did you like about this job?
• Keep this in mind for later.
– Narrow down your dislikes to list of four.
Brainstorming cont’
• Solutions to your
dissatisfaction…
– Brainstorm on some ideas that
would improve this job?
– Let your imagination flow; do not
censor your ideas, creativity is key.
Brainstorming cont’
• Narrow down your ideas.
– Discard the ideas that you all
agree are not usable; use your best
judgment.
– Choose four ideas from these.
• Compare your four solutions to
your four dislikes.
– Did you discover four solutions?
Brainstorming cont’
• Implementing your solutions, the
pros and cons…
– Discuss amongst yourselves how you are
going to implement these changes.
– Do you think you can design a satisfying
job with this new information?
– Will the employees accept your new
idea?
– What are some of the monetary and
mental difficulties of implementation?
• i.e. Learning curves will initially slow down
production.
Brainstorming cont’
• Keep in mind your solutions as
we go through the rest of the
presentation.
– At the end of the session we will
compare your solutions with some
of the Job Design topics that
follow.
Nuts and Bolts
• Job enlargement involves adding
more tasks(variety), ideally the
worker could do all the tasks
involved. This keeps thing
interesting.
• Job rotation is exactly that. It
requires skill variety.
Nuts and Bolts cont’
• Job enrichment gives the employee
more responsibility, thus creating a
greater level of freedom or autonomy.
• Compensation doesn’t play as large
of a part in job satisfaction as we
might think, but it does play a part.
We want to be paid fairly, whether it
is profit sharing, salary, commission,
or piece rate.
How It Works
• Plain and simple
– A happy employee is a productive
employee, satisfaction equals
production.
• It works by
– Balancing the organization’s goal(s) with
the employees wants and needs, thereby
designing a job that creates job
satisfaction, which should increase
production (companies goal) and satisfy
the employee.
A Real World Example
• Visioneering LLC is a new computer
animation company with three
employees. Each employee knows
his or her specific job, however, they
have been running into a few
problems.
Visioneering LLC
• The problem
– They all speak a different computer language,
the language of their software.
– Each employee is trained to use a particular
piece of software. Jason knows how to do
computer modeling using 3D studio. Ted knows
how to use adobe premier. Christa knows a little
of both, but most of her time is spent running the
business.
– Lack of concise communication stalls the work
process.
Visioneering LLC
• The solution
– Have everyone trained on all the software, job
enlargement.
• What changed?
– The first noticeable change wasn’t clearer
communication, although that was solved. What
really took them by surprise was how much
quicker they could get a project done.
– They now had more immediate access to
information.
Visioneering LLC
– If Jason couldn’t figure out how to do something
with the software he could easily ask Christa or
Ted; between the three of them they rarely had
to take the time to search reference books, or
the internet, which takes considerable amounts
of time.
– If a project needed more computer animation
they could all work on it.
– This balanced the work load, and kept one
person from feeling like they are doing all the
work.
Visioneering LLC
• Now they each have a greater
appreciation for what the others do,
job enrichment.
• Collaboration has helped move from
one part of a project to another with
greater efficiency.
• Due to their greater efficiency they
no longer have as much stress about
deadlines.
An Exercise
• Find one thing in your life that you wish you
could do better or more often then apply
one or two of the job design tools to it.
• For example, Sarah likes the idea of being
able to play the guitar. She has tried
teaching herself in the past, now her guitar
has become a dust collecting device.
• A few things she didn’t have in the past
were variety, feedback, and enrichment.
Exercise
• A few simple changes and she
was on her way again.
– First, she joined with a few friends
who play the guitar; They get
together every Thursday evening.
– Second, her friends show her new
things to try; This variety keeps
things fresh and exciting.
Exercise
– Third, she has more motivation to
practice throughout the week because
she wants to share her improvements
with her friends.
– Fourth, their feedback as well as her
feedback make learning the guitar that
much more enriching, enrichment
through praise and results.
• Take this exercise home and put it to
work; Try it for yourself.
Summary
• How do these job design tools fit
in with your brainstorming
solutions?
• Discuss…