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Job design
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Job Specialization - Specific
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Is where production Is broken down into distinct tasks that
are performed by individual employees, it is quite specific
and often results in employee boredom and dissatisfaction.
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•Involves jobs being broken down into specialist skills areas
in order to improve knowledge and skills to increase output,
reduce errors and labor cost and to control quality.
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General
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To counter this effect there are 3 job designs approaches
more general in nature, have been used and are driven by
intrinsic rewards – the good feeling that one gets from doing
something well
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Example:
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Imagine that you and your partner own a fast food outlet that
sells fish and chips. Will each of
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you prepare the food, take orders from the customers,
package the food and take the customer’s money, or would it
be better for one person to specialise in food preparation
and the other specialise in customer service?
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The individual tasks that make up the job can be designed in
different ways. They can be task specific or general.
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1. Job Rotation
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Job rotation, where employees move from task to task so that
there is some variation and a particular task does not
become boring. This approach requires additional training,
so the employee becomes multi-skilled, and consequently
increases costs.
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2. Job enlargement
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Job enlargement, where the employee completes several
tasks and avoids the boredom associated with doing just the
one task over and over. Again, this approach requires multiskilling and additional training.
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3. Job Enrichment
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Job enrichment, where the employee can see the whole
approach and understands their role in producing the final
product.
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What’s the difference from General
and Specific
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The difference???? The difference between general and
task specific job design is the option that is given to the
employees in performing the tasks.
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An employer may, for example, send a plumber to fix a
broken water pipe. It is most unlikely the employer would
specify how the pipe is to be fixed. The actual way the tasks
are done will be left to the discretion of the plumber.
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Variation
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The variation between task specific and general job design
is associated with the skill scale.
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Hotel cleaners, for example, generally have 15 minutes to
clean a room. Every task, such as making the bed, cleaning
the bathroom and wiping down the glass in the shower is
specified. It is physically hard, generally boring and low-paid
work. But some hotel managers still manage to meet some of
the social and personal requirements of the employee.
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Volvo's HR Practices - Focus on Job
Enrichment
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The case discusses the efforts made by the Swedish
automobile major - Volvo AB towards improving the work
conditions at its facilities through job enrichment programs.
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in its efforts to reduce the instances of employee turnover
and absenteeism in its manufacturing facilities, Volvo
introduced innovative job enrichment programs including
job rotation, management employee councils, small work
groups, change implementation and employee oriented
facilities. These programs helped the company to understand
the importance of designing its facilities according to the
work design and employees' requirements.
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Volvo was inspired to build a new facility keeping this work
design as a basis. This reiterated the company's belief that
industry needed to adapt itself to the people's requirements
and not vice-versa. This concept was implemented
successfully in other plants of the company too
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Volvo's efforts in bringing changes in work design offered
valuable lessons to both the academic and corporate
community.