LECTURE 9

APPLYING MOTIVATION THEORIES: JOB DESIGN AND

EMPOWERMENT

Class Overview

• Video: Quad Graphics (8 mins)

• Lecture: Job redesign and employee empowerment– Job redesign: enrichment, enlargement, rotation– The job characteristics model

Employee Empowerment

• Basic principle:– Motivation can be enhanced by increasing

autonomy and self-determination at work

• Therefore job design and assignment of responsibilities are motivational tools

• Empowerment includes: – Job redesign– Quality circles– Self-directed work teams

Job Design

• Traditional job design is based upon the principle of specialization

• Advantage:– greater task specialization improves

efficiency and productivity of workforce

• Disadvantage:– boredom, fatigue, dissatisfaction at the

individual level

Job Redesign

• Modern job designs focus upon more ‘humanization’ of work, with less specialization and simplification

• Methods:– Job enlargement– Job enrichment– Job rotation

Job Enlargement

• Involves an increase in the variety of an employee’s activities without increasing decision making authority

• AKA horizontal job expansion

• Job enlargement does improve worker satisfaction and the quality of production

• It does not appear to affect the quantity of production

Job Enrichment

• Increasing the variety of responsibilities, and including increased decision making

• AKA vertical job expansion

• Focus is upon introducing autonomy and self-regulation

• Increases satisfaction and performance

• Some people may not be not motivated by enriched jobs

Job Rotation

• Job design remains the same

• Personnel who perform the task are systematically changed (rotated)

• Uses as a training device to improve a worker’s flexibility

• Job rotation may be the only available means to introduce variety in some job settings

Job Characteristics Theory

• A comprehensive theory of job design proposed by Hackman and Oldham

• Explains how various job dimensions affect worker behavior

• Summarizing Principle: Five dimensions of job design influence three critical psychological states, which in turn influence important work outcomes

Job Characteristics Model

JobCharacteristics

PsychologicalStates

WorkOutcomes

1.Skill Variety2.Task Identity3.TaskSignificance

4.Autonomy

5.Feedback

1.Experiencedmeaningfulness

2.Perceivedresponsibility

3.Knowledgeof results

Intrinsicmotivation

Growthsatisfaction

Job satisfaction

Jobperformance

Job Characteristics Theory

• It has been argued that individual characteristics may influence (moderate) the strength of the relationships

• e.g. an individual’s respective desires to work in enriched jobs (their “growth need strength”)

• In principle this sounds reasonable• Evidence for this influence has been mixed

The Job Diagnostic Survey

• Hackman & Oldham developed this survey to ‘diagnose’ job characteristics

• A job’s motivating ‘potential’ can be calculated from information from the survey:

• MPS = ((skill variety+task identity+task significance)/3) * autonomy * feedback

• So what? This is useful for assessing the effectiveness of job redesign efforts

Other Job Redesign Approaches

• Flextime

• Modified work week

• Telecommuting

Flextime

• Work schedule that gives employees some discretion in arranging their working hours

• Employer specifies some core time that the employee must be present at work

• Not suitable for some scheduled work

• Absenteeism and turnover are lower with flextime

Modified Work Weeks

• Use “unusual” work schedules compared to traditional 9 to 5 grind, e.g. working 10 hours a day, four days a week

• Employees may experience increased levels of fatigue

• Research produced mixed findings with regard to the effectiveness of such programs

Telecommuting

• The linking of one’s home computer with the employer’s computer system which permits the completion of all or part of one’s job at home

• Tends to occur in information-processing industries

• Growth in this area is massive

• Societal, environmental, psychological and economic benefits

Telecommuting (cont.)

• Advantage: – reduced overheads (reduced need for office

space)

– employee’s content over being close to families

– higher job satisfaction levels

• Disadvantages:– lack of face-time (social isolation)

– More difficult to monitor