LECTUREPEDIA - Ajarn Paul Tanongpol, J.D.; M.B.A.;B.A.; CBEST
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LECTUREPEDIA - Ajarn Paul Tanongpol, J.D.; M.B.A.;B.A.; CBEST
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CHAPTER 15 Individuals, job design and stress
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The success of any organization depends on the talents of those people working within the organization. There might be talents inside the organization, but not fully used or exploited. In such circumstances, the organization would be operating less them optimal. The question is “how would the managers unlock the many talents of the people within the organization?” The answer to this question depends on many factors: how do people view work, the meaning of work to people, and how well do the managers motivate people to work?
i. The worker must have some feeling for the organization. This inner feeling towards the organization is called the psychological contract of the worker. This is a set of expectation that a worker has for the organization. The expectation is a two way relationship: the worker expects something from the organization, and the organization also expects something in returns.
ii. To operate at an optimum level, there must be a match between the worker’s expectation and that of the organization. If there is an incompatibility between these expectations, there will be conflicts and the organization will not operate at an optimum level. It is said that under such circumstances, efficiency suffers. There are two factors at work: 1. Inducement The organization must provide inducement to the workers. Inducement may be in the form of compensation, recognition, or even punitive measures in case of misbehavior of lacking in performance.
2. Contribution Contribution is what the employees give to the organization. At minimum it must mean that the workers are doing what is expected of them as described in their job description. That is the “primary task.” However, contribution may also mean more than the worker’s primary task. In the case of Management by objective (MBO), workers are expected to contribute by ways of general support of the organization’s overall goals.
Other than earning a living, working should contribute to the betterment of your life. The concept of work quality of life is important to the working people. Unhappy people will adversely affect work performance. Workers have to like their jobs; if they do not like what they are doing, the output will most likely be affected in a negative way.
Poor management practice will result in poor work life quality. The organization has high expectation of their workers. Therefore, managers should create or maintain a good work environment.
Workers should have a good balance between their work and their life. This is called work-life balance. This is referred to the work and family life balance. The worker has to be happy at home, as well as at work. At the work place, the company has to be sensitive to the individual needs of workers, i.e. family obligations and career development.
Job is defined as tasked performed in the organization. Job design refers to the allocation of work tasks to individuals or groups. We can say that job is what you do, and job design is the assignment of the things for you to do.
i. Job satisfaction Quality of work life may be measured by job satisfaction. This is the degree to which an individual feels positively or negatively about the job. In short, do you like your job? It is possible that a worker may like the job or the work, but is not satisfied with his job. That is possible in a case where there is bad or poor management. No matter how good or appealing the work may be, the work will not have a job satisfaction if the management maintains a toxic work environment.
ii. Job involvement A work satisfied with his job will most likely show job involvement. Job involvement is the level of participation that a worker dedicates himself to the job. It is fair to say that a satisfied worker will have higher level of involvement and vice versa.
iii. Organizational commitment It is not fair for the organization to demands much of the workers and does not respond in kind. If the organization demands more of the workers, it must also show some level of commitment to the work life quality of the workers.
Job performance is defined as the quantity and quality of task accomplishment by individual or group.
Individual performance = Ability + Support + Effort
i. Performance begins with ability The support has to come from management. This factor may be neglected and it is easily overlooked. If there is a lack of support from the management, workers will have no direction and at the end, the quality of work will suffer. Effective manager must provide support to their subordinates.
ii. Performance requires support Manager can provide all the support he could, if the workers are not competent there will not be good results to show. Ability is the ability of the workers. In the perspective of workers, this is an internal factor. Workers control it. To the extent that the management has any control or influence over this factor depends on two factors: (1) better selection in the interview process, and (2) good training program.
iii. Performance involves effort The individual work needs to show effort in performing their work. Effort is an intrinsic motivation harness by the worker. There is a problem when the workers need to be motivated by outside forces to show effort. This is something possessed by workers. No effort = laziness.
i. Job simplification The work procedures need to be simplified. Employed people in well-defined and highly specialized tasks. The rationale is that if the ob is simplified, it should not require much training. The task should be easy to performance. Easy performance = good performance.
ii. Job rotation and job enlargement Job rotation refers to shifting workers from job to job. This will allow workers to have many skills. In the end, the rationale is that the more job rotation the workers have, the more they are skilled and the better performers they will be.
iii. Job enrichment This is sometimes referred to as vertical loading. Job enrichment means building more opportunities for satisfaction into a job by expanding its content.
i. Skills variety ii. Task identity iii. Task significance iv. Autonomy v. Feedback from the job itself
In job design, managers should look for the integration of technology into job tasks to improve productivity. Routine tasks should be done by technology. When computers take over many routine tasks, workers and managers can use their talents to better work performance.
i. Destructive stress ii. Job burnout iii. Workplace rage
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