FREE online courses on Job Design and Enrichment - Techniques for Designing Jobs

Basically, there are four techniques used in the design of jobs. These include Job simplification, Job enlargement, Job enrichment and Job rotation.

Job Simplification

Job simplification is a design method whereby jobs are divided into smaller components and subsequently assigned to workers as whole jobs.

Simplification of work requires that jobs be broken down into their smallest units and then analysed. Each resulting sub-unit typically consists of relatively few operations. These subunits are then assigned to the workers as their total job.

There appears to be two major advantages in using job simplification. First, since the job requires very little training, they can be completed by less costly unskilled labour. Second, job speed increases because each worker is performing only a small portion of the previously large job and thus is able to master a smaller, less complicated job unit.

On the negative side, job simplification results in workers experiencing boredom, frustration, alienation, lack of motivation and low job satisfaction. This, in turn, leads to lower productivity and increased cost.

Job Enlargement

Job enlargement expands job horizontally. It increases job scope; that is, it increases the number of different operations required in a job and the frequency with which the job cycle is repeated. By increasing the number of tasks an individual performs, job enlargement, increases the job scope, or job diversity. Instead of only sorting the incoming mail by department, for instance, a mail sorter's job could be enlarged to include physically delivering the mail to the various departments or running outgoing letters through the postage meter.

Efforts at job enlargement have met with less than enthusiastic results. As one employee who experienced such a redesign on his job remarked, “ Before I had one lousy job. Now, through enlargement, I have three!”. So while job enlargement attacks the lack of diversity in overspecialised jobs, it has done little to provide challenge or meaningfulness to a workers' activities.

Job Rotation

Job rotation refers to the movement of an employee from one job to another. Jobs themselves are not actually changed, only the employee are rotated among various jobs. An employee who works on a routine job moves to work on another job for some hours/days/months and returns back to the first job. This measure relieves the employee from the boredom and monotony, improves the employee's skills regarding various jobs and prepares worker's self-image and provides personal growth. However, frequent job rotations are not advisable in view of their negative impact on the organization and the employee.

Job Enrichment

Job enrichment, as it is currently practiced in industry, is a direct outgrowth of Herzberg's Two Factor Theory of motivation. It is, therefore, based on the assumption that in order to motivate personnel, the job itself must provide opportunities for achievement recognition, responsibility, advancement and growth. The basic idea is to restore to jobs the elements of interest that were taken away under intensive specialisation. At this stage it may be necessary to draw a distinction between job rotation, job enlargement and job enrichment. Job enrichment tries to embellish the job with factors that Herzberg characterised as motivators: achievement, recognition, increased responsibilities, opportunities for growth, advancement and increased competence. There is an attempt to build into jobs a higher sense of challenge and achievement, through vertical job loading.

Vertical job loading  entails redesigning jobs to give:

1.       Greater responsibility,

2.       Greater autonomy,

3.       More immediate feedback to the individual or group. This might include transferring some of the superior's activities to subordinates.

          Horizontal job loading might be applied by having workers perform some of the steps that precedes and follow them in the work flow. A single operator might fit on all four fenders, be responsible for the car's entire front end, or do both rough and finished painting.

Does Job Enrichment Pay Off

The popular notion is that job enrichment is a key to successful motivation and productivity. Many scholars, consultants and practitioners (for example, Herzberg, Robert Ford, Scott Mysers, Roy Walters) extol its virtues and vigorously campaign for its widespread use in modern organisations. The reasons:

1.       The job enrichment programme at IBM was a successful affair. (Walker)

2.       In 1960, according to Reif and Schoderbek, 41 of the 200 companies surveyed used job enrichment in an attempt to reduce costs and increase profits. It proved to be successful ultimately.

3.       According to Ford (1969) after the installation of job enrichment in the Shareholders Relations Department at AT &T there had been a 27 per cent reduction in the termination rate and an estimated cost savings of  $ 558,000 over a 12 month period. At AT &T of 19 studies conducted using job enrichment nine were extremely successful, 9 were moderately successful and 1 was a ‘flop', representing a high level of success.

4.       The job enrichment programme proved to be successful, in addition, at  Olivetti and Fiat in Italy; Renault in France; Texas Instruments in USA; Volvo Inc. in Sweden; Daimler-Benz and Volkswagen in Germany, etc.

How Widespread Job Enrichment Is

According to Luthans and Reif only 4 per cent of a sample of the Fortune 500 industrial firms have made any “formal systematic attempt to enrich jobs”. Contrary to popular belief, a low ratio of employees hold enriched jobs. This view is supported by another study. “The successful experiences of Maytag, AT &T, Texas Instruments and few others cannot be accepted as a representative of the efficiency of job enrichment for all industrial firms although that conclusion is often reached. In most companies examined job, enrichment was still in the experimental stage only.”

What is Wrong with Job Enrichment

According to Reif and Luthans, in the mad rush to modernise and get away from the traditional approaches to management of people, both professors of management and practising managers, may be guilty of the same thing : blindly accepting and over generalising about the first seemingly local, practical and viable  alternative to old style  of management – Herzberg's job enrichment. Other academicians dismissed the success stories as incomplete and poorly designed and generally hold that the studies have little empirical validity.

1.       Job enrichment is not a social cure for workers' discontent. Moreover, it may not be possible to give priority to social efficiency over considerations of purely economic efficiency in long term. “The manager who pretends that the personal needs of the worker come before the objective need of the tasks is indeed a liar or a poor manager”.

2.       Some jobs cannot be enriched beyond a certain point. “The prospects for humanising work are constrained by the realities of the work to be done – realities which are beyond the power of planners to control.”

3.       Many workers do not feel alienated from their jobs and do not desire more responsibility or involvement at their workplace.

4.       Labour unions thrive on conflict with management. No wonder, they try to frustrate enrichment programmes by imposing restrictive job descriptions, tenure requirement, etc.

5.       In the job enrichment programmes we try to put all the focus on worker and how to restructure his job and forget the boss. A costly lapse indeed! Supervisors often feel that job enrichment programmes have sliced away a big part of what he feel is his responsibility.

6.       As pointed out by Tregoe increasing job scope does not automatically motivate workers and in many jobs it is impractical because they are not structured so that elements can be added.

7.       The introduction of job enrichment  programme may have a negative impact on some workers and result in feelings of inadequancy, fear of failure and a concern for dependency. For these workers, low-level competency, security and relative independence are more important than the opportunity for greater responsibility and personal growth in enriched jobs.

8.       The majority of firms currently practising it have a rather limited understanding of the concept, they are not sure how, when and where to apply it. After examining the responses from 125 companies, Reif etal., concluded thus, “Companies do not adequately prepare employees psychologically for the greater autonomy. Responsibility and development is not given sufficient attention during the implementation of job enrichment . . . Organisational support for enriched job holders is not forthcoming . . . Industry has done such a good job of conditioning  men to perform as machines that employees now are having a difficult time performing as  whole beings at work”.

9.       Most of the time job enrichment is imposed on people. They are told about it, rather than asked whether they would like it or how their jobs could be made more interesting. Mitchell Fein's research for the American Institute of Industrial Engineers indicates that the job enrichment does not work simply because workers do not want it.

How to make job enrichment effective

Whether job enrichment really pays off or not is not a simple question to answer in view of the above (difficulties) research findings. But one thing clearly emerges: Job enrichment is not a cure-all for all the human problems presently facing modern management. There is no use jumping on the job enrichment bandwagon without carefully considering all the above factors. Despite these criticisms, the evidence still shows that the job enrichment works for some groups of people. If we assume that individual employees wish to have more variety, complexity and responsibility in their jobs, job enrichment looks like a very promising and effective way to make workers – and the total organization – more effective. In this connection it may be necessary to answer one final question: What is needed to make job enrichment effective?

i.        Use job enrichment selectively after taking into account situational variables (job characteristics, personal characteristics of employees, organization level, etc.).

ii.       Provide a supportive climate for innovation and change.

iii.       Job enrichment demands a development effort. Managers must have a better understanding of what people want. They must be genuinely interested in job enrichment programme. People like to see that their managers are really concerned about their welfare.

iv.      Develop the skill of the participants first in a job enrichment programme. If you do not provide the man the skills to carry out the decision making and goal setting responsibilities under a job enrichment programme he gets more frustrated. Perhaps, an example might be the non-swimmer who sees someone drown. The objective is clear, you have to get that person out of the lake, but, if you do not have the skills to go out there and get the person then the frustration is intolerable.