Showing papers on "Job design published in 1992"

Service Provider Job Satisfaction and Customer

Abstract: Considers the impact of multi‐faceted measures of job satisfaction on customer‐oriented behaviours demonstrated by service providers. Reveals how overall job satisfaction, together with specific satisfaction related to supervision, colleagues, promotion and work are positively related to customer‐orientation, while satisfaction with pay is not of significance in this case. Discusses recommendations for management and suggestions for further research.

Exploring the exit, voice, loyalty, and neglect typology: The influence of job satisfaction, quality of alternatives, and investment size

Abstract: The current theory proposes that responses to dissatisfaction differ in constructiveness versus destructiveness and activity versus passivity, defining four categories of response: exit, voice, loyalty, and neglect. The manner in which employees react to job dissatisfaction is determined by three variables: overall job satisfaction; quality of job alternatives, and magnitude of investments in the job. This article presents a meta-analysis of the results of five studies in a program of research designed to test the current theory. Ten of 12 theory predictions received good support: Greater job satisfaction was associated with greater tendencies toward voice and loyalty, and with lesser exit and neglect. Superior alternatives were associated with greater tendencies toward exit and voice, and with lesser neglect. Greater investment size was associated with greater tendencies toward voice and loyalty, and with lesser neglect.

What Enhances or Inhibits Learning a New Job? : A Basic Career Issue

Abstract: A model of the factors that enhance or hinder learning a new position is proposed and partially tested. Time on the job explained 27% of the variance in the facility with which a position was learned, and individual-differences, job-characteristics, context, and environmental factors explained an additional 24%. Job characteristics such as role complexity and lack of job challenge and individual differences such as self-efficacy and immediate prior similar experience were strongly related to job learning. In addition, contextual factors representing the organization's climate, pace, and stage contributed to the explanation of job learning along with the individual's marital status

Technology and organization : power, meaning, and design

Abstract: The impact of technology in organizations is of central concern to managers. It plays a crucial role in job design, the motivation of the individual at work, the successful management of change and the structure of organizations. Earlier literature has tended to fall into two separate camps: either specialized studies of new technologies or mainstream accounts of organizational behaviour in which technology is of peripheral concern. In this MBA text, the authors adopt a highly integrative approach. By using the three concepts of "power", "meaning" and "design", they explore the many different ways in which technology and organizations interact. Technology can just be a description of the productive hardware. It can also be less a question of specific technologies-in-use and more concerned with the impact of technology upon organizational structures and the power balances in complex organizations. Finally, the human factors of perception and knowledge add further to technology and its associated debates. The authors highlight the major debates within these competing perspectives.

Public Sector Professionals: The Effects of Public Sector Jobs on Motivation, Job Satisfaction and Work Involvement:

Abstract: This article reports on an empirical study of the job characteristics of public sector professionals and the impact of these characteristics on motivation, job satisfaction, and work involvement. W...

The Situational Occurrences Theory of Job Satisfaction

Abstract: A two-phase study was conducted to test the Situational Occurrences Theory of Job Satisfaction. The theory was designed to address the following anomalies: (1) why do employees holding seemingly excellent jobs in terms of the traditional job facets such as pay and benefits sometimes report low satisfaction, (2) why do employees holding similar jobs at the same or different organizations with similar pay, etc. have different job satisfaction levels, and (3) why do employee job satisfaction levels change over time when pay, etc. remains relatively stable? The theory posits that job satisfaction is a function of a relatively finite and stable set of variables called Situational Characteristics and a broader based, fluid set of variables called Situational Occurrences. It was hypothesized that overall job satisfaction could best be predicted from a combination of Situational Occurrences and Situational Characteristics than by either alone. It was also hypothesized that Situational Occurrences play a dominant ...

Does Job Re-Design Theory Explain Job Re-Design Outcomes?

Abstract: A review of 31 methodologically rigorous case studies and experiments in job re-design showed only limited support lor the Job Characteristics Model. Where job re-design led to employee perceptions of improved job content then employees were also likely to experience higher job satisfaction. Job performance improvements however were not significantly associated with job perceptions, intrinsic work motivation, or job satisfaction, although they were associated with pay rises and job losses among employees. These findings are accounted for by a twin-track model which suggests that the determinants of performance are different from the determinants of satisfaction. While job re-design appears to give employees higher job satisfaction, there is no strong evidence that in and of itself it motivates them to higher performance.

A Multivariate Analysis of Curvilinear Relationships Among Job Scope, Work Context Satisfactions, and Affective Outcomes

Abstract: This study investigated the curvilinear relationships between Job Scope and Affective Outcomes and the moderating effect of work context satisfactions on those relationships. The analysis used a multivariate design to examine main and interaction effects. The results showed several different relationships between job design and the work context. Those relationships included distraction, enhancement, and compensatory effects of the work context and the job itself. The theoretical and practical implications of the results are discussed.

Retention plans and job satisfaction of gerontological social workers.

Abstract: This article examines the retention plans and job satisfaction of 813 full time social workers who provide direct services to elderly clients. Almost nine out of ten of the respondents indicated that they planned to remain in the field of gerontology, with six out of ten doing so because of the personal satisfaction they derived from working with the elderly. Job autonomy, supervisor, co-worker, and organizational support as well as client satisfaction and self-esteem were significantly associated with job satisfaction.

Exchange Ideology as a Moderator of the Relationships Between Importance of Participation in Decision Making and Job Attitudes

Abstract: The present study examined the relationships between reported importance of participation in decision making and three job attitudes of relevance to Yugoslav self-management, namely job satisfaction, perceptions of organizational support, and perceptions of organizational goal norms. Data collected from 134 of 200 randomly sampled workers in a Yugoslav tooling plant yielded weak correlations but also indicated a moderating effect of exchange ideology. These results have implications not only for Yugoslav self-management but also for exchange theory and the study of job attitudes.

The Relationships between Privacy and Different Components of Job Satisfaction

Abstract: The level of workspace architectural privacy has previously been found to relate to overall job satisfaction. It was hypothesized that because privacy may serve particular functions, only particular facets of job satisfaction will be related to it, both in the short term (less than 1 year) and in the long term (more than 1 year). One hundred thirty professional secretaries assessed their level of privacy and their level of job satisfaction as measured by the Minnesota Satisfaction Questionnaire. The results supported the hypotheses and showed that the environment in which one works affects some but not all facets of job satisfaction.

Sources of Job Motivation and Satisfaction among British and Nigerian Employees

Abstract: This study compares the responses of Nigerian and British employees living in England to questions concerning the origins of satisfaction and dissatisfaction and of working hard and working little. Job context factors emerged as being more important in the Nigerian sample, in the explanation of both high and low scores on job attitude sequences. Also, the responses of the British sample were considerably more in accordance with predictions from Herzberg's theory of job satisfaction than were the responses of the Nigerian sample. Theories of job satisfaction developed in one society therefore could not be applied to another without careful prior assessment of their relevance.

The management of operations: a conceptual emphasis

Abstract: OPERATIONS IN A GLOBAL MARKET. The Nature of Operations. International Competitiveness Through Operations: Quality and Productivity. The Operations Strategy. Product/Service Selection and Design. DESIGNING THE TRANSFORMATION PROCESS. Capacity Planning. Facility Location. The Transformation Process. Facility Layout. Job Design. PLANNING FOR OPERATIONS. Aggregate and Master Scheduling. Inventory Management. Material Requirements Planning. Detailed Scheduling. Just-In-Time Systems. Project Management. Quality Management. CONTROLLING THE TRANSFORMATION PROCESS. Quality Control. Appendices. Answers to Even-Numbered Problems. Bibliography. Index.

The hidden professionals: product designers and their impact on design quality

Abstract: The authors discuss the roles of designers in the development engineering phase of product development and examine the effects of designer communication, job design, organization climate, and CAD system quality on design quality. A survey of designers and design engineers at ten manufacturing sites was conducted. Communication with downstream processes, task significance, and job commitment was associated with greater achievement of manufacturability objectives. Communication with downstream processes and within the design core team was associated with achievement of strength objectives. Job commitment was a significant predictor of achievement of cost objectives. CAD system quality was not associated with any of the outcome measures. These results suggest that managers of development engineering organizations should treat designers more as professionals and less as workers. They should also redesign the jobs of both designers and design engineers to insure that the designers have greater responsibility and authority for linking with external groups. >

Prevention strategies and the low back in industry.

Abstract: Several different approaches have been tried in industry to prevent low-back injuries. The scientific literature shows that only job-specific strength testing and ergonomic job design are partially effective in preventing low-back injuries. Job-specific strength testing is supported as a means of identifying high-risk workers who need to perform manual materials handling. However, this approach should be carefully validated for its effectiveness before it is used as a form of selection procedure. At present, ergonomic job design offers the most potential for preventing disabling low-back injuries and other musculoskeletal injuries. Quantitative and objective methods (such as NIOSH guidelines, biomechanical models, energy expenditure, and strength data) are available to analyze a given job and to determine the relative risk of an injury.

Facilitating Natural Supports in the Workplace: Strategies for Support Consultants

Abstract: By and large, supported employment services that emphasize individual rather than group placements have followed a particular program model widely known as the job coach model. In fact, the terms "job coaching" and "supported employment" have become so closely linked that many people are unaware that job coaching predated the supported employment movement by many years (e.g. Doanne & Valenti, 1977). In the job coach model, a rehabilitation agency staff person known as a job coach, job trainer, or employment specialist provides support services to employees with severe disabilities at community job sites. Job coaching includes (a) analyzing the task to be performed, (b) systematically teaching each element of the task, (c) collecting data, and (d) gradually fading to the cues and reinforcers in the natural setting. Job coaches may also teach job-related social skills and perform additional functions, including some that take place away from the employment site (Wehman & Melia, 1985). Job coaching has been an integral part of early supported employment demonstration projects (Boles, Bellamy, Horner, & Mank, 1984; Revell, Wehman, & Arnold, 1985) and has been refined and expanded in numerous publications and training manuals (e.g., Moon, Goodall, Barcus, & Brooke, 1986). Impressive demonstrations of the effectiveness of the job coach model as compared with previous employment services available to people with severe disabilities have, however been accompanied by a recognition that external intervention by human service personnel alone is insufficient as a source of community employment support. This recognition has resulted from at least three developments. First, the importance of personnel within the natural environment has been increasingly recognized. In one of the earliest descriptions of what is now known as supported employment, Wehman (1976) recommended the inclusion of co-workers in the process of training and fading. Reports of non-sheltered vocational training of employees with severe disabilities have included co-workers and supervisors as partners in the training process (e.g., Rusch & Mechetti, 1981). Recently, strategies for including co-workers more fully and earlier have been recommended and documented (Shafer, 1986; Shafer, Tait, Keen, & Jesiolowski, 1989). Second, since integration is one of the primary components of supported employment, facilitating integration has been one of the functions assigned to job coaches. But social integration has not always accompanied physical placement in natural settings, whether vocational, residential or educational. In a review of existing supported employment literature, Rusch, Chadsey-Rusch, and Johnson (1989) noted that interactions between work trainees and nonhandicapped personnel are consistently reported far more often with staff trainers than with co-workers. Chadsey-Rusch, Gonzalez, and Tines (1987) found that workers with mental retardation were less likely to engage in non-work related social interactions than their non-disabled co-workers. The facilitation of integration function of job coaches has received far less attention in the literature than has skills training. Recent evidence suggests that job coaching may, in some instances, actually restrict social integration. A participant-observation study of supported employment found that job coaches sometimes brought a human service perspective and a narrow job task focus to work settings and were unaware of, or ignored, the wider "culture" of workplaces (Hagner, 1989). Further, job coach training can impede the natural social processes by which experienced employees teach "the ropes" to new employees and socialize them into the culture of the setting, and can project the message that some special expertise is required to interact with employees with severe disabilities. Such processes tend to put social distance between supported employees and their fellow employees. …

Generalizing the importance of occupational and career views to job satisfaction attitudes

Abstract: There is a preponderance of theory postulating that the level of job satisfaction is a direct function of the perceived discrepancy between what the employee desires from a job and what the employee actually receives from it. To date, the only job satisfaction research program that has systematically examined the relationship between job satisfaction and the degree to which perceptions of job rewards match the expressed desires of the individual is that conducted by the Minnesota Work Adjustment Project (MWAP). Although the MWAP has had success in predicting job satisfaction some of the time, it also encounters many unpredictable cases. Based on research with industrial R&D personnel, Scarpello and Campbell (1983a) suggested that one reason for the unpredictable cases is that people's views of their occupations and careers help explain their reactions to current job situations. This paper discusses the limitations of the MWAP for job satisfaction research and reports the results of a study with 806 manufacturing plant employees, that assessed the external validity and thus, generalizability of Scarpello and Campbell's (1983a) findings. Results supported the external validity and generalizability of the previous findings. Implications for future job satisfaction research are discussed.

Higher Order Skills, Job Design, and Incentives: An Analysis and Proposal

Abstract: There is a growing consensus that the curriculum as taught in schools is “out of balance.” Emphasis on basic skills outweighs to a far greater extent than appropriate the emphasis on problem solving and higher order skills. Drawing on ideas about the effects of specialization from behavioral decision theory and on recent work in the economics of organization, this article proposes structural changes in the teaching job to address this problem. The possible limitations as well as advantages of the proposal are discussed.

Family Preservation Workers: Sources of Job Satisfaction and Job Stress:

Abstract: This article reports the results of a pilot survey to examine staff burnout and sources of job satisfaction and job stress among intensive family preservation workers. Participants in this study were found to be moderately to highly emotionally exhausted as measured by the Maslach Burnout Inventory. The intense time-limited nature of the work was perceived as a stressor. Opportunities for improving skills and professional growth were viewed as major sources of satisfaction. Implications are drawn for social work in-service training and worker supervision.

Job Satisfaction and Performance in a Changing Environment

Abstract: Today, research libraries are faced with the challenge of retaining an effective staff who have the skills necessary to respond to new and changing circumstances and increased user demands. Ways must be found not only to reduce stress and prevent burnout but also to sustain a level of interest and job satisfaction among staff sufficient to ensure a high level of performance. The elements of job attitudes and their relationship to performance output are analyzed. Factors which lead to job satisfaction and dissatisfaction are explored. Steps which library administrators and managers can take to improve job satisfaction are suggested

Personnel training for safer material handling

Abstract: There are three ergonomic approaches for making ‘manual material handling’ (MMH) as safe and efficient as possible: personnel training and selection fit the worker to the job, work design fits the job to the person. The three strategies are highly related because both job demands and related human capabilities must be known in order to match them. All three strategies should be successful if properly applied. Unfortunately, few scientifically-reliable data exist to support this premise for personnel training; partly because there may be very different training objectives and procedures suitable for different MMH situations. Furthermore, the state of knowledge in biomechanics and physiology does not provide clear and generally applicable guidelines about suitable use of the body, not even for lifting. Evaluation of the success of past training approaches is very difficult because of the general lack of experimental design and control in most studies. In this contribution, an attempt is made to order the to...

Job Satisfaction and Commitment of Older Workers in Small Businesses

Abstract: Extensive research has examined work attitudes such as job satisfaction and organizational commitment and has identified various characteristics which are related to these constructs. For example, studies indicate older workers are more satisfied and committed to their firms than younger employees (Rhodes 1983). The majority of such studies, however, focus on employees in large firms in a variety of work settings. Seldom have these constructs been addressed in a systematic manner in small businesses. The relationship between work attitudes and the ages of individuals employed by small businesses has received even less attention. An understanding of such relationships may be just as important to the small business owner as to the manager in larger organizations as both seek to deal with the increasingly older work force predicted by the U. S. Small Business Administration. Traditionally, small firms have employed proportionately more younger and more older workers than large organizations, groups comprised to a great extent of retirees, homemakers, and students (Barth, Cordes, and Haber 1984; U. S. Small Business Administration 1988). The Office of Advocacy of the U. S. Small Business Administration, however, predicts a decline in both of these groups during the present decade. The lower birth rate of the mid-sixties will decrease the number of younger workers in both relative and absolute terms. Participation in the work force of individuals over 55 will also decline as more workers choose to retire early. With the decline in the labor force of these particular age groups, small businesses may find it increasingly difficult to maintain a work force similar to the one they have employed in the past. They will be at an economic disadvantage as they compete with their larger counterparts for the same pool of prime age (i.e., 35 to 54) workers. They may also find it increasingly difficult to accommodate their changing employee base in terms of the need for training, flexibility, and increased productivity. As a consequence, it is incumbent upon the small business owner to identify characteristics of employees who will be more satisfied and more committed to their firms. At present, there is little research to assist small business owners in these endeavors. This study attempts to remedy this omission. It examines the relationship of work attitudes and characteristics of employees of various age groups to identify those individuals who are inclined to make long-term commitments to their companies. BACKGROUND Both job satisfaction and organizational commitment have long been recognized as antecedents of employee tenure. Job satisfaction has been defined by Locke (1969, 1300) as a "pleasurable or positive emotional state resulting from the appraisal of one's job or job experiences." Organizational commitment is viewed as an attitude involving employee loyalty to the organization, with those individuals who are committed being willing to contribute something of themselves to their organizations (Angle and Perry 1981; Cook, Hepworth, Wall, and Warr, 1981; Morris and Sherman, 1981; Porter and Smith, 1970). Satisfaction with various aspects of occupational experiences is as difficult to characterize as is satisfaction with other forms of everyday experiences (Cook et al. 1981). With increased awareness of the significance of employee job satisfaction, researchers have designed a number of instruments which attempt to measure employee attitudes, values and perceptions as they relate to occupational experiences. Such instruments include specific individual facets such as work, pay, promotions, co-workers and supervision, rather than global measures of employee satisfaction, so that explicit areas of low job satisfaction may be identified. Scarpello and Campbell (1983) contended, however, that global job satisfaction is more than just the sum of individual work facets and that frequently some important variables are omitted from the measurement of job satisfaction. …