

Mgmt 385
Human Resource Management

Job Analysis and Job Design

Facilitator: N Dube
 What is Job Analysis?

 A process that determines the skills, duties and
knowledge required for performing jobs in an
organization
 It determines the nature and contents of a particular
job
 It is a systematic process of gathering information
concerning the duties performed in a job and the
human characteristics necessary in the successful
performance of those duties
 Why is it done

 Basis of job descriptions & job specifications
 Foundational for HRM, basis for many HRM
functions - provides data for recruitment and
selection, training, job evaluation, performance
management etc.
 When is it done?

 When jobs change due to changes in technology,
methods, systems, procedures
 When new jobs are created
 At the inception of organisations
 When there is job dissatisfaction
 When there are high turnover rates
 Importance

 Assists recruiters to do their job
 Helps in correct placement of employees
 Assists to determine training needs
 Fundamental in job evaluation
 Basis for objective performance appraisal
 Self assessment
 Minimises disputes
 Valuable in health and safety considerations

 Steps in Job Analysis
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1. Determination of purpose for conducting job analysis
2. Identification of jobs to be analysed
3. Reviewing of relevant background information
4. Planning and execution of job analysis project
5. Writing of job description and job specifications
6. Periodic review
 Job Analysis Data
Collection Methods

 Interview (individual/group)
 Questionnaire
 Observation
 Technical Conference
 Diary/Records
 Procedure or training manuals
 Combination of Methods (e.g. observation-interview)
 Job Description

 Written statement on what job holders are required
to do in terms of activities, duties or tasks
 Based on information from job analysis
 Prescriptive and inflexible
 More concerned with tasks and duties to be
performed rather than competencies required or
outcomes
 Job Description:
HR Adviser, Recruitment

Job title: HR adviser; recruitment
Reports to: HR Service Centre Manager
Job purpose: To provide recruitment services to line
managers for jobs below management level
Main duties:
1. Respond promptly to requests from line managers to assist
in recruiting staff.
2. Produce person specifications.
3. Agree on the use of recruitment agencies and/or media
advertisements or internet notifications of vacancies.
 
4. Brief and liaise with agencies and/or draft
advertisements for jobs for approval by line managers
and place advertisements or information on vacancies
using the media and/or the internet.
5. Process replies and draws up short lists.
6. Conduct preliminary interviews independently or
conduct short-list interviews with line managers.
7. Agree offer terms with line manager, take up
references and confirm the offer.
8. Review and evaluate sources of candidates and
analyse recruitment costs.
(Armstrong, 2009)
 Job Specification

 sets out the education, qualifications, training,
experience, personal attributes and competences
required for one to successfully perform their job
 variety of uses in HRM (recruitment, selection,
promotion)
 General Features

 Education
 Experience
 Training
 Physical Effort
 Skills
 Emotional characteristics
 Unusual sensory demands
 JOB DESIGN

 This is the conscious effort to organise tasks,
duties, and responsibilities into a unit of work to
achieve certain objectives, to attain a fit between
the individual and the job.
 It is the arrangement of work in order to reduce or
overcome job dissatisfaction due to repetitive
tasks
 The idea is that the job should be designed in
such a way as to enable employees to have control
over the aspects of their work
 
 It enhances the quality of the work life, harnesses the
potential of the workers in a more effective manner
and thereby improves employee performance
 The result of poorly designed jobs is: boredom,
frustration high turnover, reduced motivation, low
productivity levels, increase in operating cost
 Factors affecting Job
Design

 Organisational factors
 Environmental factors
 Behavioural factors
 Organisational Factors

 Task Features – a job design involves a number of tasks
performed by several workers. Each task consists of (i)
planning, (ii) executing, and (iii) con­trolling. An ideal job
design needs to integrate all these three features of the tasks to
be performed
 Work Flow – the nature of a product influences the sequences of
jobs (work flow). Tasks involved in a job need to be sequenced
and balanced for effective and efficient work. Consider the car
as a product.
E.g. Car product - the frame of a car needs to be built before the
fenders, and similarly the doors will be built later. Therefore, once
the sequences of tasks is determined, then the balance between
tasks is also established
 
 Ergonomics – this is designing and shaping job in
such a manner so as to strike a fit between the job
and the job holder, it matches job requirements
with the worker’s physical abilities to perform a
job effectively
 Work Practices – it is the way of doing work based
on tradition or collective wishes of workers
 Environmental Factors

 Social and Cultural Expectations - increase in literacy,
education, knowledge, awareness, etc. has raised
employee expectations from jobs. Employees are no
longer willing to work under any condition. This has led
to features like work hours, rest breaks, vacations,
religious beliefs, etc. disregarding these social
expectations can create dissatisfaction, low motivation,
high turnover and low quality of working life
 Employee Ability and Availability - employee abilities and
capabilities must be considered in job design.
Incorporating job elements beyond the employee ability
causes a mismatch between the job and the job holder
 Behavioral Factors

 Autonomy – this is the freedom to control one’s
actions/responses to the environment, it increases
sense of responsibility and self esteem. The absence
or lack of autonomy can cause workers apathy to
jobs, poor performance
 Use of Abilities - workers perform jobs effectively that
offer them opportunity to make use of their abilities.
Workers find such jobs both interesting and
challenging
 
 Feedback - job design should be determined in such a
way that workers receive meaningful feedback about
what they did. Feedback helps workers improve
their performance.
 Variety - lack of variety causes boredom and leads to
fatigue. Fatigue causes mistakes and accidents.
Variety in the job reduces boredom, fatigue and
mistakes can be avoided thereby increasing
efficiency and effectiveness in performance
Methods/Techniques in
Job Design

 Job simplification – jobs are broken down and each
part assigned to an individual
 Job rotation – this moves employees from one task to
another in a bid to reduce monotony through the
increase of variety in jobs performed
 Job enlargement – this technique combines previously
fragmented tasks into one job. It aims to increase the
variety and meaning of repetitive work. This is
known as horizontal expansion
 
 Job enrichment – this goes beyond job enlargement, adds
greater autonomy and responsibility to a job. It aims to
maximize the interest and challenge of work. This is
known as vertical expansion, where the employee is more
in control and has less supervision
 Self-managing teams (autonomous work groups) – this is an
extension of job enrichment where self-regulating teams
work mostly without direct supervision. Individual jobs
are enlarged to include a wider range of operative skills.
The group decides on the methods of work and the
planning, scheduling and control of work. It distributes
tasks among members and monitors its own performance,
and takes corrective action whenever required
 
 High-performance work design – in this technique,
working groups are set up in environments that
encourage high levels of performance. Management
defines what is needed in terms of methods of
production and the results expected. These self
managed teams have full responsibility (planning,
controlling and monitoring of work). They are
characterised by multiskilling and job demarcations
are blurred. Employees are encouraged to and are
provided with training for the acquisition of new skills
 Choice of
Method/Technique

 Although job rotation and job enlargement have
their uses (skill development and relieving
monotony), they do not address the issue of intrinsic
motivation and other various motivating
characteristics of jobs
 The issues of motivation are best addressed and
satisfied through the use of job enrichment,
autonomous work groups, or high-performance
work design, as appropriate