Job design is the organization of tasks, duties and responsibilities of human resources in an organization. The main focus is on allocation and distribution of duties, authority and responsibilities to a job in an organization.
Job designing involves careful analysis of the mental capacity, efficiency and motivation of a worker and the working standards/procedure used by a worker in performance of his/her job.
It involves the study of:
- Skills required to perform a job successfully
- Type, Length and Difficulty of Tasks related to a job
- Degree to which the job impacts other internal and external aspects of the organization
- Degree of freedom/restriction and extent of responsibilities related to a job
- Degree to which job itself explains its objectives and provides satisfaction to the employee.
A careful analysis of these factors is necessary to design a job effectively.
Techniques of Job Design
(1) Job Enlargement – Job Enlargement involves expansion of a job horizontally in an organization. It increases the scope, tasks and duties of an employee related to a job, to provide diversity in operations and encourage people with specialized jobs.
(2) Job Simplification – It involves simplification of a job. In order to do so jobs are divided into smaller and subsequent tasks and assigned to employees as full-time jobs. Breaking down jobs into simple tasks helps employees to learn tasks quickly and enables shorter work cycles which require little to no effort. This allows a company to hire low-skilled and untrained workers at standard rates and helps in replacing employees easily.
(3) Job Enrichment – It involves provision of opportunities for achievement, recognition, advancement, authority and growth to employees in relation to their job, in order to motivate them to perform better and develop a positive attitude. Employees are subjected to challenging projects and tasks in order to build personal and professional growth and provide job satisfaction to workers.
(4) Job Rotation – It involves movement of an employee from one job to another within the organization. Job rotation relives the employees from monotony and freedom and enhances the versatility of the employee.