HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT

CHAPTER 2: THE ANALYSIS AND

DESIGN OF WORK
1. Discuss, briefly the organization’s structure and work-flow process.
Organization structure refers to the relatively stable and formal network of
vertical and horizontal interconnections among jobs that constitute the
organization. It is a system that outlines how certain activities are directed in
order to achieve the goals of an organization. These activities can include
rules, roles, and responsibilities. An organization’s structure is typically
displayed via an organizational chart that conveys both vertical reporting
relationship and horizontal functional responsibilities.

There are two most critical dimensions of organization structure;

centralization and departmentalization. Centralization refers to the degree to
which decision-making authority resides at the top of the organizational chart
as opposed to being distributed throughout lower levels. On the other hand,
departmentalization refers to the degree to which work units are grouped
based on functional similarity or similarity of work flow.

Work-flow design is the process of analyzing the tasks necessary to

produce a product or service, prior to allocating and assigning these tasks to
a particular job category or person. This includes identifying outputs of work,
to specify the quality and quantity standards for those outputs, analyzing the
processes and inputs necessary for producing the desired outputs. This work-
flow process enable managers to understand the steps to be done in order to
produce a high-quality products as well as the skills needed to perform those
tasks.

Organizational Structure is a larger-scale examination of the same

dynamics that power the workflow analysis. In many cases, the goal of
workflow analysis is to figure out if any efforts are being duplicated and to
learn which tasks can be eliminated. This streamlines the efforts of the
workforce. The goal of organizational structuring is also to create an efficient
workforce, by establishing work responsibility and allocating the
administrative authority to delegate tasks and control employees.
2. What is a job analysis? Explain further its importance in human
resource management.

Job Analysis is a systematic process of getting detailed information on

nature of a job, qualities and qualification, physical and mental capabilities
required in a job, duties and responsibilities, necessary skills required to
perform a job, working conditions and environment for a job, in order to
describe job description and job specification, for recruitment and selection of
employee, improve job satisfaction, employee safety and to build up
employee motivation.

Job analysis performs numerous roles in an HRM department, by

analyzing and determining various information needed by an organization,
they support the business’ operations both internally and externally. They
provide analysis in several aspects that a company needs, including:

Work Redesign, often a firm will look for redesigning a work to make it
more efficient and effective. In order to redesign it, the company must have
detailed information about the existing job. In addition, redesigning a job will,
in fact, be similar to analyzing a job that does not yet exist.

Human Resource Planning, in a dynamic environment, managers analyze

an organization’s human resource needs and develop activities that enable a
firm to adapt to change. Job analysis is a qualitative aspect of manpower
needs, as it determines job requirements in terms of skills, qualities and other
human characteristics. This facilitates the division of labor into different
occupations.

Selection, this identifies the most qualified applicants for employment. In

order to hire a good person for the job, it is very important to know the
requirements of the job and the qualities of the person who will be doing the
job. Information on these two elements comes from the job description or job
description and helps management to tailor the job requirements as closely
as possible to the attitudes, skills, interests of employees, etc.

Training, Job analysis determines standard levels for job performance.

This helps manage learning development programs. Trainings have different
degrees of difficulty but all require the trainer to have identified the tasks
performed in the job to ensure that the training will prepare individuals to
perform their jobs effectively.
 Performance Appraisal, job analysis data provides a clear standard of
performance for each job. Employee performance can be objectively
evaluated against the job performance standard. Through this managers will
know who performed effectively and ineffectively in order to reward those who
performed well and improve the performance of those who work ineffectively
or provide a written justification for why the poor performer should be
disciplined.

Career Planning, is a process of matching skill requirements of various

jobs to individual’s skills and aspirations to pair with the opportunities that are
or may become available in the organization. This allows people in-charge of
career planning to guide individuals into jobs in which they will succeed and
be satisfied.

Job Evaluation, the basis for job evaluation was provided by job analysis.
Determining the relative value of the job which in turn helps determine job
compensation is the purpose of a job appraisal. If pay structures are not
equitable, employees will be dissatisfied and quit, or they will not see the
benefits of striving for promotions

3. Explain the different approaches to job design.

There are four (4) main different approaches to job design, namely:

Mechanistic Approach, has foundations in industrial engineering. The

focus of this approach is maximizing efficiency by identifying the simplest way
to structure work. This reduces the complexity of the work to provide more
human resource efficiency - that is, making the work so simple that anyone
can be trained quickly and easily to perform it. This approach focuses on
designing jobs around the concepts of task specialization, skill simplification,
and repetition. The positives of this approach are decreased training time,
lower chance of job error, and less mental challenge and stress. On the other
hand, its’ downside are that employees can have lower job satisfaction and
motivation, which can lead to lower productivity and more absenteeism. The
jobs can be boring and unchallenging due to their repetitive and exact nature.

Motivational Approach, has origins in organizational psychology and

management literature. Unlike mechanistic approach that focuses only on the
best way and repetition, motivational approach focuses on the job
characteristics that affect psychological meaning and motivational potential,
and it views attitudinal variables (such as satisfaction) as the most important
outcomes of job design. It is believe that this approach can provide jobs that
offer freedom, incentive, motivation, and feedback, which will lead to
advantages such as increased job satisfaction, involvement and performance,
and lower absenteeism. On the downside, this approach requires more
dedication to implement training, have higher chance of errors and, lastly, it
can place more mental demands and stress on the employees.

Biological Approach, comes primarily from the sciences of biomechanics,

work physiology, and occupational medicine, and it is usually referred to as
ergonomics. This approach focuses in minimizing physical strain on the
worker by structuring the physical work environment around the way the
human body works.

Last but not the least perceptual–motor approach, has roots in human-
factors literature. If the biological approach focuses on physical capabilities
and limitations, the perceptual–motor approach focuses on human mental
capabilities and limitations. This is similar to the mechanistic approach since it
also reduces a job’s cognitive demands. This approach seeks to lessen the
information-processing requirements in a job by considering a worker’s
mental capabilities and limitations.