HUMAN RESOURCE

MANAGEMENT

By
MADHUKAR SAXENA
 JOB DESIGN
Job design follows job analysis i.e. it is the next step after job analysis.
It aims at outlining and organising tasks, duties and responsibilities
into a single unit of work for the achievement of certain objectives. It
also outlines the methods and relationships that are essential for the
success of a certain job. In simpler terms it refers to the what, how
much, how many and the order of the tasks for a job/s.

Job design essentially involves integrating job responsibilities or

content and certain qualifications that are required to perform the
same. It outlines the job responsibilities very clearly and also helps in
attracting the right candidates to the right job. Further it also makes the
job look interesting and specialised.
 JOB DESIGN

There are various steps involved in job design that follow a logical
sequence, those that were mentioned earlier on. The sequence is as
follows:
•What tasks are required to e done or what tasks is part of the job?
•How are the tasks performed?
•What amount are tasks are required to be done?
•What is the sequence of performing these tasks?
All these questions are aimed at arriving upon a clear definition of a
specific job and thereby make it less risky for the one performing the
same. A well defined job encourages feeling of achievement among
the employees and a sense of high self esteem.
 JOB DESIGN
The whole process of job design is aimed to address various problems within the
organisational setup, those that pertain to ones description of a job and the associated
relationships. More specifically the following areas are fine tuned:
 Checking the work overload.
 Checking upon the work under load.
 Ensuring tasks are not repetitive in nature.
 Ensuring that employees don not remain isolated.
 Defining working hours clearly.
 Defining the work processes clearly.
The above mentioned are factors that if not taken care of result into building stress
within the employees.
 JOB DESIGN
Importance of Job Design: Job design is a very important function of staffing. If the jobs are
designed properly, then highly efficient managers will join the organisation. They will be
motivated to improve the productivity and profitability of the organisation. However, if the
jobs are designed badly, then it will result in absenteeism, high labour turnover, conflicts, and
other labour problems.

Benefits of a good Job design

The following are the benefits of a good job design:
Employee Input: A good job design enables a good job feedback. Employees have the option
to vary tasks as per their personal and social needs, habits and circumstances in the workplace.
Employee Training: Training is an integral part of job design. Contrary to the philosophy of
“leave them alone’ job design lays due emphasis on training people so that are well aware of
what their job demands and how it is to be done.
Work / Rest Schedules: Job design offers good work and rest schedule by clearly defining
the number of hours an individual has to spend in his/her job.
Adjustments: A good job designs allows for adjustments for physically demanding jobs by
minimising the energy spent doing the job and by aligning the manpower requirements.
Job design is a continuous and ever evolving process that is aimed at helping employees make
adjustments with the changes in the workplace. The end goal is reducing dissatisfaction,
enhancing motivation and employee engagement at the workplace.
 JOB DESIGN
Steps of Job design
1. Specification of Individual task : Details about
i) Duties and Responsibilities.
ii) Timing of job.
iii) Tasks or targets for the job.
iv) Working conditions and
v) Specification of qualification, experience and skills required.
2. Specification of method for performing each task. : Details of
i) Work process or methods.
ii) Experiments and research.
iii) Sequence & ordering of activities.
iv) Trouble shooting the problems.
v) Alternative methods.
3. Combination of tasks into specific job to be assigned to individuals.
-Grouping of activities on the basis of right combination of skills and
working processes.
Techniques of Job Design
1. Work Simplification: It involves
- Removing useless activities.
- Redefining mechanical pacing of work.
- Avoiding repetitive work progress.
- Work should be concentrated on only one part of product.
2. Job Rotation: Employees are rotated from one job to another of more
or less similar nature after regular intervals of time.
Benefits : - Employee becomes competent in different jobs.
- Provides personal growth.
- Gives more value to the employee.
- Enhance personal satisfaction.
- Provides options to the organisation for that job.
3. Job Enlargement: It is a type of horizontal expansion of duties and
responsibilities.
- Opposite to Job Simplification.
- Expansion of number of tasks & duties assigned to employee.
- Does not require new skills and abilities.
- Usually resisted by the employees.
- It may be in terms of more working hours, greater responsibilities
4. Job Enrichment: Vertical & horizontal expansion of duties & responsibilities.
Seeks to improve both task efficiency & human satisfaction.
Greater scope for personal achievement and recognition.
Employee becomes more responsible and accept challenges.
Provides more opportunities.
Employee does more planning and control.
Other Features of Job Enrichment are:
a) An enriched job will have more responsibility and autonomy (vertical
enrichment), more variety of tasks (horizontal enrichment) and more growth
opportunities.
b) Employee does more planning, controlling & self evaluation with less
supervision.
c) It benefits both employee and the organisation in terms of increased motivation,
satisfaction, performance, job involvement and reduce absenteeism.
d) It meets certain psychological needs of the job holder like esteem, importance,
value, respect, sense of achievement, greater sense of responsibility etc.
e) It gives strong motivation to the employees with addition of work and
responsibilities.
f) It helps to stimulate the process of improvement in other areas of organisation
also.
g) Job Empowerment is the by-product of Job Enrichment. Empowering means
passing or delegating authority and responsibility. Job enrichment provides power,
authority and a sense of ownership and control.
h) Empowerment results in Self Directed Work Teams. Employees under a team
manage & improve performances, solve day-to-day problems and plan & control
their work.
 Factors affecting Job Design

The guidelines influencing or factors affecting job design are depicted below.
1. Proper scope of job: The scope of the job should be proper. If the scope is narrow (less), then
the job will not be challenging. It will not give an opportunity for development. The manager will
not get satisfaction after completing an easy job. If the scope of the job is very wide, then the
manager will not be able to handle it properly. This will cause stress, frustration and loss of
control. Therefore, scope of the job must be balanced and proper.
2. Full-time challenge of the job: The job should be so challenging that it takes up the full-time
and effort of the manager. So, the service of the manager must be fully utilised. If not, the
manager will have a lot of free time. He will use this free time to interfere in the work of his
subordinates. This will cause problems and conflicts because subordinates do not like
unnecessary interference from their superiors.
3. Managerial skills : The skills of the manager should be considered before designing his job.
All managers do not have equal skills. So jobs should be designed after considering the skills of
the manager. So, a manager having a high level of skill should be given very challenging jobs
while a manager having a low level of skill should be given fewer challenging jobs. Jobs must be
made flexible so that it can be changed according to the skills of the manager.
4. Organisation's requirements: Jobs must be designed according to the requirements of the
organisation. We cannot use the same job design for all organisations.
 Factors affecting Job Design

5. Individual likes and dislikes: People have different likes and dislikes. Some people like to
work alone while some people prefer to work in groups. Some people want to do onlyplanning
and decision making while other people like to implement these plans and decision. So,
individual likes and dislikes must be considered while designing the job.
6. Organisational structure: Organisational structure also affects the job design. Individual jobs
must fit into the organisation's structure.
7. Technology: The level of technology used by the organisation also affects the job design. An
organisation having a high level of technology will have different job designs compared to an
organisation having a low level of technology.
 Factors affecting Job Design
1. Organisational Factors
Job Characteristics:Problems regarding complexities with in a job.
Problem due to integration of multiple tools.
Measurement of responsibilities.
Planning, Executing and Controlling.
Work Flow: Difficulties in ordering of activities as per nature of
job.
Ergonomics: Designing & shaping jobs to fit physical abilities &
characteristics of individuals. It helps in designing jobs
in a balanced way.

Work Practices: Different ways to performing work are determined by

Time & Motion study, in which standard time is
required to complete a job.
2. Environmental Factors
Employees Abilities and availability: There should be a balance between
employee’s abilities and their availability in the market. Complex jobs
require simple designing and little training, which helps in easy availability.
Social & Cultural Expectations: Literacy, knowledge and awareness are
expected from jobs. Quality of work life, hours of work, holidays, religious
beliefs and management styles are also considered.

3. Behavioural Elements
Feedback: Employee must get their performance feedback.
They should ideally work on a complete product or
any part of it.
Autonomy: To provide freedom to manage & control. It gives recognition
& esteem.
Use of abilities: Job allotted must make full use of abilities of job holder.
Variety : Requirement of variety in work and responsibilities,
which avoids boredom, fatigue and reduces errors.
 Human Resource Planning
According to Decenzo and Robbins,
“Human resource planning is the process by which an organisation
ensures that it has the right number and kind of people, at the right
place, at the right time, capable of effectively completing those tasks
that will help the organisation achieve its overall objectives.”

Human resource planning is a continuous process. It cannot be rigid or

static; it is amenable to modifications, review and adjustments in
accordance with the needs of the organisation or the changing
circumstances.

Human resource planning is a two-phased process by which management

can project the future manpower requirements and develop suitable
action plans to accommodate the implications of projections.
 Human Resource Planning
Objectives of Human Resource Planning
The major objectives of human resource planning in an
organisation are as follows :
• To ensure optimum use of human resources currently
employed.
• To avoid imbalances in the distribution and allocation of
human resources.
• To assess or forecast future skill requirements for the
accomplishment of the organisation’s overall objectives.
• To provide control measure to ensure availability of necessary
resources. When required.
• To control the cost aspect of human resources.
• To formulate transfer and promotion policies.
 Objectives of
Human Resource Planning
The basic activities involved in human resource planning are as :

• Listing of current manpower or human resources with the

organisation.’

• Assessing the extent to which the current manpower is utilized to the

advantage of the organisation.

• Phasing out the surplus manpower, if any.

• Analysing the requirements of manpower in future in the light of

expansion plans, retirement of personnel etc.

• Making manpower procurement plans.

• Designing training programs for different categories of manpower.

 Benefits of Manpower Planning
• Manpower planning is an important tool of Human Resource
management to anticipate shortages and / or surpluses of
manpower and correct these imbalances before they become
unmanageable and expensive.
• Manpower planning results in reduced labour costs as it helps
the management to anticipate shortages and /or surpluses of
manpower and correct these imbalances before they become
unmanageable and expensive.
• It is a better basis for planning employee development that is
designed to make optimum use of workers’ skills within the
organisation.
• It enables identification of the gaps of the existing manpower so
that corrective training could be imparted. Thus the training
program becomes more effective.
 Benefits of Manpower Planning
• It leads to improvement in the overall business planning
process.
• It helps in formulating managerial succession plan as a part of
the replacement planning process.
• It leads to a greater awareness of the importance of sound
manpower management throughout the organisation.
• It serves as a tool to evaluate the effect of alternative manpower
actions and policies.
.
HUMAN RESOURCE PLANNING PROCESS
 DIFFICULTIES IN HUMAN RESOURCE PLANNING
Human resource planning is not always effective. Some of the major
problems are described below :

Lack of Understanding of Rationale of Planning.-

Insufficient Top Management’s Support.-

Insufficient Initial Effort.

Lack of Coordination with other functions.

Lack of Integration with Organisational Plans.

Non-cooperation of Operating Managers.