WORK DESIGN AND MEASUREMENT

The importance of work design is underscored by an organization’s dependence

on human efforts (i.e., work) to accomplish its goals. Furthermore, many of the topics in
this chapter are especially relevant for productivity improvement and continuous
improvement.

JOB DESIGN

Job design involves specifying the content and methods of jobs. Job designers
focus on what will be done in a job, who will do the job, how the job will be done, and
where the job will be done. The objectives of job design include productivity, safety, and
quality of work life. Current practice in job design contains elements of two basic
schools of thought. One might be called the efficiency school because it emphasizes a
systematic, logical approach to job design; the other is called the behavioral school
because it emphasizes satisfaction of wants and needs. The efficiency approach, a
refinement of Frederick Winslow Taylor’s scientific management concepts, received
considerable emphasis in the past. The behavioral approach followed and has
continued to make inroads into many aspects of job design. It is noteworthy that
specialization is a primary issue of disagreement between the efficiency and behavioral
approaches.

 Specialization

The term specialization describes jobs that have a very narrow scope. Examples
range from assembly lines to medical specialties. College professors often specialize in
teaching certain courses, some auto mechanics specialize in transmission repair, and
some bakers specialize in wedding cakes. The main rationale for specialization is the
ability to concentrate one’s efforts and thereby become proficient at that type of work.

 Behavioral Approaches to Job Design

 In an effort to make jobs more interesting and meaningful, job designers
frequently consider job enlargement, job rotation, job enrichment, and increased use of
mechanization.

1. Job enlargement. Giving a worker a larger portion of the total task, by horizontal
loading.
2. Job rotation. Workers periodically exchange jobs.
3. Job enrichment. Increasing responsibility for planning and coordination tasks, by
vertical loading.
 Motivation

Motivation is a key factor in many aspects of work life. Not only can it influence
quality and productivity, it also contributes to the work environment. People work for a
variety of reasons in addition to compensation. Other reasons include socialization, self-
actualization, status, the physiological aspects of work, and a sense of purpose and
accomplishment. Awareness of these factors can help management to develop a
motivational framework that encourages workers to respond in a positive manner to the
goals of the organization. A detailed discussion of motivation is beyond the scope of this
book, but its importance to work design should be obvious.

Another factor that influences motivation, productivity, and employee–

management relations is trust. In an ideal work environment, there is a high level of trust
between workers and managers. When managers trust employees, there is a greater
tendency to give employees added responsibilities. When employees trust
management, they are more likely to respond positively. Conversely, when they do not
trust management, they are more likely to respond in less desirable ways.

 Teams

The efforts of business organizations to become more productive, competitive,

and customer oriented have caused them to rethink how work is accomplished.
Significant changes in the structure of some work environments have been the
increasing use of teams and the way workers are paid, particularly in lean production
systems.
 Self-directed teams, sometimes referred to as self-managed teams, are
designed to achieve a higher level of teamwork and employee involvement. Although
such teams are not given absolute authority to make all decisions, they are typically
empowered to make changes in the work processes under their control. The underlying
concept is that the workers, who are close to the process and have the best knowledge
of it, are better suited than management to make the most effective changes to improve
the process.

Generally, the benefits of teams include higher quality, higher productivity, and
greater worker satisfaction. Moreover, higher levels of employee satisfaction can lead to
less turnover and absenteeism, resulting in lower costs to train new workers and less
need to fill in for absent employees. This does not mean that organizations will have no
difficulties in applying the team concept. Managers, particularly middle managers, often
feel threatened as teams assume more of the traditional functions of managers.

 Ergonomics

Ergonomics (or human factors) is the scientific discipline concerned with the
understanding of interactions among humans and other elements of a system, and the
profession that applies theory, principles, data and methods to design in order to
optimize human well-being and overall system performance. “Ergonomists contribute to
the design and evaluation of tasks, jobs, products, environments and systems in order
to make them compatible with the needs, abilities and limitations of people.” In the work
environment, ergonomics also helps to increase productivity by reducing worker
discomfort and fatigue. The International Ergonomics Association organizes ergonomics
into three domains: physical (e.g., repetitive movements, layout, health, and safety);
cognitive (mental workload, decision making, human–computer interaction, and work
stress); and organizational (e.g., communication, teamwork, work design, and telework).

Over the years since then, technological changes have broadened the scope of
ergonomics, as hand–eye coordination and decision making became more important in
the workplace. More recently, the increasing level of human–computer interfacing has
again broadened the scope of the field of ergonomics, not only in job design, but also in
electronics product design. Poor posture can lead to fatigue, low productivity, and
injuries to the back, neck, and arm. Good posture can help avoid or minimize these
problems.

QUALITY OF WORK LIFE

People work for a variety of reasons. Generally people work to earn a living. Also
they may be seeking self-realization, status, physical and mental stimulation, and
socialization. Quality of work life affects not only workers’ overall sense of well-being
and contentment, but also worker productivity. Quality of work life has several key
aspects. Getting along well with coworkers and having good managers can contribute
greatly to the quality of work life. Leadership style is particularly important. Also
important are working conditions and compensation, which are addressed here.

 Working Conditions

Working conditions are an important aspect of job design. Physical factors such
as temperature, humidity, ventilation, illumination, and noise can have a significant
impact on worker performance in terms of productivity, quality of output, and accidents.
In many instances, government regulations apply.

 Compensation

Compensation is a significant issue for the design of work systems. It is important

for organizations to develop suitable compensation plans for their employees. If wages
are too low, organizations may find it difficult to attract and hold competent workers and
managers. If wages are too high, the increased costs may result in lower profits, or may
force the organization to increase its prices, which might adversely affect demand for
the organization’s products or services.

Organizations use a variety of approaches to compensate employees, including

time-based systems, output-based systems, and knowledge-based systems. Time-
based systems, also known as hourly and measured day work systems, compensate
employees for the time the employee has worked during a pay period. Salaried workers
also represent a form of time based compensation. Output-based (incentive) systems
compensate employees according to the amount of output they produce during a pay
period, thereby tying pay directly to performance.

METHOD ANALYSIS

One of the techniques used by self-directed teams and work analysts is methods
analysis, which focuses on how a job is done. Job design often begins with an analysis
of the overall operation. It then moves from general to specific details of the job,
concentrating on arrangement of the workplace and movements of materials and/or
workers. Methods analysis can be a good source of productivity improvements.

The need for methods analysis can come from a number of different sources:
Changes in tools and equipment, changes in product design or introduction of new
products, changes in materials or procedures, government regulations or contractual
agreements, and incidents such as accidents and quality problems.

MOTION STUDY

Motion study is the systematic study of the human motions used to perform an
operation. The purpose is to eliminate unnecessary motions and to identify the best
sequence of motions for maximum efficiency. Hence, motion study can be an important
avenue for productivity improvements. Present practice evolved from the work of Frank
Gilbreth, who originated the concepts in the bricklaying trade in the early 20th century.
Through the use of motion study techniques, Gilbreth is generally credited with
increasing the average number of bricks laid per hour by a factor of 3, even though he
was not a bricklayer by trade. When you stop to realize that bricklaying had been
carried on for centuries, Gilbreth’s accomplishment is even more remarkable.

Gilbreth’s work laid the foundation for the development of motion study
principles, which are guidelines for designing motion-efficient work procedures. The
guidelines are divided into three categories: principles for use of the body, principles for
arrangement of the workplace, and principles for the design of tools and equipment.
WORK MEASUREMENT

Job design determines the content of a job, and methods analysis determines
how a job is to be performed. Work measurement is concerned with determining the
length of time it should take to complete the job. Job times are vital inputs for capacity
planning, workforce planning, estimating labor costs, scheduling, budgeting, and
designing incentive systems. Moreover, from the workers’ standpoint, time standards
reflect the amount of time it should take to do a given job working under typical
conditions. The standards include expected activity time plus allowances for probable
delays.

A standard time is the amount of time it should take a qualified worker to

complete a specified task, working at a sustainable rate, using given methods, tools and
equipment, raw material inputs, and workplace arrangement. Whenever a time standard
is developed for a job, it is essential to provide a complete description of the parameters
of the job because the actual time to do the job is sensitive to all of these factors;
changes in any one of the factors can materially affect time requirements. For instance,
changes in product design or changes in job performance brought about by a methods
study should trigger a new time study to update the standard time. As a practical matter,
though, minor changes are occasionally made that do not justify the expense of
restudying the job. Consequently, the standards for many jobs may be slightly
inaccurate. Periodic time studies may be used to update the standards.

 Stopwatch Time Study

Stopwatch time study is used to develop a time standard based on observations

of one worker taken over a number of cycles. That is then applied to the work of all
others in the organization who perform the same task.

 Standard Elemental Times

Standard elemental times are derived from a firm’s own historical time study
data. Over the years, a time study department can accumulate a file of elemental times
that are common to many jobs. After a while, many elemental times can be simply
retrieved from the file, eliminating the need for analysts to go through a complete time
study to obtain them.

 Predetermined Time Standards

Predetermined time standards involve the use of published data on standard

elemental times. A commonly used system is methods-time measurement (MTM),
which was developed by the Methods Engineering Council. The MTM tables are based
on extensive research of basic elemental motions and times. To use this approach, the
analyst must divide the job into its basic elements (reach, move, turn, disengage),
measure the distances involved (if applicable), rate the difficulty of the element, and
then refer to the appropriate table of data to obtain the time for that element.

 Work Sampling

Work sampling is a technique for estimating the proportion of time that a worker
or machine spends on various activities and the idle time. Unlike time study, work
sampling does not require timing an activity, nor does it even involve continuous
observation of the activity. Instead, an observer makes brief observations of a worker or
machine at random intervals and simply notes the nature of the activity. For example, a
machine may be busy or idle; a secretary may be typing, filing, talking on the telephone,
and so on; and a carpenter may be carrying supplies, taking measurements, cutting
wood, and so on. The resulting data are counts of the number of times each category of
activity or non-activity was observed.

OPERATIONS STRATEGY

It is important for management to make design of work systems a key element of

its operations strategy. Despite the major advances in computers and operations
technology, people are still the heart of a business; they can make or break it,
regardless of the technology used. Technology is important, of course, but technology
alone is not enough.
 The topics described in this chapter all have an impact on productivity. Although
they lack the glamour of high tech, they are essential to the fundamentals of work
design. Workers can be a valuable source of insight and creativity because they actually
perform the jobs and are closest to the problems that arise. All too often, managers
overlook contributions and potential contributions of employees, sometimes from
ignorance and sometimes from a false sense of pride. Union–management differences
are also a factor. More and more, though, companies are attempting to develop a spirit
of cooperation between employees and managers.

In the same vein, an increasing number of companies are focusing attention on

improving the quality of work life and instilling pride and respect among workers. Many
organizations are reaping surprising gains through worker empowerment, giving
workers more say over their jobs.