Managing Performance Through Job Design and Goal Setting |  |
Chapter SummaryThis chapter deals with two of the most important application areas that have emerged for high-performance organizations. The first part examines job design. Although the concern for designing jobs goes back to the scientific management movement at the
turn of the twentieth century, the recent concern for human resource management as a competitive advantage has led to renewed interest in, and research on, job design. The
older job engineering and job enlargement and rotation approaches have given way to first a job enrichment approach and then a job characteristics approach that relates to psychological or motivational states leading to improved employee satisfaction and per-formance. Characteristics such as skill variety, task identity, task significance, autonomy, and feedback have been found by research to be related to employee satisfaction and quality of work. But the way employees perceive these characteristics and the importance of moderating variables such as growth-need strength are being shown to have an important impact on the relationship between job scope and job satisfaction and employee performance. Also, theoretically based approaches such as engagement and social information processing (SIPA) have emerged to account for social effects. Increased attention is being given to the impact of a more macrooriented perspective,
and incorporating QWL concerns is the sociotechnical approach to job design. Sociotechnical projects at Volvo in Sweden and at General Foods and other companies in this country have important historical significance. There has been a surge of interest in
self-managed teams and other high-performance work practices (HPWPs) as companies try to use HRM-based approaches to meet their competitive problems. These HPWPs’ applications have reportedly been very successful. Yet, as is true of the other techniques discussed in this text, more systematic research is needed for the future.
The last part of the chapter deals with the theory, research, and applications of goal setting. Basing his approach on a cognitive perspective, Locke has developed a
goal-setting theory of motivation. This theory emphasizes the important relationship between goals and performance. Laboratory and field studies have generally verified this relationship. In particular, the most effective performance seems to result when specific, difficult goals are accepted and when feedback on progress and results is provided. An extension and systematic application of the goal-setting approach are benchmarking,
stretch targets, and MBO, which has evolved into a total performance system approach with a positive, but modest, impact on satisfaction and performance. The goal setting and other performance-enhancing approaches may have an overlooked impact on the psychological contract. To be successful, the human capital must also benefit and receive a return (reward). |
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2002 McGraw-Hill Higher Education