Page 274 - Introduction to Business

248 PART 2 Managing Business Behavior

Job Enrichment Programs. In order to break the monotony in certain
jobs, especially those requiring repetitive action such as in an assembly line,
job rotation The practice where managers generally resort to job rotation. For example, managers periodically
employees are periodically moved move employees through different operations on an assembly line. This also pro-
through different operations in a
company to break job monotony and to vides employees the opportunity to learn different skills and to obtain a feel for
provide employees the opportunity to all the operations of the company. It provides employees with an appreciation
learn different skills and obtain a feel for for what other workers in the company do as well. In some countries, job rota-
all the operations of the company
tion is the norm, regardless of the industry or professional level of work. For
example, Japanese corporations even rotate their managers from personnel to
finance to marketing to manufacturing. This approach creates a whole cadre of
general managers who can be moved quickly to different management functions
depending on corporate need. Job rotation provides both employees and
management greater flexibility in operation, especially during periods when
structural changes such as greater global competition take place. Companies can
move employees from areas where there is less demand for a certain type of
skilled worker to divisions where demand is high, thereby minimizing the need
to hire and fire workers.
Since the deregulation of the airline industry in the United States, most airlines
job enlargement The practice where have resorted to job enlargement, especially at smaller airports. Airline employees
employees are assigned to manage and
are assigned to manage and run related tasks that lead to job enrichment. For
run related tasks that lead to job
example, an airline employee will be issuing tickets and checking in baggage at one
enrichment
time and will be on the runway moments later loading baggage into the airplane or
directing a pilot to park the plane. Although job enlargement may also become
monotonous after some time, it does provide job enrichment and helps both the
employee and the company.

Job Redesign Programs. Employees have certain likes and dislikes about
their jobs. These can be due to demographics or the academic and professional
experience of the employee concerned. To help keep employees satisfied and also
to enhance their creativity and performance, managers often try to redesign exist-
job redesign Redefining jobs to keep ing jobs with the goal of motivating employees. Job redesign can be accomplished
employees satisfied and to enhance
through three major avenues: combining tasks, forming compatible work groups,
their creativity and performance
and establishing customer relationships. The goal of combining tasks is to make the
redesigned job more employee-specific by adding responsibilities that are more in
line with the employee’s area of interest or expertise, while at the same time delet-
ing the more mundane job chores and delegating them to others in the organiza-
tion who may be interested in doing them. Increasingly, some of these relatively
mundane service jobs are being outsourced overseas (also called offshoring). Com-
panies in industrialized countries, especially the United States, the United King-
dom, and other English-speaking countries, are moving these jobs, such as pro-
gramming and systems work and loan and credit card processing work, abroad to
countries like India and the Philippines that have a large pool of highly-educated,
English-speaking workers. This trend will continue to accelerate in the future. 8
There are two major benefits of outsourcing jobs. First, home country employees
find redesigned jobs more to their liking, since they requested the job modification
in the first place. Combining tasks enriches jobs, and helps motivate employees
and maintain high job satisfaction and performance. Second, outsourcing signifi-
cantly increases corporate profitability since the jobs that are outsourced cost a
fraction of those in the United States. 9
Another approach to job redesign is the development of compatible work
groups in which employees with similar interests and professional background
work together often as teams. As a group, they tend to have expertise in a specific

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