HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT (HRM)

JOB ANALYSIS, JOB DESIGN & JOB EVALUATION

JOB ANALYSIS
Strategic Overview
Jobs are dynamic and subject to change. Before people are assigned work, managers must
examine jobs scientifically and describe the tasks needed clearly.

Learning Objectives
• Nature of job analysis
• Identifying how job analysis information is used in other HR activities
• Process of job analysis
• Methods by which job analysis is typically completed
• Assessing he impact of behavioral factors on job analysis
• Distinguishing job descriptions and job specifications
• Job analysis changes as organizations change.

Introduction
India being a labor surplus country, jobs are very important to individuals. Jobs help determine
the standards of living, places of residence, status and even one’s sense of self-worth.

What is Job Analysis?

Job analysis is a systematic exploration of the activities within a job. It is a technical procedure,
one that is used to define the duties, responsibilities and accountabilities of a job.
This analysis “involves the identification and description of what is happening on the job…
accurately and precisely identifying the required tasks, the knowledge and the skills necessary
for performing them, and the conditions under which they must be performed now and in the
future”.

Uses of Job Analysis

Good human resource management demands of both the employee and the employer a clear
understanding of the duties and responsibilities to be performed on a job. How job analysis helps
with other aspects of work are summarized below.

Human resource planning: Job analysis helps in forecasting human resource requirements in
terms of knowledge and skills. By showing lateral and vertical relationships between jobs, it
facilitates the formulation of a systematic promotion and transfer policy. Also helps in
determining the quality of human resources needed in an organization.
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Recruitment: Job analysis is used to find out how and when to hire people for future job
openings. An understanding of the skills needed and the positions that are vacant in future helps
managers to plan and hire people in a systematic way. For e.g. a company for its financial
analysis section may be hiring MBAs. An analysis may show that a graduate with an analytical
bent of mind can also serve the purpose. The prospect can result in savings to the company.

Selection: Without a proper understanding of what is to be done on a job, it is not possible to

select the right person. If a college has not clearly identified what a clerk has to do, it is difficult
to ascertain if the person selected is in a position to handle stores or maintain a cash register or
even the books of accounts.

Placement and orientation: After selecting people, we have to place them on jobs best suited
to their interests, activities and aptitude. If we are not sure about what needs to be done on a job,
it is not possible to identify the right person suited for the job. Similarly, effective job orientation
cannot be achieved without a proper understanding of the needs of each job. To teach a new
employee how to handle a job, the job has to be clearly defined.

Training: If there is no proper job analysis it will lead to confusion and proper training cannot
be initiated.

Counseling: Managers will be in a position to counsel employees about their careers when they
understand the different jobs in an organization. Likewise, employees can better appreciate their
career options when they understand the specific needs of various other jobs.

Employee safety: A job analysis will indicate unsafe conditions associated with a job.

Performance appraisal: Only on a proper job analysis being made available will it be possible
to assess or compare individuals. It is necessary to compare what individuals should do (as per
performance standards) with what they have actually done (as per job analysis).

Job design and redesign: Once the jobs are understood properly, it is easy to locate weak spots
and undertake remedial steps. Unnecessary movements, simplifying certain steps and improving
the existing steps through continuous monitoring can be followed through a process of redesign.

Job evaluation: Job analysis helps in finding the relative worth of a job, based on criteria such
as degree of difficulty, type of work done, skills and knowledge needed, etc. This in turn helps in
designing proper wage policies and rewards.

The Process of Job Analysis

Organizational Analysis: It is necessary to first have an overall picture of the various jobs in
an organization. This is required to find the linkages between jobs and organizational objectives,
inter-relationships between jobs and contribution of various jobs to the effectiveness and
efficiency of the organization. The information can be obtained through organization charts and
workflow charts.

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Selection of representative positions to be analyzed: It is not possible to analyze all the jobs
and a representative sample of jobs can be selected for analysis keeping in mind time and cost
constraints.

Collection of job analysis data: The step involves the collection of data on the characteristics
of the job, the required behavior and personal qualifications needed to carry out the job
effectively.

Preparation of job description: This step involves describing the contents of the job in terms
of functions, duties, responsibilities, operations, etc.

Preparation of job specification: The step involves conversion of the job description
statements into a specific job. Job specifications is a written statement of personal attributes in
terms of traits, skills, training, experience needed to carry out the job.

Methods of Collecting Job Analysis Data

The methods that managers use to determine job elements and the essential knowledge, skills
and abilities for successful performance include the following:

Job performance: The job analyst actually performs the job in question thus giving him/her a
first hand information of the job in terms of physical effort, hazards, emotional pressures, social
demands and mental requirements.

Observation Method: A job analysis technique where data is gathered by watching employees
work. Difficult to observe managerial tasks. The analyst must observe average workers during
average conditions and the analyst should observe without getting directly involved in the job.

Critical Incidents Technique: CIT is a qualitative approach to job analysis which is used to
obtain specific descriptions of work. These incidents can be dissimilar. For e.g. a waiter being
rude to a customer can result in the loss of this customer for a lifetime.

Individual Interview Method: Meeting with an employee to determine what his / her job
entails but process is time consuming.

Group Interview Method: Meeting with a number of employees to collectively determine

what their jobs entail.

Technical Conference Method: A job analysis technique that involves extensive input from
the employee’s supervisor. The method does not allow having the employee’s perception of the
task. This method is also called Panel of Experts Method.

Diary Method: requires employees to record their daily activities but the process is very
extensive with a number of days observations’ to be taken into account making the process
expensive

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Structured Questionnaire Method: Workers are given a well-structured questionnaire which

they check and rate from a long list of possible task items. This technique while being excellent
does not allow for follow-up questions to be asked

Some of the standard questionnaires that are widely used:

• Position Analysis Questionnaire (PAQ): is a standardized questionnaire developed at

Purdue University to quantitatively sample work oriented elements. It contains 194 items
divided into six major divisions. The PAQ permits management to scientifically a
quantitatively group inter-related job elements into job dimensions.

Employees Activities in PAQ

1. Information Input: Where and how does the employee get the information s/he uses
in performing her/his job?
Examples:
Use of written materials
Near-visual differentiation
2. Mental processes: What reasoning, decision making, planning and information-
processing activities are involved in performing the job?
Examples:
Levels of reasoning in problem solving
Coding/decoding
3. Physical activities: What physical activities does the employee perform and what tools
or devices does s/he use?
Examples:
Use of keyboard devices
Assembling/disassembling
4. Relationship with other people: What relationship with other people is required in
performing the job?
Examples
Instructing
Contacts with public, customers
5. Job context: In what physical and social context is the work performed?
Examples
High temperature
Interpersonal conflict situations
6. Other job characteristics: What activities, conditions or characteristics other than
those described above are relevant to the job?
Examples
Specified work pace
Amount of job structure.

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• Management Position Description Questionnaire (MPDQ): is a standardized

instrument designed specifically for use in analyzing managerial jobs. The 274 item
questionnaire contains 15 sections.

• Functional Job Analysis (FJA): is a worker-oriented job analysis approach to describe

the whole person on the job. FJA is frequently used in government jobs.

Impact of Behavioral Factors on Job Analysis

While carrying out a job analysis, managers must take note of certain strong behavioral
responses from the employees. Employees do not always like someone taking a hard look at their
jobs.

Exaggerate the facts: Employees tend to exaggerate the importance and significance of their
jobs during interviews so that their jobs can result in higher pay levels.

Employee anxieties: Most employees fear that job analysis may put them in a ‘Strait-Jacket’,
curbing their initiative and latitude to perform. Another feeling could be that as long as someone
does not know what I’m doing – I’m safe.

Resistance to change: With technological changes there is a need to revise job descriptions
and job specifications – to make them more meaningful.

Overemphasis on current efforts: Job analysis efforts should not place heavy emphasis on
what the employees are currently doing. Some employees are gifted with unique capabilities and
given a chance they may expand the scope of the job and assume more responsibilities.

Management ‘Strait-Jacket: Job analysis efforts may put managers in a ‘Strait-Jacket’,

limiting their freedom to adapt to changing needs from time to time.

Job Description (JD): A written statement of what the jobholder does, how it is done,
under what conditions it is done and why it is done. It should accurately portray job content,
environment and conditions of employment.

Job Description acts as a resource for describing the job to potential candidates, guiding newly-
hired employees in what they are specifically expected to do and providing a platform for
appraisal.

According to Ernest Dale, the following guidelines should be kept in mind while writing job
descriptions:

1. JD should indicate the nature and scope of the job

2. JD should be brief, factual and precise

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3. Specific words to be chosen to show the kind of work, the degree of complexity, the
degree of skill required, the extent to which problems are standardized and the degree and
type of accountability
4. The extent of supervision available should also be clearly stated
5. The reporting relationships must be clearly stated (e.g. who reports to whom, frequency,
etc.)

Job Specification: The minimum acceptable qualifications that an employee must possess
to perform the job successfully. Based on the information acquired through job analysis, the job
specification identifies the knowledge, skills, education, experience, certification and abilities
needed to do the job effectively.
The personal attributes required for a job specification are:

1. Essential attributes: skills, knowledge and abilities (SKAs) a person must possess
2. Desirable attributes: qualifications a person ought to possess
3. Contra-indicators: are attributes that will become a handicap to successful job
performance.

Role Analysis: Over a period of time, roles to be played by a job holder may undergo a
change. Role analysis provides a satisfactory answer to this problem. A role is a set of
expectations people have about the behavior of a person in position. A position holder may
perform three types of roles in day to day life.

Expected role: For e.g. a faculty member is expected to come on time and teach the subject well.

Perceived role: is how the individual thinks s/he should behave to fulfill the expected role.

Enacted role: is the actual role – the way a person actually behaves in an organization.

Job Analysis Changes as Organizations Change

The concept of a job has been changing over the past few years. Employees do not like
standardized, routine operations nor do they enjoy supervisors overseeing their work from close
quarters. Employees now want more challenging work which is meaningful and interesting.

Certain techniques that have helped in redefining jobs in this manner are:

Flatter organizations: Most progressive organizations are trimming the excess fat and also at
the same time reducing levels. As the remaining managers are left with more people reporting to
them, the roles of subordinates get larger.

Work teams: Till the other day, jobs were rigid in the functional sense. Workers performed the
same tasks daily. The situation has now changed. Work is organized around teams and processes
rather than around specialized functions.

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Organizations without boundaries: In these types of organizations, boundaries that normally

separate organizational functions (production, marketing, finance, etc.) and hierarchical levels
are reduced.

Re-engineering: brings about a radical change in an organization. For e.g. specialized jobs are
combined and enlarged and each person’s job is made more interesting.

Questions for Practice

What are some of the important reasons for the drastic changes we are seeing in the way jobs
are done?

How will one carry out a job analysis in an organization that never has had job descriptions?

Individual exercise: Draw up job descriptions of two or three friends or relatives working in
organizations.

Group exercise: Draw up a job description for the Head of Department (HOD) of the
Psychology / Sociology / Economics / Accountancy sections and based on your analytical skills
develop a job specification. - Each group to choose one section by a draw of lots to be carried
out by the respective Subject Representative.

Job Design
Learning Objectives
• Job Design and approaches to Job Design

Overview

Job design, which is an outgrowth of job analysis, is a way of organizing tasks, duties and
responsibilities into a productive unit of the work. While designing work, HR managers should
take care of organizational requirements in terms of timely completion, high quality
performance, economic use of resources, etc. At the same time, while trying to realize
organizational objectives, employees’ job related needs must also be taken care of.

The focus must be to ensure technical efficiency without negatively impacting the workers’
job-related needs in terms of interest, challenge and achievement.

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Engineering Approach
The principles offered by scientific management (F. W. Taylor) to job design can be
summarized as follows:
Work should be scientifically studied
Work should be arranged so that workers can be efficient
Employees selected for work should be matched to the demands of the job
Employees should be trained to perform the job
Monetary compensation should be used to reward successful performance of the job

Human Relations Approach

Human Relations Approach recognizes the need to design jobs in an interesting manner. In the
past two decades, much work has been directed to changing jobs so that job incumbents can
satisfy their needs for growth, recognition and responsibility. Herzberg’s research popularized
the notion of enhancing need satisfaction through what is called job enrichment.
According to Herzberg, there are two types of factors, viz. Motivators like achievements,
recognition, work itself, responsibility, advancement and growth and Hygiene factors like
working conditions, organizational policies, inter-personnel relations, pay and job security.

The Job Characteristics Approach

The Job Characteristics Theory of Hackman and Oldham states that employees will work hard
when they are rewarded for the work they do and when the work gives them satisfaction. Hence
they suggest that motivation, satisfaction and performance should be integrated in the job design.

Any job can be described in terms of five core job dimensions which are:
1. Skill variety: The degree to which the job requires that workers use a variety of different
activities, talents and skills in order to successfully complete the job requirements.
2. Task identity: The degree to which the job allows workers to complete whole tasks from
start to finish, rather than some portions of the job.
3. Task significance: The degree to which the job significantly impacts the lives of others
both within and outside the workplace.
4. Autonomy: The degree to which the job allows workers freedom in planning and
scheduling and the methods used to complete the job.
5. Feedback: The degree to which the job itself provides workers with clear, direct and
understandable knowledge of their performance.

Socio-technical Systems Approach

While the above theories of job design are concerned with designing individual jobs, the
approach adopted by the socio-technical systems method is the design or work systems that
foster a meshing of the technical and social aspects of the job. In order to create jobs which have
this supportive relationship, work teams - not individual jobs must be studied.

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Techniques for Designing Jobs

Job Simplification: is a design method whereby jobs are divided into smaller components and
subsequently assigned to workers as whole jobs. Simplification of work requires that jobs be
broken down into their smallest units and then analyzed.

Job Enlargement: expands a job horizontally. It increases job scope; that is, it increases the
number of different operations required in a job and the frequency with which the job cycle is
repeated. By increasing the number of tasks an individual performs, job enlargement increases
the job scope, or job diversity.

Job Rotation: refers to the movement of an employee from one job to another. Jobs themselves
are not actually changed, only the employees are rotated among various jobs.
Job Enrichment: as currently practiced in industry, is a direct outgrowth of Herzberg’s Two
Factor Theory of motivation. It is based on the assumption that in order to motivate personnel,
the job itself must provide opportunities for achievement recognition, responsibility,
advancement and growth.

Questions for Practice

‘If you want to know if an employee is satisfied with his job, just ask her/him!’ Do you agree
or disagree?
‘Employees should have jobs that give them autonomy and diversity’. Build u an argument in
favor of this statement. Also build an argument against the statement.

Find out from your School Teachers or Jr. or Sr. College Faculty (at least 25) what they
believe are the two most important rewards. Sum up their responses and find out whether it is
consistent with Hackman and Oldham’s Job Characteristics Model.
For the past one year, Jaydeep a manager at an engineering company comes home from work
depressed and angry. He just finds that in spite of his best efforts he can’t motivate his workers
to improve their performance. Over the last year, Jaydeep sent each worker for special training,
purchased new equipment and transferred employees who lacked the ability to do their jobs.
Despite those interventions, his department’s performance is a t the same level it was two years
ago. This has Jaydeep worried coz he fears being fired.
Jaydeep thought that a boost in morale would improve performance so he gave each worker a
10% rise. In spite of morale increasing, workers complained even louder than before. Jaydeep
also held a departmental meeting in which he requested everyone to work hard and improve
their performance levels. His department was enthusiastic for a fortnight but productivity level
did not change.
Where has Jaydeep gone wrong and what advice would you offer him to motivate his
employees?

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JOB EVALUATION
Learning Objectives
• What is job evaluation?
• Distinguish between job evaluation and performance appraisal
• Process of job evaluation
• Methods of job evaluation
• Limitations of job evaluation

Overview
 Job evaluation is a systematic way of determining the value/worth of a job in relation to other
jobs in an organization. It tries to make a systematic comparison between jobs to assess their
relative worth for the purpose of establishing a rational pay structure.

Job Evaluation (JE) Vs Performance Appraisal (PA)

PA is the systematic description of an employee’s job-related strengths and weaknesses. The
basic purpose of PA is to find out how well the employee is doing the job and establish a plan for
improvement. The aim of job evaluation is to find the relative value/worth of a job and determine
what a fair wage for such a job should be.

Characteristic Job Evaluation Performance Appraisal

Define Find the relative worth of a job Find the worth of a job holder

Aim Determine wage rates for different jobs Determine incentives and
rewards for superior
performance

Shows How much a job is worth? How well an individual is

doing an assigned work?

Process of Job Evaluation

Gaining acceptance: Before undertaking job evaluation, top management must explain the
aims and uses of the program to employees and unions
Job evaluation committee: A single person cannot evaluate all the key jobs in an organization
Jobs to be evaluated: All jobs need not be evaluated as it can lead to high costs and can
become too taxing
Analyzing and preparing job description
Selecting the method of evaluation: The most important method evaluating the jobs must be
identified keeping the job factors and organizational demands in mind
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Classifying jobs: The jobs should be arranged in order of importance using criteria such as
skill requirements, experience needed, under what conditions are jobs performed,
responsibilities, etc.
Installing the program: Once the evaluation process is over and a plan of action is ready,
management must explain it to its employees and put it into operation
Reviewing periodically: Traditional clerical jobs of the past have undergone a sea change due
to technological developments - hence a periodic review is a must.

Job Evaluation Methods

Ranking Method: Jobs are arranged from highest to the lowest, in order of their merit or value
to the organization.

Classification Method: A pre-determined number of job groups or classes are created and jobs
are assigned according to these classifications, for e.g.
Class - I: Executives
Class - II: Skilled workers
Class - III: Semiskilled workers
Class - IV: Unskilled workers.

Factor Comparison Method: A most complex method but is consistent. Under this method,
instead of ranking complete jobs, each job is ranked according to a series of factors. These
factors include mental effort, physical effort, skill needed, responsibility, supervisory
responsibility, working conditions and other such factors.

Point method: is currently widely used. Jobs are expressed in terms of key factors. Points are
assigned to each factor after prioritizing each factor in order of importance. The points are
summed up to determine the wage rate for the job

Questions for Practice

Considering all the methods why is point method the most widely used for job evaluation?
If payment is done predominantly for jobs rather than people, how can the truly exceptional
performing employee be rewarded?

- Source: Human Resource Management – V S P Rao

- Compiled by Faculty: L. A. D’Costa for Raheja College TYBMS Sem. V Students
(2009-10)
- Cell: +91 98193 77556 E-mail:dcosta.l.a@gmail.com

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