PSYCHOLOGY AND INDUSTRIAL PRODUCTIVITY

By the same authors

INDUSTRIAL PRODUCTIVITY: A Psychological Perspective RESEARCH IN PSYCHOLOGY AND MEDICINE (co-editors with

].R. Eiser}

Also by Michael M. Gruneberg

APPLIED PROBLEMS IN MEMORY (with P.E. Morris) ASPECTS OF MEMORY (co-editor with P.E. Morris) JOB SATISFACTION: A Reader (editor) PRACTICAL ASPECTS OF MEMORY (co-editor with P.E. Morris and

R.N. Sykes) UNDERSTANDING JOB SATISFACTION

PSYCHOLOGY AND INDUSTRIAL PRODUCTIVITY A Reader

Edited by Michael M. Gruneberg and David J. Oborne

Introduction and selection © Michael M. Gruneberg and David J. Obome 1981

Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 1981

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted, in any form or by any means,

without permission

First published 1981 by THE MACMILLAN PRESS LTD

London and Basingstoke Companies and representatives

throughout the world

ISBN 978-0-333-27074-5 ISBN 978-1-349-04809-0 (eBook) DOI 10.1007/978-1-349-04809-0

Contents Introduction IX

PART I MOTIVATION ANDTHEJOBITSELF 1

1 Job Attitudes and Employee Motivation: Theory, Research and Practice 5 Edward E. Lawler, III

2 Participative Decision Making: an Experimental Study in a Hospital 23 ].E. Bragg and I.R. Andrews

3 Knowledge of Performance as an Incentive in Repetitive Industrial Work 33 P.S. Hundal

4 An Experimental Case Study of the Successes and Failures of Job Enrichment in a Government Agency 39 Edwin A. Locke, David Sirota and Alan D. Wolfson

5 The 'Practical Significance' of Locke's Theory of Goal Setting 63 Gary P. Latham and]. james Baldes

6 Split Roles in Performance Appraisal 70 Herbert H. Meyer, Emanuel Kay and John R.P. French, ]r

PART II CONTEXT FACTORS IN PRODUCTIVITY 85

7 Motives of Workpeople who Restrict their Output 89 D.]. Hickson

8 Employee Reactions to a Pay Incentive Plan 103 Cortlandt Cammann and Edward E. Lawler, III

9 Leadership Style, Subordinate Personality and Task Type as Predictors of Performance and Satisfaction with Supervision 123 Stan E. Weed, Terence R. Mitchell and Weldon Moffitt

VI Contents

10 Work-group Composition as a Factor in Productivity and Satisfaction 141 Denys Cross and Peter Warr

11 Relation of Organisational Structure to Job Satisfaction, Anxiety-Stress and Performance 161 John M. Ivancevich and James H. Donnelly, Jr

PART III ABSENCE AND TURNOVER 177 12 Realistic Expectations as an Aid in Reducing

Voluntary Resignations 181 Daniel R. ligen and William Seely

13 Effectiveness of an Attendance Control Policy in Reducing Chronic Absenteeism 188 John F. Baum

PART IV THE VALUE OF ERGONOMICS TO PERFORMANCE, SAFETY AND PRODUCTIVITY 203

14 Men, Machines and Productivity 207 F. C. Bartlett

15 Is Human Factors Engineering Worth the Investment? 215 Kenneth S. Tee[

16 The Marriage of Human Factors and Safety in Industry 223 Thomas A. Yoder, Richard L. Lucas and Gerald D. Botzum

PARTV MACHINEDESIGN

17 Instrument Reading: the Design of Long-scale Indicators for Speed and Accuracy of Quantitative

241

Readings 245 Walter F. Grether

18 Tactile and Kinaesthetic Aspects of Push-buttons 259 T.G. Moore

19 Check-reading Accuracy as a Function of Pointer Alignment, Patterning and Viewing Angle 274 Sidney G. Dashevsky

Contents Vll

20 Tests of Ten Control-display Linkages 282 Alphonse Chapanis and Donald A. Mankin

21 Direction of Motion Relationships between Controls and Displays Moving in Different Planes 295 D.H. Holding

PART VI ENVIRONMENTAL EFFECTS ON PERFORMANCE 307

22 The Environment at Work 309 E. C. Poulton

23 A Study of the Performance of Industrial Inspectors under Two Kinds of Lighting 324 Judith S. Lion, E. Richardson and R.C. Browne

Index 339

Introduction THE SCOPE OF THE BOOK

For some readers the title of this book, Psychology and Industrial Productivity, might conjure up a picture of the psychologist taking on the role of a manipulator of workers, in order to satisfy the rapacious greed of management with its in­satiable demand for profits. Productivity, however, is not a goal sought only by management and shareholders. Our whole society depends on the efficient production of a vast range of goods for its very existence. The more efficient and plentiful is production, the more goods and services are available to society and therefore the more society as a whole is likely to benefit. Even for the individual in an organisation, the more efficient the productive process, the more he is likely to be rewarded and the more secure is his job likely to be.

The factors which make for efficient production are not, of course, limited to the human factors of interest to psychologists. Technological factors, such as the degree of sophistication of machinery and plant lay-out, play a major role in the produc­tivity of a work situation. However, machines normally need men and women to operate them and so it is self-evident that the most sophisticated machinery is of little use if the human side of the operation is ignored. In their well-established roles as experts in selection and training, psychologists play an impor­tant part in resolving some of the problems arising from the 'human' side of productivity. Their role in two other aspects of productivity, in improving motivational aspects of work and in designing machinery to fit human capacities and needs, is also widely acknowledged but perhaps less commonly utilised. The aim of this book is to illustrate the part psychology t:an play in these two areas.

WHAT IS PRODUCTIVITY?

As soon as one considers the question of the nature of produc-

X Introduction

tivity, a number of problems arise. To regard increased produc­tivity purely in terms of an increased number of units is clearly unsatisfactory, as this takes no account of the extra input neces­sary to achieve extra output. An investment of £10 million in a car firm, for example, is likely to be considered unsuccessful if the net result is an increase in output of only two cars per year. Conversely, a decrease in output following job design changes might be economically beneficial if the changes lead to increased quality of production, which may in tum lead to greater de­mand for the company's products. Again job design changes may lead to a decrease in absence and turnover, or simple changes in the equipment and/or the work environment may lead to increased safety and less employee absence due to illness or accidents. These consequences are costly to the organisation, in terms of retraining new workers, the temporary loss of a team member, or even the payment of compensation. Increased productivity, then, should not be conceived of solely in terms of increased or decreased amounts of unit production, but should take into account inputs on the one hand, and changes of a qualitative kind on the other.

PERFORMANCE APPRAISAL

Clearly, no evaluation of the effectiveness of schemes designed to improve productivity is possible unless productivity can be measured, particularly in relation to individuals. Evaluation of an individual's performance is not only useful in terms of the overall goals of the organisation, but is an essential tool for im­plementing promotion procedures, payments systems and so on.

Whilst there are situations in which productivity can simply be measured by a straightforward count of units produced, in many low-level and almost all high-level jobs the problem is far from simple. There are, for example, a large number of jobs where assessment of units of production for an individual or a group is impossible or inappropriate. This would be the case where part of the production is determined by factors outside the control of the individual, or where quality is more impor­tant than quantity, as with a novelist or a creative scientist, for example.

Even where performance can be measured in theory, its

Introduction xi

measurement is often fraught with problems. First, the evalua­tion of performance of one person by another involves con­siderable interpersonal difficulties because of the threat to self­esteem implicit in the situation. To evaluate an individual's per­formance negatively is to make implicit statements about levels of skill and competence. Neither the evaluated nor, indeed, the evaluator necessarily enjoys this. Partly ·because of this, studies have consistently shown evaluations of performance by superiors as suspect. Superiors often evaluate everyone at a high or at a low level. Again, evaluation depends on the evaluator's skills at assessing performance, which in complex tasks such as manage­ment may be far from easy.

A further difficulty with performance evaluation arises since employees often devise methods to deceive superiors, particu­larly in situations where there is little incentive for high produc­tivity. For example, where productivity deals are in the offing, it pays an employee to produce below his capacities in order that he can be rewarded better under a productivity deal for re­cording his normal production level.

Whilst the evaluation of performance clearly has problems, being often subjective and subject to biases of various sorts, it is nevertheless an essential aspect of efficient organisations. As Porter et al. (197 5) note, the present trend is away from the assess­ment of employees on a number •of traits such as creativity, in­telligence, etc. and much more in terms of meeting specific per­formance criteria, agreed between superior and subordinate. As was noted previously, however, any evaluation procedure runs into difficulties when dealing with qualitative and complex criteria, although it must not be thought that qualitative mate­rial is unamenable to evaluation. Most people would agree that Rembrandt was qualitatively superior to Landseer, or Dickens to Harold Robbins. Thus, despite its difficulties, performance evaluation is an important aspect of organisational efficiency, and the fact that problems exist does not obviate the need for appraisal to be carried out as well as possible.

THE ORGANISATION OF THE BOOK

The book has two aspects. The first deals in its broadest sense

Xll Introduction

with motivational aspects of productivity and is concerned with motives in the individual which affect productivity, with job context factors, and with factors involved in absence and tum­over. In the second part the relationship between the physical environment, machines and productivity is considered. This includes the value of ergonomics in terms of cash benefits, and exemplifies the ways in which machine and environment design may help a worker to increase his performance.

MOTIVATIONAL ASPECTS OF PRODUCTIVITY

Central to any decision concemingjob redesign is an understand­ing of human motivation in relation to productivity. One 'commonsense' notion is that individual productivity is related to job satisfaction, such that the greater the job satisfaction, the greater the productivity. This notion has been considerably undermined, however, in recent years following a number of review articles in which little or no relationship was found between the two factors. In general terms one reason for this is that some of the factors which make for job satisfaction, such as enjoyment of social relationship, may be unrelated or indeed incompatible with high productivity.

Expectancy theory, one of the major motivation theories in organisational psychology, accounts, amongst other things, for the relationship between satisfaction and productivity. Expec­tancy theory argues that we are motivated to act to the extent that we perceive our actions as being effective in attaining what we want, in other words where our actions are instrumental in giving satisfaction. Thus, productivity results in satisfaction, it does not result from satisfaction. The paper by Lawler (1976) outlines the theory and its implications for productivity.

Another major theory has been developed by Herzberg (1968) who argues that only when we are able to fulfil our higher-order needs, such as those of achievement, will we be truly motivated. This kind of theory has led to the view that in order to improve productivity, jobs should be redesigned and enlarged to include greater complexity and responsibility. This theory has been further developed by Hackman and Lawler (1971) to argue that job redesign should include four elements,

Introduction X Ill

improvements in job autonomy, variety, task identity and feed­back, as these are required to help in the fulfilment ofhigher-order needs. Whilst there is considerable doubt about the validity of a large number of job redesign studies (see e.g. Gruneberg, 1979), a number of papers in Part I show the effects of these job aspects on productivity, although equivocal results are sometimes obtained (see e.g. Locke et al. in Part I).

Another major aspect in improving motivation is goal setting, and work in recent years has shown convincingly that goal setting can have a major impact in increasing productivity. Goal setting is at the heart of 'Management by Objectives' and other programmes, and the paper by Meyer et al. examines a pro­gramme involving goal setting.

Apart from intrinsic aspects of the job which .affect motiva­tion, extrinsic factors are also seen to be of importance and are considered in Part II. Amongst the most important of these is pay, where a large number of schemes have been developed in order to relate productivity to financial reward. As Lawler (1976) notes, there is no such thing as the ideal payments sys­tem: a large number of factors, such as the technology and the nature of the job, must be considered. The paper by Hickson, for example, shows how social and other influences can inter­fere with payments systems.

Pay is, of course, not the only context factor which material­ly affects productivity. Cross and Warr in their paper indicate the importance of work-group structure, Weed et al. found leadership style to be related to productivity, as well as job satisfaction, and organisational structure was found to be re­lated to performance by Ivancevich and Donnelly. These are of course by no means definitive studies or exclusive treatments of the field.

The final section on motivational aspects of productivity looks at factors involved in absence and turnover. It is impor­tant to appreciate that both absence and turnover are complex phenomena, depending on more than the individual's job satis­faction, for example. Turnover is influenced by job opportun­ities, ambition, family circumstances and a further number of factors unrelated to any action on the part of the individual firm or employee. Nevertheless, certain factors are affected by policies within the control of the organisation and these can be examined in order to reduce both absence and turnover.

XIV

MAN, HIS MACHINES, ENVIRONMENT AND PRODUCTIVITY

Introduction

Although the social job design factors discussed above are ex­tremely important in helping to understand worker product­ivity, modern enlightened management is gradually realising the need to consider the relationship between the worker and his physical work situation - his machines and his environment. (In this respect, the word 'machines' is an umbrella term rep­resenting machines, environment and the total work situation.) As well as 'tailoring' the worker to fit the work·system by such means as selection, training and incentives, contemporary app­lied arid industrial psychological thought recognises the need to tailor the machine to fit the worker.

As the papers in this book will illustrate, this approach (embodied in the new science of ergonomics - from the Greek ergos:work, and nomos: laws) is extremely important if productivity is to be maintained and increased. Many of the new machines which are being designed require fast, accurate operation; many of the older machines still in use perhaps re­quire heavy forces to be exerted for operation or are situated in badly lit or in noisy environments. These are merely a few examples of some of the factors which may impose strains on the operator and impair his performance or safety. Only when the worker is able to use his machines fully and consistently will their true value, in terms of output, be realised. The philosophy of ergonomics suggests that this state of affairs will be reached only when the requirements of the machines are tailored to fit the capabilities (perceptual, cognitive, mechanical, etc.) of the operator. The papers which deal with this aspect have been in­cluded to illustrate areas in the physical work situation in which sometimes simple and relatively cheap alterations may result in increased operator performance or safety.

The papers illustrating the importance of the physical work environment to productivity are divided into three sections: those showing the value of ergonomics to performance and pro­ductivity; those illustrating the importance of adequate machine design; and those which discuss the effects of the environment. Unfortunately, on first impressions, such divisions may suggest to the reader that ergonomics is concerned with considering only one aspect of the work situation at a time, e.g. the machine

Introduction XV

and its displays, safety aspects, the environmental noise, the lighting, etc. This is not the case. As with the social factors which influence productivity, all of the physical factors may, to a greater or lesser extent, interact to affect performance. For example, an ergonomically designed machine which helps the operator to attain a high performance rate in one part of the factory may be of far less value when placed in another part of tht: factory having perhaps different lighting conditions. For this reason, modem ergonomics philosophy argues for the need to investigate the relationship of the human operator to the total work system and also considers such factors as vigilance, fatigue and stress.

The importance of ergonomics to productivity became appar­ent during the Second World War when men were required to operate increasingly sophisticated fighting machines efficiently. In Part IV, Bartlett draws on such experience to consider the value of ergonomics to the emerging industrial sector of the time. His words, however, have an almost prophetic quality, since he predicts fairly accurately the future of the rela­tionship between industry and ergonomics and the ways in which a fruitful, symbiotic relationship may be attained.

No matter how strong a relationship exists between ergono­mics and productivity, any manager who is to consider either implementing an ergonomics investigation of part of his plant or introducing a machine system designed to ergonomics prin­ciples must be able to justify the cost in relation to the rewards. The second paper, by Ted, considers the value of ergonomics using a cost/benefit analysis. Finally, the paper by Yoder et al. considers the value of ergonomics in the reduction of accidents. As was pointed out earlier, accidents may well lead to time off work and reduced productivity.

The five papers included in Part V are intended to provide no more than an illustration of the ways in which simple altera­tions to aspects of existing machines may beneficially affect performance. Thus, for example, Grether considers appropriate displays, and Moore the design of controls. The papers by Dashevsky, by Chapanis and Mankin and by Holding investigate the ways in which such displays and controls should be posi­tioned in front of the operator for maximum effect.

Finally, the selection of papers in Part VI considers the im­portance of environmental factors upon performance.

XVI Introductz"on All of these studies have been chosen to illustrate the fact

that sometimes simple alterations to the type or quality of the operator's physical environment may increase his comfort, safety and/or performance.

This book makes no claim to cover the field of industrial productivity exhaustively. Not only are a number of areas not included, the papers which have been selected are intended to be illustrative of aspects of importance, and they are not intended to be definitive reviews of the area. In choosing papers for this book, we have sought to select papers which are both readable and scientifically sound and which in total serve to indicate to the reader the potential value of applying psychology to indus­trial problems. Apart from making minor changes for stylistic consistency we have not altered any of the papers, as we feel that this reduces the value of the reader as a reference work.

REFERENCES

Gruneberg M. M., Understand£ng Job Sati'sfact£on (London: Macmillan, 1979).

Hackman J. R. and Lawler E. E., 'Employee Reactions to Job Characteristics', journal of Applied Psychology, 55 (1971) 259-86.

Herzberg F., 'One More Time: How Do You Motivate Em­ployees?', Harvard Business Rev£ew, 46 {1968) 53-62.

Lawler E. E., 'Control Systems in Organisations', in M. D. Dunette (ed.), Handbook of Industrial and Organisational Psychology (Chicago: Rand McNally, 1976).

Porter L. W., Lawler E. E. and Hackman J. R., Behav£our in Organisations {New York: McGraw-Hill, 1975).