Work Design and Measurement

Chapter 7

Quality of Work Life

• Quality of work life affects not only workers’ overall sense of well-being and contentment, but also their productivity

• Important aspects of quality of work life:– Working conditions– Compensation– Job Design

Working Conditions

• Physical– Temperature and humidity– Ventilation– Illumination– Noise and Vibration

• Psychological– Work Time and Work Breaks– Worker Relationships– Occupational Healthcare– Safety

Compensation

• It is important for organizations to develop suitable compensation plans for their employees

• Compensation approaches– Time-based systems– Output-based systems

• Incentive programs

– Knowledge-based systems

Compensation

• Time Based System– Compensation based on time an employee has

worked during a pay period.• Output Based System

– Compensation based on amount of output an employee produced during a pay period.

Discussion

• Advantages and disadvantages for– Time-based compensation system– Output-based compensation syste

Individual and Group Incentive Plans• Individual incentive plans

– Straight piecework• Worker’s pay is a direct linear function of his or her output

– Base rate + bonus• Worker is guaranteed a base rate, tied to an output standard,

that serves as a minimum• A bonus is paid for output above the standard

• Group incentive plans– Tend to stress sharing of productivity gains with employees

Knowledge-Based Pay Systems• Knowledge-based pay

– A pay system used by organizations to reward workers who undergo training that increases their skills

• Examples?

Discussion

• Can you come up with other creatrive incentive plans?

Job Design• Job design

– The act of specifying the contents and methods of jobs• What will be done in a job• Who will do the job• How the job will be done• Where the job will be done

Specialization

• Specialization– Work that concentrates on some aspect of a

product or service

AdvantagesFor management:1.Simplifies training2.High productivity3.Low wage costs

For employees:1. Low education and skill

requirements2. Minimum responsibility3. Little mental effort needed

DisadvantagesFor management:1.Difficult to motivate quality2.Worker dissatisfaction, possibly resulting in absenteeism, high turnover, disruptive tactics, poor attention to quality

For employees:1.Monotonous work2.Limited opportunities for advancement3.Little control over work4.Little opportunity for self-fulfillment

Behavioral Approaches to Job Design

• Job Enlargement– Giving a worker a larger portion of the total task

by horizontal loading

• Job Enrichment– Increasing responsibility for planning and

coordination tasks, by vertical loading

• Job Rotation– Workers periodically exchange jobs

Work Measurement

• Work measurement is concerned with how long it should take to complete a job.

• It is not concerned with either job content or how the job is to be completed since these are considered a given when considering work measurement.

Work Measurement• Standard time

– 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.

• Commonly used work measurement techniques– Historical times– Predetermined data– Stopwatch time study– Work sampling

Work Measurement Techniques• Historical Times

– are derived from a firm’s own historical time study data.• Predetermined time standards

– involve the use of published data on standard elemental times.• Stopwatch Time Study

– Used to develop a time standard based on observations of one worker taken over a number of cycles.

• Work sampling – a technique for estimating the proportion of time that a worker or

machine spends on various activities and idle time.

Stopwatch Time Study• Used to develop a time standard based on observations of

one worker taken over a number of cycles.• Basic steps in a time study:

1. Define the task to be studied and inform the worker who will be studied

2. Determine the number of cycles to observe3. Time the job, and rate the worker’s performance4. Compute the standard time

Observed Time

nsobservatio ofNumber

timesrecorded of Sum

timeObservedOT

where

OT

n

x

n

x

i

i

Normal Time

rating ePerformanc PR

timeNormal NT

where

PROT NT

Assumes that a single performance rating has been made for the entire job

Normal Time

j

jx

x

j

j

jj

element for rating ePerformanc PR

element for timeAverage

timeNormal NT

where

PR NT

Assumes that performance ratings are made on an element-by-element basis

Example

A job has two steps:1 and 2. 4 cycles of performance are observed. The observed time for each step is shown in the table. Calculate Normal Time.

1 2

Step Performance Rating 1 2 3 4

1 90% 2.5 3.5 3 3

2 120% 5 6 6 5

Observation(min)

Standard Time

on workday based percentage Allowance 1

1AF

timejobon based percentage Allowance 1AF

and

factor AllowanceAF

timeStandard ST

where

AFNTST

day

job

AA

AA

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.

– Work sampling does not require timing an activity or involve continuous observation of the activity

– Uses:

1. ratio-delay studies which concern the percentage of a worker’s time that involves unavoidable delays or the proportion of time a machine is idle.

2. analysis of non-repetitive jobs.