Module 3 – Case

Job Redesign

Case Assignment

In the background materials you had a chance to view some videos and read about the traditional “top down” approach of job redesign as well as the newer “bottom up” approach of job crafting. Before starting on this assignment, make sure you have thoroughly reviewed the videos and readings and understand the key job redesign and job crafting strategies. Once you have finished reviewing the background materials, apply what you’ve learned to the specific scenarios and questions below. Make sure to cite at least one of the required readings for each answer, and try to cite at least four of the readings or videos in your answer. Your paper should be 4–5 pages in length:

1. The ABC Corporation has a team of telemarketers. The job description for the telemarketers is pretty basic: They call up potential customers who have visited his company’s web page and requested information about the product. Telemarketers’ performance evaluations depend mostly on their monthly sales as well as customer satisfaction surveys, and they receive monthly feedback reports. Their supervisor gives them some initial training, but these telemarketers have a lot of freedom to choose how and when to call customers. For example, they are free to customize their own sales pitch as long as they don’t mislead potential customers. Also, they are not required to fill out a time card or work at the office (they can work from home, if they want). As long as they are making enough monthly sales they are free to set their own schedules. While the telemarketing team is performing well, the company is concerned about high turnover among telemarketers and wants to do some job enrichment. Which of the five core job dimensions discussed in Bauer and Erdogan (2012) or page 9 of Griffin (2007) do you think should be revised the most during a job redesign intervention? Which ones do you think do not need to be revised? Explain your reasoning and cite some of the required readings in your answer.
2. At the Grand Valley Medical Clinic there are four high-ranking employees. These include Dr. Roberts who specializes in pediatric medicine, Dr. Wilson who specializes in heart surgery, Dr. Drake who specializes in eye medicine, and Nurse Desser who does basic health check-ups for patients and refers patients to specialists as needed. They have all been working at the clinic for a long time and have strong performance records, but management is worried they are becoming bored and dissatisfied with their jobs and there is concern they might all leave unless their jobs change. However, given the high degree of training required for each of their specializations management is not sure how to go about making their jobs less monotonous and more rewarding. In general, would you recommend management undergoes a traditional job redesign approach or a job crafting approach? Which specific job redesign strategy or job crafting strategy would you recommend? For example, if you choose job redesign discuss whether you would recommend job rotation, enlargement, enrichment, etc. If you choose job crafting, refer to one of the specific strategies or interventions discussed in Wrzesniewski (2014) or Dik and Duffy (2012).
3. Transwest Airlines has decided to hire you as a job crafting consultant for two groups of their employees. One group consists of airline pilots. The pilots of course have one main task that dominates their job description—flying the airplanes safely. The second group consists of Transwest’s online marketing team, who engage in many different tasks such as designing the company’s webpage, handling calls from customers, and promoting the airline through social media. Before arriving at the airline to do interviews and make recommendations, you first need to do some reading on what general approach you will use. As a first step, review Dik and Duffy (2012), where they discuss task crafting, relational crafting, and cognitive crafting. Which of these three types of job crafting do you think would be most appropriate for pilots, and which one do you think would be most appropriate for the online marketing team? Also, read up on “job-crafting swap meets” in Wrzesniewski (2014). Do you think a swap meet would be appropriate for either pilots or online marketers? Any other strategy from Wrzesniewski (2014) that you think would be useful for either pilots or online marketers?
4. Conclude your paper with a discussion of A) what you think the main similarities and differences are between job redesign and job crafting, and B) what you think are the main advantages and disadvantages of job redesign and job crafting.

Assignment Expectations

• Answer the assignment questions directly in 4 to 5 written pages.
• Stay focused on the precise assignment questions; don’t go off on tangents or devote a lot of space to summarizing general background materials.
• Make sure to use reliable and credible sources as your references. Articles published in established newspapers or business journals/magazines are preferred. If you use articles from the Internet, make sure they are from credible sources.
• Reference your sources of information with both a bibliography and in-text citations. See the Student Guide to Writing a High-Quality Academic Paper, including pages 13 and 14 on in-text citations. Another resource is the “Writing Style Guide,” which is found under My Resources in the TLC portal.

Module 3 – SLP

Job Redesign

As with the Case Assignment, make sure you have thoroughly reviewed the background readings and understand the key concepts of job redesign and job crafting. Then think about your own job and workplace and how these concepts apply to your own work life. Once you have finished reviewing the background readings and have carefully thought about how these concepts relate to your own job, write a 2- to 3-page paper answering the following questions:

1. Of the three main types of job redesign (job enlargement, job rotation, job enrichment), which one do you think would be the most effective in your current workplace? Explain your reasoning, and cite Bauer and Erdogan (2012) or Griffin (2007) as part of your answer.
2. Suppose your supervisor decides to use job enrichment to redesign your job. Of the five core job characteristics discussed in Bauer and Erdogan (2012) or page 9 of Griffin (2007), which one do you think should be changed as part of your job redesign?
3. Which specific job crafting strategy or intervention do you think would be most effective at your organization or for your specific job? Refer to one of the specific strategies or interventions discussed in Wrzesniewski (2014) or Dik and Duffy (2012).

SLP Assignment Expectations

• Answer the assignment questions directly in 3 to 4 written pages.
• Stay focused on the precise assignment questions; don’t go off on tangents or devote a lot of space to summarizing general background materials.
• Make sure to use reliable and credible sources as your references. Articles published in established newspapers or business journals/magazines are preferred. If you use articles from the Internet, make sure they are from credible sources.
• Reference your sources of information with both a bibliography and in-text citations. See the Student Guide to Writing a High-Quality Academic Paper, including pages 13 and 14 on in-text citations. Another resource is the “Writing Style Guide,” which is found under My Resources in the TLC portal.

Module 3 – Background

Job Redesign

Required Reading

Start out this module by viewing this two videos that will give you an overview of both traditional job redesign techniques as well as the newer concept of job crafting:

Hartzell, S. (2015). Types of job redesign: Job enrichment, enlargement & rotation. Intro to Business. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y8X0HCGKaLA

Wrzesniewski, A. (2015). Job crafting – Amy Wrzesniewski on creating meaning in your own work. Re:Work with Google. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C_igfnctYjA 

Now for a more in-depth view of job design dig into the following two readings. Pay special attention to the concepts of job rotation, job enrichment, and job enlargement. Also, pay attention to the core job characteristics such as task variety, autonomy, etc. discussed in both readings:

Bauer, T., & Erdogan, B. (2012) Chapter 6.1: Motivating employees through job design. Introduction to Organizational Behavior. Flatworld Knowledge.

http://2012books.lardbucket.org/books/an-introduction-to-organizational-behavior-v1.0/s10-01-motivating-employees-through-j.html

Griffin, R. (2007). Chapter 6: Organization structure and design. Principles of Management. Houghton Mifflin, New York. http://college.cengage.com/business/griffin/sas_principles/1e/assets/students/know_bank/griffin_sas_KB_6.1.pdf

Now that you have read up on traditional approaches to job design, read up on job crafting. This reading is by Amy Wrzesniewski, who you saw in one of the videos above:

Wrzesniewski, A. (2014). Chapter 6: Engage in job crafting. In Dutton, J. E., & Spreitzer, G. M. (eds). How to Be a Positive Leader: Small Actions, Big Impact. San Francisco, CA, USA: Berrett-Koehler Publishers. [EBSCO eBook Business Collection]

Finally, this chapter provides a solid overview of job crafting including some relational, cognitive, and task crafting:

Dik, B. J., & Duffy, R. D. (2012). Chapter 7: Job crafting. Make Your Job a Calling: How the Psychology of Vocation Can Change Your Life at Work. West Conshohocken, PA: Templeton Press. [EBSCO eBook Business Collection]