TAYLORISTIC JOB DESIGN PRINCIPLES

Tayloristic Job Design Principles

Tayloristic Job Design Principles

Principles Of Job Design

Four major approaches underlie research into training and development in organizations: those of human resource management (HRM), industrial/organizational (I/O) psychology, labor economics, and industrial relations.

The earlier field of 'personnel management' considered training as one of several separate HR practices and focused on identifying and implementing training models in a series of steps to improve individuals' job performance. By contrast, in the HRM approach, HR practices, including training and development, are used to improve organizational performance, help implement an organization's business strategy and meet its objectives, and help build a sustainable competitive advantage that creates financial performance. The approach is strategic in terms of managing human resources to meet the organization's objectives. (Taylor, 2005)

The theoretical basis for the strategic HRM approach includes the resource-based view (RBV) of the firm. High-performance work systems (HPWS) are integrated systems of HR and other work practices that are internally consistent with each other and externally consistent with organizational strategy. HPWS are designed to help develop valuable, unique employee capacities that assist an organization to develop core competencies - firm-specific resources and capabilities that enable an organization to enact a strategy that creates value by not being implemented simultaneously by competitors and which competitors find hard to duplicate. Developing employees is an effective way of gaining valuable, rare and perhaps unique capacities, and training and development is a key practice, amongst others, to do so. Training, in combination with other HR practices (e.g., selective staffing, performance-contingent compensation, developmental and merit-based performance appraisal) and other work practices such as work design (self-managed teams, flexible work assignments, teamwork), open communication, quality improvement, and decentralized decision-making, helps develop core competencies by which the organization can gain a sustained competitive advantage.

A further major theoretical basis used in the HRM approach is social exchange theory. Social exchange can be viewed as favors one party provides to another that create diffuse future obligations which, due to a norm of reciprocity, will result in reciprocation by the receiver. General training can be viewed as a resource that an employer provides to help an employee that demonstrates support and caring. Employees perceive training as an investment in, and commitment to, them and reciprocate in kind with extra effort, commitment, organizational citizenship behavior, and cooperation. Training may be viewed as a gift when provided on its own or when provided as part of HPWS. Because employees can interpret HPWS as expressing appreciation, investment, and recognition due to the rigorous recruitment, extensive training, empowerment, and rewards central to HPWS, they begin to perceive themselves in a social exchange as opposed to a purely economic relationship. HPWS are thought to result in generalized norms of reciprocity, shared mental models, role making, and organizational citizenship behaviors that then lead to organizational performance. (Arvey, 1996)

In contrast to the strategic approaches that underlie the HRM approach to training, industrial/organizational (I/O) psychology focuses on the science of training - how to design, deliver, implement, transfer and evaluate training so ...