“Job design is not intuitive, it is a strategic process requiring the leadership to make strategic choices”

How are jobs created in your organization? Does every job in the organization speak to any real business need? Does every job on the organization structure add any real value to the business?

Job design is a process of structuring work and designating specific tasks to individual jobs in a manner that ensures the achievement of organizational objectives. It is a process that seeks to integrate the job responsibilities (actual work to be done), job requirements (competencies required) and rewards (compensation).Job design is a meticulous process that ensures that every job in the organization is ultimately serving to achieve the same vision and mission in a way that meets the needs of the organization and the job holder. This shows that job design cannot be done intuitively where functional heads just decide to create positions without thorough justifications.

There are some fundamental dimensions that underpin the job design process, viz:

1. Organizational need:

• What is the business need informing the creation of a job?
• Can this need not be met in the current work distribution?
• Can current roles not be re-organized to meet the need?

2. Productivity:

• What are the expected outputs from this job?
• Is it a “full job” that guarantees full employment of competencies?
• Does the job context allow the job to be done optimally?

3. Job satisfaction:

• Is the compensation adequate for the expected outputs?
• Is the work itself motivating – is there no boredom?
• Is the work meaningful to the job holder?

Addressing these three dimensions is critical before creating any new positions in the organization

Unfortunately in many organizations job design is not meeting these objectives mainly because the creation of jobs is done intuitively. There is rarely any due process that is followed – there is no thorough interrogation and justification of the business need, productivity and job satisfaction dimensions of the job. When Heads of Functions feel work pressure, or there are new functions to be done in the department, the general feeling is that the department is understaffed and the temptation is to create new positions for most. There is rarely a conscious discussion and drive towards work reorganization to account for the changes. Coupled with good lobbying skills, these new positions that are created can quickly be approved by the Managing Director without much interrogation, and recruitment subsequently follows. Our experience shows that in many of these organizations there are a number of jobs that are not “full jobs” – jobs where people are not fully employed in terms of application of their competencies (knowledge, skills and attributes). In these jobs, motivation is usually low because there is no challenge for the employee in terms of capacity and capability – job holders do not have a full day’s work. The employee does not grow in the job because the job is not challenging. The organization is also not optimizing on the capacity and capabilities of its people. Many managers and executives complain about carrying “dead wood” in their departments – it is a result of such practices where jobs are not put to the full design test in order to justify their existence.

When designing jobs in an organization, it should be done in a holistic manner – it should consider the context within which the job will be done as well as the relationships between the new jobs and other jobs existing in the department – how is the creation of a new role going to impact current jobs? These factors are important as they directly impact on performance in the job. The arrangement of tasks in a job has to be done in such a way that optimum performance can be achieved, not only in the job but also in all jobs closely related to the new job. Related tasks have to be combined in order to achieve operational efficiency in the role and in the work process.

It is also important to note that jobs are not static – they need continual review and redesign. As the business operating environment changes and as organizational strategy adapts to these changes, this should also be reflected in jobs within the organization. It is imperative that jobs reflect organizational strategy otherwise the organization will not be able to achieve its objectives.

Such a process ensures that all jobs, at all times, are relevant to the business, they add real value and are motivating and challenging to the individual job holders.

Emmanuel Jinda is the Managing Consultant of PROSERVE Consulting Group, a leading supplier of Professional Human Resources and Management services locally, regionally and internationally. He can be contacted at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. tel: 263 773004143 or 263 4 772778