Employee reactions to job characteristics.

Abstract

A conceptual framework specifying the conditions under which jobs will facilitate the development of internal motivation for effective performance was developed and tested. The 5s were 208 employees of a telephone company who worked on 13 different jobs. Primary independent variables were: (a) a measure of strength of desire for the satisfaction of "higher order" needs (e.g., obtaining feelings of accomplishment, personal growth); and (6) descriptions of jobs on four core dimensions (variety, autonomy, task identity, feedback). It was predicted and found that when jobs are high on the four core dimensions, employees who are desirous of higher order need satisfaction tend to have high motivation, have high job satisfaction, be absent from work infrequently, and be rated by supervisors as doing high quality work. A number of supplementary analyses were reported, and the implications of the results for future research on job effects and for the design of jobs were discussed.Researchers and managers alike are increasingly attending to the way jobs are designed as an important factor in determining the motivation, satisfaction, and performance of employees at work. This is not to say that jobs previously have been seen as irrelevant to organizational administration. On the contrary, earlier in this century when scientific management was in its prime, considerable research effort was expended to find ways that jobs could be simplified, specialized, standardized, and routinized. At the same time, industrial psychologists were developing rather complex and sophisticated procedures for describing and analyzing jobs in terms of their simplest components, as a means of evaluating the skill levels required for different jobs. The results of job analyses have been used to

The Role of Acceptance and Job Control in Mental Health, Job Satisfaction, and Work Performance.

“…Consistent with theories of occupational health and performance (e.g., Hackman & Lawler, 1971;Karasek, 1979), our results indicate that the longitudinal effects of job control on mental health, performance, and job satisfaction are unidirectional. In that, consistent with the findings of De Jonge et al (2001), noted above, we found that none of these three outcomes at Time 1 predicted job control at Time 2.…”

“…It is interesting, however, that results also showed that acceptance interacts with job control to affect these two outcomes, as hypothesized. This work organization characteristic is one of the most important ones that is identified by occupational health and performance theories (e.g., Emery & Trist, 1960;Frese & Zapf, 1994;Hackman & Lawler, 1971;Karasek, 1979) and the research that investigates them (see Terry & Jimmieson, 1999, for a review). Findings from this study suggested that higher levels of acceptance at Time 1 serve to increase the association between higher levels of job control at Time 1 and better mental health and performance at Time 2.…”

Reciprocal relationship between proactive personality and work characteristics: A latent change score approach.

“…First, we had no objective measures of work characteristics. Researchers have argued and considerable empirical evidence has shown that perceptions of work characteristics reflect objective attributes of work (Frese & Zapf, 1999;Fried & Ferris, 1987;Hackman & Lawler, 1971;Morgeson et al, 2012;Spector, 1992). As such, perceived work environments play a mediating role in the relationship between objective work conditions and outcomes (e.g., Oldham & Hackman, 1981;Rousseau, 1978).…”

Job control mediates change in a work reorganization intervention for stress reduction.

“…The job characteristics model (Hackman & Lawler, 1971;Hackman & Oldham, 1975;Turner & Lawrence, 1965), the sociotechnical systems approach (e.g., Cherns, 1976;Emery & Trist, 1960), action theory (Frese & Zapf, 1994;Hacker, Skell, & Straub, 1968), the demandscontrol model (Karasek, 1979), and the job design theory of stress (Carayon, 1993) all hypothesize that providing people control over their work serves to improve stress-related outcomes. In line with these theories of work control and employee well-being, Terry and Jimmieson (1999) noted, in their review of this research literature, that there appears to be "consistent evidence" that high levels of worker control are associated with low levels of stressrelated outcomes, including anxiety, psychological distress, burnout, irritability, psychosomatic health complaints, and alcohol consumption (p. 131).…”