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Job enrichment is an approach to job redesign developed in the late 1950s. The term refers to the alteration of the job content so that the employee is given an identifiable unit of work and granted with more authority and control over his/her job (Herzberg, 1968). For many years job enrichment has concerned people inside and outside academic circles, generating more research investigations than any other technique in the field of job motivation. ...
The question of whether job enrichment is effective is rather indefinite and ambiguous. We can approach it from several different perspectives: Does job enrichment work for the employees? That is, does it help employees feel more motivated and satisfied with their job? Does job enrichment work for managers? ... Is job enrichment a threat for managers and their power? Does job enrichment work for the society? ... Is job enrichment a threat to the capitalist profit- maximizing value? ... Therefore, the question concerning this essay is: “Does job enrichment make employees feel more motivated and satisfied at work?”
First we will examine the theoretical foundations of job enrichment and briefly view the circumstances under which the technique was first suggested. ... What follows next is the support of the argument that job enrichment does not work for the employees. Lastly, some thoughts about the value of job enrichment and its contribution to personnel management are expressed.
THEORETICAL FOUNDATION
Job enrichment is based on Herzberg’s dual-factor theory of job satisfaction and motivation (Kreitner, Kinicki, 2001). Herzberg suggested that people are satisfied with factors intrinsic to their job (motivators), such as achievement, recognition for achievement, the work itself, responsibility, advancement and growth. ... Conversely, people are dissatisfied with factors extrinsic to their job (hygiene factors), such as company policy and administration, supervision, interpersonal relations, working conditions, salary, status and security. ... As motivators lead to job satisfaction they are effective in motivating the employee to perform more efficiently. ... In other words, managers must enrich employees’ jobs (Herzberg called it vertical job loading, see Exhibit 1).
Job enrichment was developed in a post-war period of rising affluence and levels of education. ... It was then that companies began to consider job redesign as the answer to their problems (Thompson, McHugh, 1990). Job enrichment was developed after the unsuccessful implementation of job rotation and job enlargement in several industrial settings. ... Nowadays, however, articles on job enrichment have disappeared from management literature and hardly any company puts into practice what Herzberg suggested.
RESEARCH EVIDENCE
The period that followed Herzberg’s dual-factor theory and his suggestion of vertical job loading was full of research about the practical utility of the new technique. During the 1960s and 1970s many companies were willing to test the usefulness of job enrichment in their own settings. ... Some proponents of job enrichment reported dramatic improvement in the motivation and satisfaction of employees (e. ... Others stated that enrichment did not contribute to employee motivation, the technique’s costs were high, and moreover, employees were dissatisfied with the changes of their work content. Furthermore, enrichment’s advocates were accused of using false research methods, writing biased reports and withholding those cases that resulted in failure (Fein, 1974). Therefore, it appears rather difficult for the reader to judge the effectiveness of job enrichment in terms of employee satisfaction from those past studies. ... The authors mention keeping the employees ignorant of the research project, using experimental and control groups, giving to the experimental group more complete tasks and control, and assessing job satisfaction before and after the change (Paul, Robertson, 1970). ...
DOES JOB ENRICHMENT WORK FOR THE EMPLOYEES?
In my point view, the theory of job enrichment is based on generalizations about human behavior at work. It assumes that all employees will perceive and respond to their new job content in the same fashion: they will perceive their enriched work as challenging and intrinsically motivating and respond by working hard to meet their need for psychological growth.
Approximate Word count = 3119
Approximate Pages = 12.5
(250 words per page double spaced)
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