Unit 5.3 - Employee Involvement Strategies

Question 1

What is Quality of Worklife (QWL)?

Answer 1

Provides opportunities for employees to participate in the organization as managers or owners

Goals:
1. They attempt to create a democracy
2. They try to share the financial rewards
3. They seek to create greater job security
4. They try to enhance individual development

Question 2

What are Self-Directed Work Teams?

Answer 2

Teams that consist of small groups of workers who are responsible for performing a series of jobs.

Each group is directed by its own informal leadership rather than through a layer of supervisors.

The strategic advantage of self-directed work teams is that they are more responsive to change.

Question 3

What are Quality Circles?

Answer 3

A quality circle consists of a group of workers who meet periodically to discuss methods of increasing productivity.

• Participation in the group discussion is voluntary
• The discussions are led by a supervisor or a group facilitator
• The meeting is designed to identify and diagnose problems, to explore
  alternative solutions, and to recommend the best solution
• The members of the group are encouraged to discuss only the problems about which they can do something

Question 4

What is Job Design and redesign?

Answer 4

Method to increase organizational effectiveness and improve quality of work-life.

Considerations:
* Ergonomics
* Job Specialization - simplifying a job by reducing its elements for a single worker; increases efficiency and proficiency; downside is the worker may get bored
* Job Enrichment - adding more managerial responsibilities to increase ownership over projects (vertical integration)
* Job Enlargement - increasing number of activities for a worker (horizontal integration)

Question 5

What is the Job Characteristics Model?

Answer 5

Core job characteristics:
* Skill variety - opposite of job specialization
* Task identity -
* Task significance - impact on organization, community, etc.
* Autonomy - degree to which workers are free of influence of a supervisor
* Feedback - degree to which workers obtain info about their performance

Critical psychological states:
* Experienced meaningfulness of the work
* Experienced responsibility for the outcomes of the work
* Knowledge of actual results of the work

Job outcomes:
* High internal work motivation
* High growth satisfaction
* High general job satisfaction
* High work effectiveness

Moderators:
* Employee growth-need strength
* Knowledge and skill
* Context satisfactions

Question 6

What is Participative Decision Making (PDM)?

Answer 6

Employee involvement by:
* Keeping subordinates informed about the economic condition of the
organization
* Inviting employees to recommend innovative ideas and suggestions
* Treating subordinates with consideration and respect
* Supporting employees even when they make mistakes
* Providing training and development opportunities to help employees
advance

Question 7

What are the alternative work schedules?

Answer 7

• Flex time - ex. employees may start work staggered (ex. 10am, 11am); orgs may have “core hours”
• Compressed work week
• Part-time work
• Job sharing
• Phased retirement - ex. someone is in the office 4 days a week, then 3 days a week, etc. and after 6 months, they will be fully retired; a replacement can be trained in the meantime
• Home-based/telecommuting