Impact of Change in the Employee - (L7) Flashcards
What is the difference between process and outcome?
Process:
• How change is designed, delivered, maintained and managed (e.g., management-led vs. participative).
• The mechanisms that determine the outcomes.
Outcomes:
• The ‘measurable’ impact of change on various stakeholders.
Today there is much more focus on the outcomes.
What are the four markers of impact? Why are they poor indicators on people’s feelings for change?
- Experiences of work: how do people experience this? What does it feel like? Has their job, way of working change? Relationships? (due to change)
- Worker attitudes: are people satisfied, committed? What do they think about their managers/peers? We’re interested in what people think but attitudes don’t predict behaviour, e.g., someone might hate their job and the company, but they may not have an alternative – on the surface they may seem like a committed person.
- Health and wellbeing: how do people feel and how are they handling work during/post-change? Can assess physiological/psychological wellbeing.
- Behavioural: absence? High turnover? People often don’t take time off when they’re ill, thus not a clear indicator.
- Inter-linked: proximal (experiences) to distal (behavioural).
Overall, these markers can be inaccurate and poor indicators on how people feel about change. People don’t always behave in the way that they think – for example, it may be reasonable to assume that someone who has a positive experience of work even post-change may not have experienced any issues, but in reality this may not be the case. A person might be committed to their job but may also hate their job and may not have an alternative.
How does the change process affect someone?
The change process may affect how someone may experience work, their attitudes and stress, which can lead to wellbeing and behaviour being affected.
Example of MDLZ and leaving.
Regarding the experience of work, what aspects does change affect?
• Various types of change have implications for:
- Demands (type and amount). (WFH/adulting)
- Control (choices about using skills and making decisions). (Education)
- Support (frequency and type of interactions, team and organisational structures etc.)
- Plus, uncertainty, job insecurity, career development, role at work, management of change process itself and so on.
What is stress theory? Apply COVID-19/placement experience?
- Stress theory: when perceived demands exceed perceived resources (change can impact on both).
- Stress links workers’ experiences to health, well-being and behaviour (a mediator / bridge).
What is the HSE definition of stress?
“…the process that arises when… demands of various types and combinations exceed the person’s capacity to cope………It is a significant cause of illness and disease and is known to be linked with high levels of sickness absence, staff turnover and other indicators of organisational underperformance – including human error.”
Explain Karasek’s Job Strain Model.
• Karasek’s Job Strain model posits that strain is derived from one’s job demands and the level of decision-making control one has in their job. The model maps these as job demands and job decision latitude and produces for different types of jobs; passive, low strain, active, high strain. The model predicts that strain increases with job demands. Employees can decrease strain by having greater control, often through leveraging social support in the form of developing colleague/supervisor relationships for example. They can also better cope with demands where they are able to maintain good physiological and psychological health.
Explain Passive Jobs as part of Karasek’s Job Strain model.
Characterised by low control and low demands. Passivity is associated with job dissatisfaction. Examples include admin work, cleaning, maintenance.
Explain Active Jobs as part of Karasek’s Job Strain model.
Characterised by high control and high demands. Examples include lawyer, engineering, private healthcare.
Explain Low Strain Jobs as part of Karasek’s Job Strain model.
Characterised by high control and low demands. Examples include freelancing, arts, self-employment
Explain High Strain Jobs as part of Karasek’s Job Strain model.
Characterised by low control and high demands. Findings suggest these workers report exhaustion, depression and anxiety. Examples include fast food work, deliveries, nursing.
Explain the Conservation of Resources (COR) model of Hobfoll, 2001 and its aspects.
- People identify, protect, and develop resources they value (Hobfoll, 2001). But some people lose sight of this.
- We each have personal characteristics and environmental conditions that support coping and protect well-being. Naturally we seek to nurture and protect these.
- Conditions are the situation a worker finds themselves in (e.g., having good security of tenure or a valued senior role).
- Personal resources (e.g., optimism and self-efficacy).
- Energies (e.g., time, knowledge, and skills).
- Social support works across these categories as it helps people to preserve and develop their resources – surrounding ourselves with the right people.
How do you conserve resources?
Think about this.
What are job demands?
Job demands can be defined as the ‘physical, psychological, social, or organisational aspects… associated with certain physiological and/or psychological costs’ (Bakker and Demerouti, 2006). Examples of job demands I faced in my role included meeting short deadlines, heavy workload and working in a fast-paced environment. However, job demands should only be viewed negatively if the employee consistently struggles to apply the same level of effort to them and is unable to recover as a result (Meijman and Mulder, 1998, as cited in Bakker and Demerouti, 2006).
What are job resources?
Those mentioned aspects of the job that aid goal achievement,
reduce the impact of the costs of job demands, and encourage development (Bakker and
Demerouti, 2006). Some job resources that allowed me to manage my job demands
included strong working relationships with my team and stakeholders, access to feedback,
and task variety.
Explain the importance of work engagement in the JDR model?
Where there is work engagement, and/or people are more engaged and in control, this can positive impact performance and reduce the health implications associated with higher job demands.
How is performance affected in the JDR model?
You know this. Think about job demands and resources, how this impacts work engagement and then performance.
Discuss placement findings for JDR model.
The office environment appears to be the preferred for respondents to maintain positive wellbeing and high job performance with respect to job demands and job resources. Employees are better able to manage workloads, are more comfortable with their work routines, and communicate more easily with peers in contrast to the virtual environment. Furthermore, most employees are less stressed, less susceptible to burnout and energy depletion, and do not feel their morale is negatively impacted as a result of their job demands, yet many feel these hinder high job performance. Employees are also better able to maintain strong working relationships, feel more supported, and are more confident that their job resources help them to manage their job demands.
Give some examples of change and potential benefits/outcomes.
Teamworking & De-layering (Flatter Structures):
- Increased autonomy, support, variety.
- Multi-skilling.
- More responsibility without more pay?
Business Process Re-engineering and outsourcing:
- More fragmented work & less social contact.
- Higher demands with lower variety.
- Increased efficiency?
NOT GUARANTEED.
What is the theory of planned behaviour?
Even if we hold attitudes, they don’t always manifest into behaviour. Behaviour tends to be influenced by norms, behavioural attitude and perceived behavioural control.
“Low empirical relations between general personality traits and behaviour in specific situations had led theorists to claim that the trait concept… is untenable.” (Mischel, 1968 as cited in Ajzen, 1991).
Instead by aggregating behaviour across different occasions, which considers a range of contextual factors in specific situations, we are better able to understand one’s general behaviour.
What are intentions?
Signify how willing someone is to perform a behaviour. Where the intention is strong, one is more likely to perform a behaviour. It’s important to understand that the intention can only translate into behaviour if the person can decide to perform it.
