WHP lecture 2

What is design?

Creating a plan before something is made, or the purpose and planning behind an action, fact, or object.

What is job design?

The specification of job contents, methods, and relationships to satisfy technological and organizational requirements, social requirements, and jobholder requirements.

What did scientific management traditionally emphasize?

Task simplification and increasing productivity.

What is the goal of modern job design?

To create good jobs that promote involvement, satisfaction, health, and performance.

What is Theory X?

The assumption that employees are passive, unmotivated, lack ambition, and need directive control.

What is Theory Y?

The assumption that employees can be motivated, active, responsible, and capable of development.

What is the Job Characteristics Model (JCM)?

Hackman and Oldham's (1976) model explaining how core job characteristics influence psychological states and work outcomes.

What are the five core job characteristics in the JCM?

Skill variety, task identity, task significance, autonomy, and feedback.

What is skill variety?

The extent to which a job requires different skills and abilities.

What is task identity?

The extent to which an employee completes a recognizable or whole piece of work.

What is task significance?

The extent to which a job has an important impact on other people.

What is autonomy in the JCM?

The freedom and independence an employee has in deciding how to perform their work.

What is feedback in the JCM?

Information about how well an employee is performing.

Which three job characteristics lead to experienced meaningfulness?

Skill variety, task identity, and task significance.

Which job characteristic leads to experienced responsibility for work outcomes?

Autonomy.

Which job characteristic leads to knowledge of actual results?

Feedback.

What are the three critical psychological states in the JCM?

Experienced meaningfulness, experienced responsibility for outcomes, and knowledge of actual results.

What are the expected outcomes of the JCM?

High internal work motivation, high-quality performance, high job satisfaction, low absenteeism, and low turnover.

What is growth need strength?

An employee's need or desire for personal growth and development.

What are the main criticisms of the JCM?

It uses a narrow set of motivational job characteristics, gives insufficient attention to social factors and extrinsic motivation, neglects job demands, and has limited support for the mediating role of psychological states.

What is the Job Demands–Resources (JD-R) model?

A model that classifies job characteristics into job demands and job resources to explain employee well-being and performance.

What are job demands?

Physical, psychological, social, or organizational aspects of a job that require sustained effort or skill and can cause physiological or psychological costs.

What are job resources?

Physical, psychological, social, or organizational aspects of a job that help achieve work goals, reduce demands and costs, and stimulate growth, learning, and development.

What is Proposition 1 of the JD-R model?

Job characteristics can be classified into job demands and job resources.

What is the health impairment process (Proposition 2)?

Job demands require effort and deplete physical, emotional, and cognitive resources, leading to exhaustion and potentially health problems.

What is the motivational process (Proposition 2)?

Job resources support psychological need satisfaction and work engagement, which can promote creativity and performance.

What is the buffer hypothesis (Proposition 3)?

Job resources weaken the negative impact of job demands on strain or exhaustion.

What is the boost hypothesis (Proposition 3)?

Job demands can strengthen the positive impact of job resources on engagement or work motivation.

What are personal resources (Proposition 4)?

Positive self-evaluations concerning an individual's ability to control and successfully influence their environment.

What are three examples of personal resources?

Optimism, self-efficacy, and resilience.

What is the relationship between personal and job resources (Proposition 4)?

They can reinforce each other reciprocally: personal resources can support job resources, and job resources can support personal resources.

How can personal resources act as moderators (Proposition 5)?

They can change how strongly job demands affect well-being

What is job crafting (Proposition 6)?

Employees proactively change job demands and resources to better align their jobs with their abilities and preferences.

What are the expected effects of job crafting?

It can increase job and personal resources, facilitate work engagement, and improve performance.

What is the gain cycle (Proposition 7)?

Work engagement leads to proactive behavior, which creates more job and personal resources, improves coping with demands, and supports future engagement.

What is self-undermining (Proposition 8)?

Dysfunctional behavior, such as poor communication or conflict, that creates obstacles and can undermine performance.

How can self-undermining affect job demands?

It can create additional hindering job demands, leading to more strain and poorer performance.

What is the loss cycle (Proposition 9)?

Strain leads to concentration problems and mistakes, which can trigger self-undermining, create new demands, and cause further strain.

What are the main criticisms of the JD-R model?

It is broad and lacks specificity, demands and resources can be difficult to distinguish, and it does not fully address factors outside work.

What is the difference between the health impairment and motivational processes?

The health impairment process explains how job demands can harm employees' health, whereas the motivational process explains how job resources can increase motivation, work engagement, and performance.

What is the difference between the buffer and boost hypotheses?

Buffer: resources weaken the demand–strain relationship. Boost: demands strengthen the resource–engagement relationship.

What is the difference between a gain cycle and a loss cycle?

• Gain cycle: Job and personal resources reinforce each other, leading to more resources and positive outcomes. For example, an employee has supportive colleagues, becomes more engaged, performs well, and gains more confidence and personal resources.

• Loss cycle: A loss of resources can lead to further losses and negative outcomes. For example, high job demands exhaust an employee, leaving them with less energy to cope with their work, which can lead to further exhaustion and reduced resources.

How does the JD-R model extend the JCM?

The JD-R model covers a broader range of job demands and resources, including social and negative job characteristics, rather than focusing on five core motivational characteristics.

How can you apply the JD-R model to a work example?

Identify the job demands and resources, explain whether the health impairment or motivational process occurs, and discuss the consequences for well-being and performance.