Exam 6: Applied Performance Practices

Scientific management is the process of systematically dividing work into its smallest possible elements and standardizing work activities to achieve maximum efficiency.

Task identity is the main job characteristic related to job enrichment.

Busy Bee Ltd.has a large secretarial pool on the third floor of company headquarters where professional and lower-level managers have their reports and other documents word-processed.The tasks are received by the secretarial pool coordinator and assigned randomly (on an availability basis)to secretaries in the pool.The secretaries often do not know the managers or professionals for whom the word-processing assignment is being completed.They rarely find out about the quality of their work because revisions are often sent to other secretaries in the pool due to the rotating work assignment system.Some assignments involve simple word-processing while others require complex formatting using more sophisticated word-processing software.Some secretaries don't mind working in the pool,but most are there because it represents the entry-level secretarial position.They resent the lack of control over work assignments and look forward to being transferred to other secretarial jobs in the firm where there is more freedom to schedule their own work activities.Turnover in the pool is much higher than for other support staff at Busy Bee Ltd.Would job enlargement (combining tasks)be an effective job design strategy for employees in Busy Bee's secretarial pool?

A video journalist is someone who performs all jobs previously done by a traditional news team-from operating the camera to reporting the story.Thus,a video journalist is an example of job enlargement and job enrichment.

Employees are empowered when they:

Self-leadership is dependent on the person and the situation.

According to the job characteristics model,which core job characteristic results in a feeling of responsibility for the employee?

One problem with empowerment is that it tends to make employees less responsive to the company's needs and objectives.

Which of the following systematically evaluates the worth of each job within the organization?

Self-monitoring and designing natural rewards are both:

Employees assembling complete computer modems would have higher task identity than those assembling only one component and passing it along to others for further assembly.

Herzberg's motivator-hygiene theory led to a more serious study of:

Compared with women,men give money a lower priority in their lives.

Employee share ownership plans and share options tend to create an ''ownership culture'' in which employees feel aligned with the organization's success.

Knowledge of results originates primarily from:

Briefly describe some of the important strategies for improving reward effectiveness.

Which of these job design actions is mainly a form of job enlargement?

Jobs with high level of task significance provide freedom,independence,and discretion in scheduling the work,and determining the procedures to be used to complete the work.

Job enrichment tends to increase the quality of products or services.

Gainsharing plans focus on cost reductions and increased labour efficiency.