New Approaches to Work Design at Spectrum Private Limited

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Today, many organizations are increasingly focused on effectively managing their people to remain competitive in the market. People are recognised as a key resource in managing operations and meeting the goals and objectives of the organisations. The aim of this report is to discuss concepts in managing a modern work force and applying new approaches to work design at Spectrum Private Limited.

Employee job satisfaction leads to greater loyalty and commitment. However, organizations need to ensure that they are motivated and trained adequately to perform at their best levels to stay ahead of its competitors.

Managers need to create an environment where employees can take responsibility, learn and manage themselves so that they can maximize their contributions to their companies as well as their own personal development

Companies are recognizing the importance of involving employees in aspects of work in addition to their main tasks, in order to develop the abilities of all employees and hence improve organizational performance.

Several studies proved that implementation of self-managed teams can lead to increased employee satisfaction, increased socialization at work place & increased autonomy.

Companies are offering its employees more choices in terms of work arrangements to help creating conditions to meet the needs of both the companies and its employees

Spectrum Pvt. Ltd. is a trading company in Maldives. It currently operates five retail outlets and manages over 300 employees. The management should consider implementing Employee Involvement programs such as Quality Circles and Suggestions Schemes. The participating staff should also be trained with the necessary skills and rewarded for their contribution. It is also recommended to transform groups of employees to self-managed teams as this would benefit the employees as well as the company. Moreover it is important to develop a culture that fosters employee empowerment, self-managed teams and employee involvement. Flexi-time, part-time schedules and other work arrangements can be offered by the management to enhance productivity of the existing staff and attract new employees.

1.0 PREAMBLE

Today, many organizations are increasingly focused on effectively managing their people to remain competitive in the market. People are recognised as a key resource in managing operations and meeting the goals and objectives of the organisations. The aim of this report is to discuss concepts in managing a modern work force and applying new approaches to work design at Spectrum Private Limited.

Spectrum Pvt. Ltd. is a trading company in Maldives. It currently operates five retail outlets and manages over 300 employees.

Due to the nature of changes happening in the workplace, the growing competitive nature of the markets, and the change of employee attitudes towards work and their commitment to organizational goals, organizations need to review their current approaches towards managing people. As ultimately it is people of the organization who provide superior organizational performance.

The final section of this report is intended on providing recommendations on further improving operations at Spectrum Pvt. Ltd. through changes to its current work design.

2.0 STATE OF KNOWLEDGE

Job Satisfaction, Motivation and Job Performance

It is crucial for organizations to ensure that employees are well motivated and performing at their best levels in order to stay ahead of competitors. They may be satisfied with their jobs but may not have the desire to perform better. Terry Hill (2005, p.71) explains that job satisfaction and motivation is not the same. If employees are satisfied it may increase their loyalty and commitment to their organizations, while it does not necessarily increase their performance. In contrast, if employees are well motivated, it could lead to increased efforts and better performance from them.

Hill further explains that Hertzberg Model (two-factor theory of motivation) can be applied to identify several aspects of work that can lead to satisfaction or dissatisfaction and those that can lead to motivation. 'Hygiene Factors' are referred as the ones if not maintained well will lead to employee dissatisfaction, where as 'motivators' are factors that leads to motivation. Security, pay and relationships are considered as hygiene factors. On the other hand, motivators are factors such as personal growth, responsibility and achievement. The author concluded that to meet the necessary performance standards, employees need to be sufficiently motivated.

Employees cannot be motivated directly as motivation is personal and internal. Therefore, managers should be working on creating an environment for the employees to be motivated (Flynn 2011, p.15).

However, motivation alone is not sufficient to achieve good job performance standards. It is equally important develop their skills to get the best results (Hill 2005, p.72). This creates the need for effective staff training and development programs.

Managers' roles

Managers need to create an environment where employees can take responsibility, learn and manage themselves so that they can maximize their contributions to their companies as well as their own personal development. This should be the fundamental role of the managers. Furthermore, recognizing the change of role, managers need to be "communicating a vision and confirming corporate objectives and getting employees to manage themselves at work and be responsible for putting things right" (Hill 2005, p.78). Therefore, management needs to think strategically to create values, expectations and an environment enabling its employees to work and manage themselves better.

Employee involvement

More companies are recognizing the importance of involving employees in aspects of work in addition to their main tasks, in order to develop the abilities of all employees and hence improve overall business (Hill 2005, p.80).

"Employee involvement is a process designed to empower members of an organization to make decisions and to solve appropriate to their level in the organization" (Pace, cited in Sun et al. 2000, p.350). Employees are usually in a better position to make improvement decisions if they are directly dealing with the problems or opportunities encountered and have control of the improvement processes (Sun et al. 2000, p.350).

A research revealed that Employee Involvement is positively related to quality management and suggested combining Employee Involvement