The Job Characteristics Theory: What a Leader Should Know
In my efforts to better understand leadership, I performed some Google searches and came across a theory by Hackman, Lawler, and Oldham in 2000 call the Job Characteristics Theory. What stuck out in my mind about this theory is that it focuses on the follower, which, as we see later, in the LMX (Leader-Member Exchange) Theory, the follower has impacts upon a leader’s leadership effectiveness.
Essentially, the Job Characteristics Theory states that there are five job characteristics skill variety, task identity, task significance, autonomy, and job feedback. When successful or positive outcomes for all occur, this leads to three distinct psychological states: a feeling that the job performed meaningful, gaining a sense of personal responsibility, and possessing an understanding of the results, (Hackman, Lawler, and Oldham, 2000).
The job characteristics, according to (Hackman, Lawler, and Oldham, 2000) are defined in the following manner:
- Skill variety deals with the number of different or unique skills are employed in the completion of work tasks; if you use just one or two skills to complete your job, it becomes mundane and meaningless.
- Task identity is the boundary or definition of a job. If there is a clear beginning, middle, and end to tasks or duties or functions, then the job is more meaningful because the worker or professional has an idea of where there stand in terms of progress.
- Task significance is the idea that the job one undertakes is important to others or to the outcome of a department or organization. If the job is viewed by others are insignificant or meaningless, with little value, the worker’s opinions of their work is negatively impacted.
- Autonomy is essentially the leeway that a worker has to make decisions or impact the outcome of their own work product. A job with little or no autonomy is less favorable to a worker (emotionally) than one that allows more thought and freedom of choice.
- Job feedback is how much information is relayed to the worker by a leader or supervisor on how the worker is performing. Is the communication frequent and positive or constructive or non-existent or vehement? If there is little feedback and workers don’t have a clear understanding as to where they stand in terms of their performance, they are likely to have an unfavorable feeling toward their manager or their work in general.
Knowing these five key attributes of the Job Characteristics Theory, we can understand how this interplays with a worker’s feelings about their job. As leaders we can use this information to work with our subordinates to ensure their job satisfaction is intact and positive so that output is not negatively affected.
For example, if I own a factory where repetitive tasks are required (such as a conveyor belt that requires workers to pour chocolate into a candy mold, using the Job Characteristics Theory, I can manage my business to a positive way. I know that the work has low skill variety (workers do the same thing each day and only use two skills, pulling a lever and judging the timing of when to start or stop the chocolate) and the job has low autonomy in that the workers have little input to the task at hand, the job probably has low task significance to other workers in the plant.
Yet, the job of the chocolate pourer may have high task identity (there is a beginning, middle and end).
So, as a leader what can be done to get more performance out of my workers?
First, I can be sure to provide feedback regularly and as positive as practicable (if the worker needs reprimand; they need to be informed), The task significance can be expounded upon to the worker by stating how important that the chocolate is to the business; without the chocolate, there would be no company. Also, cross training and rotation of workers into a shift lead position can improve skill variety and providing the leads with more decision making power can lead to better autonomy.
So, as you can see, even leaders can learn from understanding the job’s influence and impact on subordinates.
References
Hackman, J., Lawler, E. and Oldham, G.R. (2000). Job characteristics theory. In Miner, J (ed) Organizational Behavior: Essential theories of motivation and leadership. M.E. Sharpe; Armonk, N.Y
Terrill James Malvesti says
Hi!
Thanks for posting a really good overview of the LMX theory as it was very clear to understand and relate to. I really liked reading this theory in the text and relating it to my current workplace and others that I’ve worked in. I have to privilege to be in a leadership position and I’ve used this theory in part to help motivate individuals who respond well to some of the theory’s primary characteristics. I say that I subscribe ‘in part’ to this theory because I’m not keen on dividing my team in to different groups with group “A” getting preferential treatment over group “B” thus creating potential discrimination issues. Northouse (2013) states that although the LMX theory wasn’t designed to discriminate, it breeds the development of privileged groups.
Aside from creating an “in” and “out” group, I think that focus on the follower is a good way of developing trust between individuals. The big ones for me are employee feedback and autonomy. These are two characteristics that help people achieve a high potential. There are employees who really strive on being recognized frequently for their performance. I prefer to give on-the-spot recognition versus waiting until an employee performance review counseling session, it is much less forced this way. Giving subordinates autonomy to make their own decisions within policy or the scope of their job description also empowers them to keep reaching for greater responsibility. I can’t think of a better way to subtly evaluate someone for a promotion than to allow them to be autonomous and step outside of the box and maybe even take a calculated risk. The former two characteristics really help to develop trust between the leader and follower.
In sum, I think that there are many good aspects of the LMX theory and if used equally across the board with all subordinates it will create an atmosphere of trust. In contrast, allowing one group to have more power than another has the potential to erode work-place climate and ultimately decrease productivity.
Reference:
Northouse, P.G. (2013). Leadership: Theory and Practice. Los Angeles: Sage Publications.