Understanding Job Analysis

• Job analysis is studying a job to identify the skills, knowledge and experience needed to perform it.
• It identifies the tasks, duties, and responsibilities of a specific job.
• Job analyses should be re-analyzed regularly.
• Job Analysis is a technical process used to define the duties, responsibilities, and accountabilities of a job.

Definitions of Job Analysis

• Edwin B. Flippo: Job Analysis is the process of studying and collecting information about the operations and responsibilities of a specific job.
• Michael J. Jucius: Job Analysis studies the operations, duties, and organizational aspects of jobs to derive job specifications or descriptions.
• Blum: Job Analysis is an accurate study of various job components including duties, work conditions and worker qualifications.
• John A Shubin: Job Analysis is the methodical compilation and study of work data, defining each occupation to distinguish it from others.
• Scott, Clothier, and Spriegel: Job Analysis critically evaluates the operations, duties, and relationships of a job.

Key Terms in Job Analysis

• Element: Smallest part of a job, showing every part of the process during a job.
• Task: A particular work activity carried out for a specific purpose.
• Duty: Involves a number of tasks (e.g., counseling, supervising).
• Position: One or more duties performed by one person in the organization.
• Job: A kind of position within the organization.
• Job Family: A group of two or more jobs with similar worker characteristics or parallel work tasks.
• Occupation: A group of similar jobs within the organization (e.g. clerk, accountant).
• Career: The sequence of positions, jobs, or occupations a person has during their working life.

Conducting Job Analysis

• Determine the desired applications of the job analysis.
• Select the jobs to be analyzed.
• Gather job information.
• Verify the accuracy of the job information.
• Document the job analysis by writing a job description.

Types of Job Analysis Methods

• Interview
• Observation
• Questionnaires

Interview Methods

• Individual Interview: Interviewing employees or supervisors to gather information about the job which can be time consuming and risk exaggerating a job.
• Group Interview: Interviewing two or more incumbents to gather information about a particular job, with increased accuracy.

Observation

• Direct observation of employees or reviewing films of them on the job.
• Provides firsthand information, but workers might not function efficiently while being watched.

Structured Questionnaire Method

• Delivers questionnaires to employees to get their remarks on the job, which may be multiple choice or open-ended questions
• It is less expensive, but may result in incomplete or inaccurate information.

Position Analysis Questionnaire (PAQ)

• Developed in the early 1970s by McCormick et al.
• Consists of 194 work-oriented job elements divided into six major categories, rated on a scale of 0 to 5, which is long with complicated scoring.

Other Methods of Analysis

• Technical Conference Method: Gathers supervisors with extensive knowledge to obtain specific characteristics of a job.
• Dairy or Log Method: Employees maintain log records or daily diaries of their activities and provides fair idea about duties and responsibilities.
• HRD Record: Uses employee records maintained by HR department to do job analysis.
• Managerial Job Analysis: Specialized methods for managerial jobs due to their different nature with Management Position Description Questionnaire (MPDQ).
• Computerized Job Analysis: Uses information communication technology to develop computerized job analysis systems for job descriptions.
• Actual Performance of the Job: Observer actually does the work themselves to understand the required skills and difficulty.
• Critical Incident Method: Asking employees to write about critical incidents they have encountered while performing the job.
• Combination Methods: Uses a combination of methods due to each method having its own strengths and weaknesses.

Job Analysis Methods

• Task Inventory Analysis
• Critical Incident Technique
• Position Analysis Questionnaire
• Functional Job Analysis

Job Description

• A written profile of a job.
• Helps identify unnecessary tasks, overlapping responsibilities, and unfilled functions.
• Includes job title, location, grading, relationships, purpose, list of duties, terms, conditions, and negative aspects.

Job Specification

• Also known as person specification or worker characteristics.
• Describes the profile of the person who should succeed in the job.
• Includes knowledge, skills, abilities, education, experience, physical and personality requirements, and career path.

Factors Affecting Job Analysis Program

• Job analyst has to consider factors influencing the program.
• Analyst has to work with organizational representatives to determine effective methods.
• Analyst has to understand how the organization operates.
• Analyst has to find the best time to obtain information from incumbents and supervisors.