Job crafting

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Job crafting is an individually-driven work design process which refers to self-initiated, proactive strategies to change the characteristics of one's job to better align the job with personal needs, goals, and skills. [1] Individuals engage in job crafting as a means to experience greater meaning at work, a positive work identity, better work-related well-being, and better job performance. [2] As a topic of scientific inquiry, job crafting was built on research that suggests employees do not always enact the job descriptions that are formally assigned to them, but instead actively shape and utilize their jobs to fit their needs, values, and preferences. [3] Classic job design theory typically focuses on the ways in which managers design jobs for their employees. [4] As a work design strategy, job crafting represents a departure from this thinking in that the redesign is driven by employees, is not negotiated with the employer and may not even be noticed by the manager. [2] This idea also distinguishes job crafting from other 'bottom-up' redesign approaches such as idiosyncratic ideals (i-deals) which explicitly involve negotiation between the employee and employer. [5]

Contents

Theoretical background

The term 'job crafting' was originally coined by Amy Wrzesniewski and Jane E. Dutton in 2001, [2] however the idea that employees may redesign their jobs without the involvement of management has been present in job design literature since 1987. [6] Wrzesniewski and Dutton's (2001) initial definition limited job crafting to three forms: Changes made by employees in their jobs tasks (i.e. task crafting), job relationships (i.e. relational crafting), and meaning of the job (i.e. cognitive crafting). More recent developments have indicated that employees may change other aspects of the job; to cover this broader scope, Maria Tims and Arnold B. Bakker proposed in 2010 that job crafting be framed within the job-demands resources (JD-R) model. [7]

Recent theoretical developments have classified job crafting behaviours into two higher-order constructs: Approach crafting, which refers to self-directed actions to gain positive work aspects; and avoidance crafting, which refers to self-directed actions to avoid negative work aspects. [8] These two constructs can then be further differentiated depending on whether the job crafting is behavioural (i.e. the individual makes actual changes to the job) or cognitive (i.e. the individual changes the way they think about the work). [8] Further differentiating can then be made depending on whether individuals change their job resources or job demands, resulting in eight 'types' of job crafting (e.g., approach behavioural resource crafting). [8]

Forms of job crafting

Practical implications

For employees

If enacted properly, job crafting is a method for employees to improve their quality of life at work in several important ways, as well as make valuable contributions to the workplace. [4] The uniqueness of individual workers makes it exceptionally difficult for organizations to create 'one size fits all' work designs. Job crafting means that work designs are not fixed, and can be adapted over time to accommodate employees' unique backgrounds, motives, and preferences. The success of a job crafter may depend largely on their ability to take advantage of available resources (i.e. people, technology, raw materials etc) to reorganise, restructure, and reframe a job. Research has demonstrated that this type of resourcefulness can help employees get more enjoyment and meaning out of work, enhance their work identities, cope with adversity, and perform better. [4]

For managers

Job crafting has the potential to positively influence both individual and organizational performance, meaning it is in the interest of managers to create a context that facilitates resourceful job crafting. [4] Highly prescribed, restrictive job designs may limit employees from making positive changes in the way they perform tasks, taking on additional tasks, altering interactions with others, or viewing their jobs in an alternative way. On the other hand, job crafting that is beneficial for the job crafter may be harmful to the goals of the organization and produce negative effects. Therefore, in addition to allowing room for crafting, managers must build a shared understanding with employees that job crafting is encouraged so long as it aligns with the organizations overall strategy. Maintaining open lines of communication between managers and employees and building trust may promote positive job crafting which is favourable to both the individual crafter and the organization. [4]

Related Research Articles

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Job satisfaction</span> Attitude of a person towards work

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Employee engagement</span> Relationship between an organization and its employees

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Affective events theory</span> Psychological model

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Functional diversity encapsulates the cognitive resource diversity theory, which is the idea that diversity of cognitive resources promotes creativity and innovation, problem solving capacity, and organizational flexibility. Functionally diverse teams “consist of individuals with a variety of educational and training backgrounds working together." This differs from social diversity, which in accordance with the similarity attraction (homophily) paradigm, is the idea that individuals who are more similar together are able to work together more effectively. There is a degree of ambiguity in academic literature in the definition of functional and social diversity due to many studies in this matter either focusing on one or the other or mashing up the different characteristics.Psychologists, economists, sociologists have conducted numerous studies on diversity within groups to examine the effects on group performance. There are debates about benefits and costs of working in a functionally diverse groups. Milliken and Martins (1996) concluded that “diversity appears to be a double-edged sword”.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Trait activation theory</span>

Trait activation theory is based on a specific model of job performance, and can be considered an elaborated or extended view of personality-job fit. Specifically, it is how an individual expresses their traits when exposed to situational cues related to those traits. These situational cues may stem from organization, social, and/or task cues. These cues can activate personality traits that are related to job tasks and organizational expectations that the organization values. These cues may also elicit trait-related behaviors that are not directly related to job performance.

References

  1. ↑ Tims, M.; Bakker, A. B.; Derks, D. (2012). "Development and validation of the job crafting scale". Journal of Vocational Behavior. 80 (1): 173–186. doi:10.1016/j.jvb.2011.05.009.
  2. 1 2 3 Wrzesniewski, Amy; Dutton, Jane E. (2001). "Crafting a Job: Revisioning Employees as Active Crafters of Their Work". Academy of Management Review. 26 (2): 179–201. doi:10.5465/amr.2001.4378011. ISSN   0363-7425.
  3. ↑ Grant, Adam M.; Parker, Sharon K. (2009). "7 Redesigning Work Design Theories: The Rise of Relational and Proactive Perspectives". Academy of Management Annals. 3 (1): 317–375. doi:10.5465/19416520903047327. ISSN   1941-6520.
  4. 1 2 3 4 5 Berg, J. M.; Dutton, J. E.; Wrzesniewski, A (2008). "What is Job Crafting and Why Does It Matter?". Positive Organizational Scholarship.
  5. ↑ "Beyond top-down and bottom-up work redesign: customizing job content through idiosyncratic deals". Development and Learning in Organizations. 24 (6). 2010-10-05. doi:10.1108/dlo.2010.08124fad.001. ISSN   1477-7282.
  6. ↑ Kulik, C. T.; Oldham, G. R.; Hackman, J. R. (1987). "Work design as an approach to person–environment fit". Journal of Vocational Behavior. 31 (3): 278–296. doi:10.1016/0001-8791(87)90044-3.
  7. ↑ Tims, Maria; Bakker, Arnold B. (2010-12-02). "Job crafting: Towards a new model of individual job redesign". SA Journal of Industrial Psychology. 36 (2). doi: 10.4102/sajip.v36i2.841 . ISSN   2071-0763.
  8. 1 2 3 Zhang, Fangfang; Parker, Sharon K. (2018-10-23). "Reorienting job crafting research: A hierarchical structure of job crafting concepts and integrative review". Journal of Organizational Behavior. 40 (2): 126–146. doi:10.1002/job.2332. hdl: 20.500.11937/76998 . ISSN   0894-3796. S2CID   149766028.
  9. 1 2 Slemp, G. R.; Vella-Brodrick, D. A. (2013). "The Job Crafting Questionnaire: A new scale to measure the extent to which employees engage in job crafting". International Journal of Wellbeing. 3 (2): 126–146.
  10. 1 2 3 4 Geldenhuys, Madelyn; Bakker, Arnold B.; Demerouti, Evangelia (2020-09-24). "How task, relational and cognitive crafting relate to job performance: a weekly diary study on the role of meaningfulness". European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology. 30 (1): 83–94. doi: 10.1080/1359432x.2020.1825378 . ISSN   1359-432X.
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