Work measurement is a process of analyzing jobs for the purpose of setting the performance standards and benchmarks. It involves linking the employee responsibilities to the time required to complete specific tasks to achieve desired levels of performance. Job design involves specifying the work activities of an individual or group in an organizational setting. To this end, job design seeks to enhance job performance through clear definition of responsibilities for different work activities.

Techniques Used

Work measurement employs time study and activity sampling to determine the time an employee should take to accomplish a task. Job design, on the other hand, seeks to balance work responsibilities through approaches such as job rotation and specialization techniques to increase workers’ job satisfaction.

Objectives

Job design is aimed at reducing job dissatisfaction amongst employees that comes about because of doing the same tasks repetitively. Work measurement is aimed at determining the time a qualified worker will take to accomplish a particular task at a set level of performance.

Application

Work measurement is used in budgeting, planning for manpower, job scheduling, standard costing and designing incentive schemes for workers. Job design is used in offering non-monetary rewards like employee satisfaction so as to meet the rising challenge and duties of workers.

Impact

The operations manager uses job design techniques to structure work responsibilities to meet both the physical and behavioral needs of workers. Work measurement methods are used to determine the most efficient approaches for performing different tasks and setting reasonable standards for performing the tasks.