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Ownership of work
(empowerment), which is the heart of self-directed work teams, often requires
taking a new look at the way work is performed, and at the systems that support
the work. More than twenty-five years
ago, Cherns (1976) presented fundamentals of work design that still apply today:
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Minimal critical specification (Keep it simple):
Don’t specify more than is absolutely necessary.
Don’t create any more rules, regulations, or general bureaucracy than
you need.
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Multi-functionalism (Task variety):
Rather than performing only a highly specialized job, each individual
team member should be able to understand and perform all the tasks within the
team. Multi-functionalism helps
teams adapt to changing demands.
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Boundary location (Job ownership):
Whenever possible, give our teams a whole and identifiable piece of the
business with complete responsibility for producing a product or service.
The value of this idea contrast with traditional forms of job design
where equipment or territories are the guiding principles.
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Information flow (Open communication):
Information systems should be designed to provide information directly to
the point where action on the data occurs.
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Support congruence (Empowering systems): Often existing
organizational systems—rewards, training, and time keeping systems, for
example—will undermine your vision and values.
In such cases, these systems must b e redesigned to reinforce rather than
subvert the team process.
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Evolution (Fine tuning): Team design never ends.
Remember that a team’s emergence is evolutionary, not revolutionary.
Don’t expect to create a perfect design in six days.
Instead, plan to reevaluate and adjust your design constantly.
Most successful
team implementations involve people at all organizational levels; in fact those
closest to the work are often in the best position to recommend design changes.
The figure below from Welling et al.
(1991), illustrates the degree of involvement for major
stakeholders in the design process. The
more all stakeholders are involved in the design and implementation
process, the more likely it is that your teams will be successful.
Stakeholders' involvement in the design process (p. 106)
Management Presentation (Example from a different company)
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