Chapter Four: Job Analysis 4 – 12
job descriptions.
• In some organizations, analyzing work content is now conducted as part of work flow
and supply chain analysis.
VIII. Job Analysis and Globalization
A. Job Analysis and Susceptibility to Offshoring
• Offshoring refers to the movement of jobs to locations beyond a country’s
borders.
o Historically, manual, low-skill jobs were most susceptible to offshoring.
o There are substantial differences in hourly compensation costs across
countries for manufacturing workers; this has played an important role in
• Increasingly, susceptibility to offshoring is no longer limited to low-skill jobs.
White-collar jobs are also increasingly at risk.
• The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics has attempted to systematically measure
which jobs are most susceptible to offshoring in service-providing occupations.
o Exhibit 4.14 shows the list of occupations found to have the highest and
lowest susceptibility to offshoring.
• Jobs are most susceptible to outsourcing when:
o Inputs and outputs can easily be transmitted electronically
o Little interaction with other workers is required
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generally small or negative, while jobs on the low susceptibility list have shown
strong growth.
• Exhibit 4.15 reports estimated susceptibility (probability) of different jobs to
automation.
B. Job Analysis Information and Comparability across Borders
• As firms spread work across multiple countries, there is an increasing need to
analyze jobs to either maintain consistency in job content or else be able to
IX. Judging Job Analysis
A. Reliability
• Reliability is a measure of the consistency of results among various analysts,
various methods, various sources of data, or over time.
o Reliability is a necessary, but not sufficient, condition for validity.
• Using a single rater to conduct a job analysis typically results in very poor
reliability.
o By using multiple raters and taking their average rating, the reliability increases.
• The outcome of a job analysis depends to an important degree on who conducts it.
o There is higher reliability between professional job analysts and also when more
• Other research finds that reliability is lower for jobs that are more interdependent
with other jobs, and have more autonomy/are less routine.
• To date, no studies have found that gender and race differences affect reliability.
Chapter Four: Job Analysis 4 – 14
• The way to increase reliability in a job analysis is to understand and reduce sources
of difference.
o Quantitative job analysis helps do this.
B. Validity
• It examines the convergence of results among sources of data and methods.
• If several job incumbents, supervisors, and peers respond in similar ways to the
C. Acceptability
• If job holders and managers are dissatisfied with the initial data collected and the
process, they are not likely to buy into the resulting job structure or the pay rates
attached to that structure.
D. Currency
• To be valid, acceptable, and useful, job information must be up to date.
• As Exhibit 4.16 shows, most organizations report that they have up-to-date job
information, but a substantial portion report that job information is not up to date.
o This can not only hinder compensation practice and decision-making, but also
E. Usefulness
• Usefulness refers to the practicality of the information collected.
• For pay purposes, job analysis provides work-related information to help determine
4 – 15 Compensation – Thirteenth Edition Gerhart │Newman │Milkovich
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Education.
how much to pay for a job—it helps determine whether the job is similar to or
different from other jobs.
• If job analysis does this in a reliable, valid, and acceptable way and can be used to
make pay decisions, then it is useful.
• Some see job analysis information as useful for multiple purposes, such as hiring
and training.
• But multiple purposes may require more information than is required for pay
decisions.
F. A Judgment Call
• In the face of all the difficulties, time, expense, and dissatisfaction, managers bother with
job analysis because work-related information is needed to determine pay, and
differences in work determine pay differences.
• If work information is required, then the real issue should be, How much detail is needed
to make these pay decisions?
o The answer is, enough to help set individual employees’ pay, encourage
continuous learning, increase the experience and skill of the work force, and
minimize the risk of pay-related grievances.
X. Your Turn: The Customer-Service Agent
Summary of Case
Students are provided with information on a day in the work life of Bill Ryan, a customer-service
Learning Objective
Demonstrate how to apply some of the key techniques of job analysis by analyzing the work
activities of Bill Ryan and translate the analysis into a job description.
Teaching Guidelines
Use this case to help students understand the challenges in writing a job description.
Chapter Four: Job Analysis 4 – 16
Student answers may vary. Students can consider the following inputs in constructing their
answers.
Discussion of Case Questions
Note: An example of a job description for the job of customer service agent is provided
1. Does the day diary include sufficient information?
2. Identify the specific information in the article that you found useful.
Examples of information students are most likely to find useful include:
• The introduction prior to the day dairy that contains information about Half.com, an
overview of how the company’s business operates, a summary of the job duties of the
3. What additional information do you require? How would that information help you?
Additional data directly related to the completion of a job description that students might
suggest as being useful include:
1. How similar/different are the two descriptions? You and your teammate started with
exactly the same information. What might explain any differences?
Chapter Four: Job Analysis 4 – 18
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Education.
customer complaints. Requires knowledge of the operation of personal computers and relevant
computer software.
Physical requirements: Ability to sit for extended periods of time in one location. Possess visual
and hearing acuity to perform job-related functions.
Essential Responsibilities
1. Responds to 60 – 100 routine and non-routine e-mail messages and phone calls regarding
sales transactions between buyers and sellers.
3. Performs trust and safety work that investigates sales transactions that may be fraudulent.
5. Attends required, recommended, or job-related training programs and/or seminars.
7. Communicates the unavailability of a specific book to the employee in charge of fixing
Answers to Review Questions
1. Job analysis has been considered the cornerstone of human resource management.
Precisely how does it support managers making pay decisions?
Work-related information is needed to determine pay for each job in an organization based
on the different tasks and responsibilities of each job. There is no satisfactory substitute that
can ensure that the resulting pay structure is work related, and that it will provide reliable,
accurate data to make and explain pay decisions.
Chapter Four: Job Analysis 4 – 20
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Education.
• How useful are the results?
4. Distinguish between task data and behavioral data.
5. What is the critical advantage of quantitative approaches over conventional
approaches to job analysis?
The quantitative approach, which involves the use of an online questionnaire or an
inventory, lends itself to statistical analysis. This approach allows more data to be collected
faster from more jobholders. Responses can be machine scored, and the results can be used
6. How would you decide whether to use job-based or person-based structures?
The decision on which type of pay structure to utilize should be based on which approach is
most appropriate for the organization. The organization’s strategy (mission, vision,
objectives), combined with the product/service offered, the nature of the competitive
7. Why do many managers say that job analysis is a colossal waste of their time and the
4 – 21 Compensation – Thirteenth Edition Gerhart │Newman │Milkovich
time of their employees? Are they right?
Sometimes the people advocating the use of job analysis become so enamored with the
technical aspects of the process, the statistics, and the computers, they lose sight of the