Job Redesign and Workplace Rewards Assessment

The company that I work for is in the transportation industry that is involved in providing freight solutions for goods from one point to another. The TransMovers Company has been in the industry of providing transportation services for a period of four years now, over the years that it had been in existence the company had slightly expanded and grown in size and recently opened another branch within the state of Michigan. Despite its entry in the industry four years ago, TransMovers Company has not grown in tandem with the growth of the industry in general. This is given that transportation industry has been one of the most rapidly expanding industries within the country in general.

My job title in TransMovers Company is truck driver, a job that I have held for the last two years that I had worked with the company. The job description mainly involves transporting and delivering goods to the clients, and more importantly ensuring that goods are delivered safely and on time. Besides this, as the truck driver I have the responsibility to ensure that the truck is driven safely and properly maintained so that it is able to operate efficiently. Other responsibilities for this job include ensuring that truck license and insurance is up to date and valid at all times in addition I am required to drive within legal speed limits.

My job description as a driver does not provide me with the benefit of teams work or in that case constant management by the head person who is responsible for managing and reviewing the performance of all truck drivers.

As such the company has developed templates as management tools for most of their staffs; in this case, a template is defined as a tool that is used to monitor and record the outcome of a job requirement that is filled by the employee or the manager that evaluates the level of output against set standards of the company (Reeve, J. (2008).

Therefore as a truck driver I am supposed to record specific details for each task that I undertake in a preset monitoring sheet which include such details like time of departure, time of arrival, goods transported, average speed and so on. This is mainly because of two major reasons; one the company is not able to directly manage truck drivers in their course of duty. Two, the company and management policy is intentionally designed to be this way as opposed to management style that provides employee with greater leeway in making and effecting decisions independently.

The implication is that there is no self-management or in that case choice of decisions since the procedure of discharging tasks is usually clearly defined within the job template. This approach of implementing job related task has several distinct advantages, for instance it is very effective in ensuring work output uniformity, requires less management personnel and prevents company losses from employee mistakes (Pearce and Robinson, 2008). Nevertheless the downside of this approach is that it kills employee creativity since employee are required to adhere to set procedures, the result is lack of interest and ultimately lack of motivation due to monotony.

The TransMovers Company operates in one of what is emerging as the most competitive and unpredictable industry, for instance slight raises in crude oil prices has significant impact on the profit-loss ratio of the company. There is constant need for companies in this line of business to streamline and downsize in order to remain competitive due to increased players in the market that are offering similar services in an industry that is not expanding as fast as the number of freight companies that are coming up. This factor and the fact that the major professionals that the company needs to employee are mainly drivers who are not considered as high value or skilled workers means that the company does not need to pay high remuneration rates or provide ideal working environment in order to attract workers.

In this company remuneration rates for the drivers are therefore on flat rates meaning that no over time payment is paid to drivers even where certain tasks requires the driver to work overtime in order to finalize them, for instance during a 12 hour transport journey. The argument that the company advances for not paying overtime hours to drivers is that drivers are also at working hours not engaged in any type of work and are idle but the company gets to pay them anyway. While this is true, it is the company that gains mostly from this arrangement. Besides the basic salary that drivers are paid at the end of the month there is no other form of benefits or bonuses that are paid to drivers. This is because the company management style does not recognize or reward hard work for employee in general; it therefore does not see the need to pay bonuses or rewards in order to motivate such an initiative.

On the other hand the company has put in place penalties that are in form of cash deductions that are deducted from drivers for specific contraventions of what they refer as “company laws”. For instance the company has the right to deduct employee speeding cost and associated costs incurred when a driver is given a speed ticket or when goods delivery are delayed for long without acceptable reasons, where the company has the right to determine what constitutes reasonable reasons. Therefore the trend is that drivers do not see the need of putting more than the minimum efforts needed to accomplish a certain task or going beyond what their job description entails for two major reasons.

For one, excellent performance of job does not lead to increased earnings or attract any form of bonus; given that monetary rewards is one of the single leading tools that has been recognized as very effective in employee motivation lack of bonuses greatly reduces motivation for drivers (Reeve, 2008). The company is also not able to reward employees through other forms of motivation that does not necessarily involve use of money such as recognition and promotion. Monetary motivation in form of bonuses in this case is central to ensuring that job performance goes beyond required company standards that would eventually increase the company income levels and also to attract new clients.

Motivation refers to the desired positive mental attitude in an employee that emanates from activities done by the employer or that comes from within the employee that serves to promote job satisfaction and over achievement (Reeves, 2008). Therefore motivation is in two parts, that which an organization undertakes through such activities as motivational talks, salary increase and improved work environment, or through personal motivation that comes from within the employee.

An employee is able to achieve personal motivation if the job description matches with the skill and therefore makes the job easy to do and enjoyable, other reasons are personal happiness, financial security and when they feel that they are valued (Marlock, 2000). In this job as a driver I don’t feet motivated because of the low pay wage and work overload.

Employee motivation in a work place has numerous benefits to the organization. Foremost motivation enables workers to deliver more for the organization through increased job performance and high quality work output. It also saves organizational cost in employee motivational programs that have a concept of behavior change that requires repeated learning. The organization is also able to retain for long employees that are satisfied with their job and do not incur recruitment and personnel training costs that are associated with high turnover of organizational employees. The benefits to the employee include suitable job environment, health and job satisfaction all of which contributes to the success of an organization and advertent why it is in the organization interest to ensure employees are always motivated at work place (Marlock, 2000). All this benefits both to the company and myself as a driver have been missed since the TransMovers perception of motivation is that it is a costly affair that the company does not need to invest in.

The goals that are set for TransMovers Company employees and for drivers specifically are developed from the job descriptions of the particular job. In this way job task outline the objectives that should be met by the employee in the process of discharging identified duties.

Once objectives of the job have been identified the goal of the position is developed which is the general role that the employee should play within the company or what an employee is essentially striving to achieve through implementation of a given set of activities usually referred as job responsibilities.

There are two types of goals bad goals and good goals, bad goals are structured poorly, are unclear and have no direct relationship with the job description (Erez, Earley and Hulin, 1985). Bad goals translate to poor strategic planning and management for the company in general since overall company performance is a product of goals structure. Good goals on the other hand enables employee to be efficient and productive for the company since they are focused on meeting specific relevant targets. In this company the goals that the company has developed for drivers are not effective in that they are not entirely relevant to the job description and therefore they do not contribute to the efficiency of the company.

This is because the way that the goals have been developed does not indicate relationship with the job description, for instance one of the indicated goals I have as a driver is to work towards delivering substantial goods to the client which is not specifically defined to be at what level. Besides the job description for a driver does not include outsourcing tenders for transport of goods. The importance of setting goals for companies is not only relevant to employees alone but to the company as well since it is one of great importance that organizational management cannot afford to overlook.

It refers to plans, decisions and actions that an organization must implement in the course of business operations in order to chart the organization towards the most desirable level that the management desires as envisioned in the mission statement (Pearce and Robinson, 2008).

The single most important aspect of goal setting in the running of an organization is its ability to provide the management with a sense of direction and ability to measure accomplishment at every level of business operation (Pearce and Robinson, 2008). More importantly it enables the direction of the business to be informed by use of best practices as opposed to decisions that are not based on any strategic management models. However for TransMovers Company this is not the case and the process of developing goals is uncoordinated at every level while the existing goals are not consistency with the overall mission of the company.

In addition the importance of goal development for company has other advantages besides ensuring that job targets are routinely met. Perhaps one of the most desirable advantages of application of goals setting concept in business operations is the way that it allows management to determine both the short term and long term plans for the business at the same time and therefore structure job requirements accordingly. This has the advantage of providing the business with the best plans of actions at any given time that best favor it success. Finally it enables management to use the same concept to monitor as well as evaluate the performance of the business at any point and take corrective measures (Pearce and Robinson, 2008). In this company the management has not effectively utilized the advantaged that comes with setting of organizational goals; this is because the goals are not well developed in the first place because the company system of goal development is ineffective and weak.