Stay or leave ... a question you may be asking yourself, too.
What do we see:
- increased stress and burnout symptoms
- ever-lengthening traffic jams
- anticipated scarcity of talent as the so-called baby boomer generation retires
- people are working less long for the same employer, more temporary or freelance contracts are being used
- automation and digitization making some functions redundant
- increased retirement age...
These developments force organizations and individuals to deal consciously with talent. In order to remain vital, involved, satisfied, developed and motivated, it is important that you take responsibility and that the HR instruments and company culture are adjusted accordingly.
The call to a life career is growing day by day. Perhaps you feel you want things to be different. The HR department and/or manager expects you to take some control of your career yourself. But how do you do that concretely? Jobcrafting, or job design, can help.
1. What is Jobcrafting?
Wikipedia defines jobcrafting as an employee's own way of restructuring their job. This implies that an employee makes small changes to create a positive impact in the work experience. This allows him to shape the job a little more to his liking and this results in higher motivation, engagement and enthusiasm and ultimately better business results.
The term Job crafting was introduced in 2001 by American professors Amy Wrzesnieuwski and Jane Dutton.
However, jobcrafting is becoming increasingly popular because it fits with the current HR trends of lifelong learning, vitality, creating a talent pool, advancement, sustainable employability, self-direction, work flexibility, empowerment and employability.
In Jobcrafting, you as an employee will take a close look at your current job. You tinker with the energy balance of your job by focusing on what gives you energy, what you want to develop and eliminate as much as possible the things that cost you energy. You learn to 'stand still' with yourself, your job and to look 'differently'... In consultation with your manager, you make small changes in your work, so that you experience a positive impact on the daily working day. This takes into account personal goals, the goals of colleagues and the company goals. So the job is adapted to you, not the other way around. Jobs are reviewed and if necessary redesigned and adjusted....
2. When Jobcrafting?
- When you are dissatisfied in the current position
- To make a team function better by taking into account the talents present
- When changes impact employees: vb reorganization, merger....
- In preparation for an evaluation or performance interview
3. Why Jobcrafting?
There are several reasons why Jobcrafting can add value to you and the company:
- Meaningful work is the key to motivation and retention: When an employee gradually becomes bored with the work, but is unable/unwilling to progress immediately or take career steps, a jobcrafting interview provides the necessary insight to make the work more meaningful again.
- There are certain phases in a person's life that make them want to consciously take a "step back" because other things are temporarily important. This is discussed during a jobcrafting interview. The employee decides whether it is time to sow or reap ... He learns to spread energy over the career. It is unrealistic to spend an entire career hitting high peaks... A life career is not a marathon.
- White ravens are scarce: An organization that encourages employees to fill their jobs taking into account available talents and ambitions will more easily attract and keep the white ravens!
- Working longer: We cannot keep doing the same job for life, so it is interesting if a job can evolve with age and specific needs.
- Create more accountable teams: Leadership determines the strategy and the goal to be achieved. Employees determine by agreement how and who does what work.
- Employees who are directors of their lives are happier and perform better!
In short, win-win!
4. How to Jobcraft?
Jobcrafting offers no ready-made solution, but is a process of discovering talents and ambitions, naming them and puzzling with them within the current setting, in consultation with the manager.
Once you know what aspects of the current job need to be adjusted, you look for a way to make those small adjustments.
There can be an adaptation on WHAT you do, with WHO, HOW and WHERE. You can distinguish here between task crafting, relational crafting, cognitive crafting and contextual crafting.
- Taskcrafting: doing more challenging tasks, focusing more on the work you are good at, shedding tedious tasks. Vb. An employee who made it his responsibility to show new employees around and induct them, without being asked.
- Relational crafting: organizing the work so that you have more contacts with the client, or less with colleagues with whom you work poorly. Vb. Cleaners in a hospital who also have an eye for the patients and their visitors. And occasionally ask how they are doing.
- Cognitive crafting: looking at your work differently by focusing more on the purpose of the work and what the result means to others. Vb hairdressers who not only cut hair but also see it as their job to get people to tell their life stories and offer them a listening ear if that proves necessary.
- Contextual crafting: playing with workplace, work environment, working time: The New World of Work is an example of this. Employees choose the workplace that best suits their task at that moment. Or they choose to adjust their working hours to better combine their work with their private life.
The employer supports people and gives them space to make their own work motivating(more).
The interesting thing about this shift is that it means that jobs and tasks no longer have to be appropriate "from the drawing board," but that employees themselves are given the space and responsibility to bend the tasks in their jobs a bit. People are seen as 'entrepreneurs of their own talent'
5. Scientifically based
Research shows that every job has degrees of freedom to tailor, sculpt the work.
Research by the Antwerp Management School (2013) shows that Jobcrafting has strong engagement and retention enhancing effects. It belongs in a modern organizational strategy around people management. From SERV's Workability Monitor (2010), only 21% of employees would still want to do their current job until retirement age if there are more than 3 job constraints. This rises to 82% if there is "customized" work.
6. Teamcrafting
In addition to the individual component, it is also important to have a qualitative conversation about work at the team level. In this way, individual crafting results grow into group results. Tasks are distributed together in the best possible way and team dynamics are strengthened.
7. Who takes the initiative?
This can come from an employee, the supervisor and/or the HR department. In itself, it does not matter who takes the initiative, it is important that communication is initiated because jobcrafting is a win-win for both employee and employer!
8. Critical notes
Jobcrafting requires commitment from employees, supervisor, the HR department and the organization:
- It requires employees to be proactive, self-reliant and self-managing, and it is very important that organizations involve their employees more in the vision, mission and strategy of the organization. Giving more responsibility and space in shaping one's own job only makes sense when it becomes clear to employees how they can contribute to the strategic objectives, the success of the organization and how they can develop themselves to the best of their ability.
- It is important for a manager to consider the entire team. Jobcrafting should not result in a "fun package" for some while leaving the tedious tasks to colleagues.
- It requires the HR department to have a policy and strategy where job content, responsibilities and compensation are managed and made flexible.
So this requires an open mind from both employee and employer, and 'leeway' to puzzle. However, it may be that 'the gap' between what is desired and what is possible is too large. Then it is to the advantage of both parties that another solution is sought, possibly in another department or, if necessary, externally... In practice, however, we often see that much more is possible internally than first meets the eye.
Getting Started
What would it be like if you knew your career passport?
If you know what elements are needed to make you work with Energy, Enthusiasm and Engagement? So that there are practical tools for Empowerment and Employability?
This career passport possesses these magical ingredients and varies from person to person. After all, what is a dream job for one person is a drama job for another. Together with you, we search for what is important to you in your work, what you are good at and enjoy doing, and what you would like to develop.
We set in motion a process of awareness, which is translated both practically and concretely, so that you know how to have a conversation with your manager and together we can look for a win-win.