Autonomy and The Autonomous Work Group
Workplace Autonomy
(Wooll, 2021) describes workplace autonomy as employee`s making their own decisions where these decisions are made transparent to all by the employee in who they wish towards setting goals. However, on the contrary, (Wooll, 2021 ) notes that if the results turn out to be dissatisfactory, the employee becomes responsible for answering to the work team due to the letdown. This implies how too much freedom to make choices to achieve workplace goals as well has its own consequences.
(Parker, Andrei and Van Den Broeck 2019) expresses how the levels of engagement at the workplace are on a continous decline is some parts of the world due to employees being uninspired and tedious ad they are being told how exactly things needed be done. This could be due to organizations failing to provide autonomy to their employees from the beginning stage of work design.
How do Autonomous Groups Work?
According to (Kokemuller, n.d.), autonomous work groups are where several individuals work towards common tasks or goals by bringing in stronger and broader perspectives as opposed to one individual. In addition, many share responsibility, become each other’s support system, creative exchange takes place as well as instil a sense of importance and belonging all of which are vital for employee motivation on the job.
(Kokemuller, n.d.) notes how autonomous work groups have increasingly become part of the 21st century work environment where many organizations become leaner by removing mid management redundancy. (Kokemuller, n.d.), further notifies that work groups are those who are given responsibility to oversee particular asks in an organization with the freedom being granted to make decisions which eventually produce favourable outcomes. Hence, it is noted how the afore mentioned context is responsible for autonomy where there is independence in activity besides monitoring and evaluation by either the team leader or supervisor.
Why do Employees and Employer’s in Organizations seek Autonomy?
(Rebecca Johannsen and Zak, 2020) expresess how in some firm`s employees desire autonomy, sense of meaning from their work and purpose more than monetary compensation. The afore is furthur backed up again by (Rebecca Johannsen and Zak, 2020), who notes that these job characteristics play such an important role that employees are willingly accepting lower salaried jobs which have meaning and autonomy in place.
Furthuremore, organizations which have cultures which interntionally or uninterntionally promote employees to obtain autonomy and meaningful work are faced with the outcome of lower job turnover rates and higher productivity. (Rebecca Johannsen and Zak, 2020) implies how employees who have autonomy to execute projects are more productive and satistified with their work as the level of ownership of the outcome is upon them. In keeping with (Rebecca Johannsen and Zak, 2020), it is stated that when employee’s are in an autonomous environment, they tend to have higher innovation due to the persistence they have in overcoming challenges and problems in projects they control and furthur work towards increasing the quality of work.
Beneficial Relationship Between Job Design and Autonomy
As per (Edge, n.d.), autonomy is an important aspect of job design where employees have ownership over their ideas and decisions being made with there being three types of autonomy: employee, team and managerial. Employee autonomy is an important form of autonomy as it improves the workplace function whilst creating better work relationships that have greater trust between the employees and management.
Thereafter, (Edge, n.d.) notes how it is vital to know during the job design process to know the amount of discretion each employee has over making important decisions as autonomy and responsibility are key factors of job design which go hand in hand. In addition, (Edge, n.d.) notifies how increased autonomy on employees result in the personality traits of conscientiousness and extroversion being strongly and positively impacted on job performance. Hence, when designing jobs, the management needed review each role and consider the suitable level of autonomy as it could lea to better decisions being made along with increase job satisfaction.
As per (Blustein, Lysova and Duffy, 2023), jobs which have high levels of autonomy, skill variety, task identity, task significance and feedback from the job in addition to having challenging work demands result in enabling greater meaning work experinces. Supporting this is (Capano and 2022), who note that organizational autonomy and discretion allow for better felxible and agile responses due to decentralization.
Furthuremore, (Blustein, Lysova and Duffy, 2023) states that if organizations focus on enriching jobs through autonomy and redesigning, their organizational relational structure would allow emploees to notice their impact on beneficiaries which cover the perception of decent work. This is due to the job redesign enabling statisfaction which is fostering meaningful work through satsifying self determination needs and social contribution.
Drawbacks of The Autonomous Group
As per (Kokemuller, n.d.), with complete independence work groups tend to use the opportunity to work at a moderate pace as well as internal fights over authoritative control is highly likely to arise. In addition, resistance to change is a significant disadvantage in autonomous work groups as the members often are likely to resist changes in company policies or even responsibilities for new assignments (Kokemuller, n.d.). Furthermore, (Muchskills, 2023) depicts how giving total autonomy is counterproductive as it leads to overconfidence which results in a decline in performance. (Muchskills, 2023) goes on to note how leaders should experiment with policies and ideas until they are certain about the level of autonomy which could bring out the best in their teams. In addition, leaders need to critically evaluate the decisions which are best left to the teams and those which require their direct supervision.
Changes in Levels of Autonomy and Controlled Motivation between Older and Younger Workers
Through (Henning et al., 2023), it is noted that autonomous and controlled motiavtion changes in older age depending on the type of work motiavation and may either increase or reduce prior to retirement which may have different consequences for individuals and employers alike. For instance, (Georg Henning, 2023) demonstrates how higher autonomous work is in association to lower turnover intentions due to the impression of being committed to the workplace. Evidently, the afore draws a relationship between autonomous job design to having lower turnover within a workplace.
As per (Georg Henning, 2023) , one notes that older age should be associated with higher autonomous work motivation as older workers may choose to retire when they are not motivated where younger workers who have lower autonomous motivation would be forced to continue working. The afore goes to show how there would be an arise in conflicts between older and younger workers as their work motivations would be different. In keeping with (Georg Henning, 2023), it is shown that older workers are likely to be more autonomously motivated in comparison to younger groups which implies that autonomous motivation changes across one’s lifespan. This implies that a optimum work cycle needs to be created for different individuals within an organization as the type of motivation for work differs with age.
How can Leader’s and HR Support Autonomy in the Workplace?
(Botes, 2022) depicts how in an
increasingly digitalized world, what entails as autonomy as well as to what
extent manipulative techniques interfere with the choices people have. This
implies that employee`s choices can be influenced by technological advancement
tools such as social media and may have effects on the decisions being made. (LaGree et al., 2021) states that business leaders can
foster employee loyalty and engagment through positive and supportive workplace
culture. This would help leaders in organisations having to ability to create a
more autonomous culture as they trust the decisions made by the employees who
have high autonomy to bring positive imapcts to the organization. In addition,
HR as well could furthur support this by training leaders to create more
autonomous teams, equip employees with the necessary tools and celebrate and
the success of achievements. As per (Kaabomeir et al., 2023), there are five
techniques for supporting autonomy, namely; taking in consideration a persons
perspective, providing explanatory rationals, acknowleding and admitting
negative affects, being paient and using non presurising informational language.
If HR encourages leaders in a organization to utilize the afore mentioned autonomy
supporting techniques, employees are bound to make the best decisions which bring
about benefits to the organization goals as the autonomous work group concept
is not based upon any technology it is virtually applicable to any situation.
References
Botes, M., 2022. Autonomy and the social dilemma of online manipulative behavior. AI and Ethics .
Danielle LaGree, B. H. M. D. a. H. S., 2021. The Effect of Respect:Respectful Communication at Work Drives Resiliency,Engagement, and Job Satisfaction among Early Career Employees. International Journal of Business Communication.
David L. Blustein, E. I. L. R. D. D., 2023. Understanding Decent Work and Meaningful Work. Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior, Volume 10.
Edge, H., n.d. 5 considerations for executives
when designing effective jobs. [Online]
Available at: https://humanedgeglobal.com/5-considerations-executives-designing-effective-jobs-2/
[Accessed 16 November 2023].
Georg Henning, A. S. S. T. M. E. M. L., 2023. Levels and change in autonomous and controlled work motivation in older workers—The role of proximity to retirement and sense of community at work. Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology, 96(1).
Giliberto Capano, F. T., 2022. Thinking outside the box, improvisation, and fastlearning: Designing policy robustness to deal withwhat cannot be foreseen. Public Administration.
Kokemuller, N., n.d. What Is an Autonomous Work
Group?. [Online]
Available at: https://smallbusiness.chron.com/autonomous-work-group-14402.html
[Accessed 16 November 2023].
Muchskills, 2023. Why autonomous teams are so
important in the workplace today. [Online]
Available at: https://www.muchskills.com/blog/why-autonomous-teams-are-so-important-in-the-workplace-today
Noori Kaabomeir, K. M. A. M. K., 2023. How supervisors can support employees' needs and motivation? an experimental study based on SDT. Current Psychology.
Rebecca Johannsen, P. J. Z., 2020. Autonomy Raises Productivity: An Experiment Measuring Neurophysiology. Frontiers in Psychology, Volume 11.
Sharon K. Parker, D. A. a. A. V. d. B., 2019. Why
Managers Design Jobs to Be More Boring Than They Need to Be. [Online]
Available at: https://hbr.org/2019/06/why-managers-design-jobs-to-be-more-boring-than-they-need-to-be
Wooll, M., 2021 . Autonomy at work is important:
Here are 9 ways to encourage it. [Online]
Available at: https://www.betterup.com/blog/autonomy-in-the-workplace?hs_amp=truehttps://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/19494501.pdf
[Accessed 16 November 2023].
No one likes to be micromanaged at work. Having a manager or supervisor constantly looking over your shoulder is frustrating. It also damages leadership trust in the work place. That is the main reason autonomy is important. Autonomy in the workplace means giving employees the freedom to work. With autonomy at work, employees get to decide how and when their work should be done. Benefits of Workplace Autonomy is High productivity, Motivation improve creativity.
ReplyDeleteTotally agreed with your points. By enabling autonomous work within the organizational set up, it enables for employees to have better satisfaction at work as well which increases their performance. As rightfully mentioned, bring micromanaged brings in to question the level of trust the employer has on the work carried out by the employee.
DeleteAgreed. The beneficial relationship between job design and autonomy is a cornerstone in modern Human Resource Management (HRM). By empowering employees with autonomy within well-designed roles, organizations foster motivation, creativity, and job satisfaction, contributing to enhanced performance and organizational success.
ReplyDeleteYes, in a modern organization context, through the concept op job design autonomy can be integrated into the system and this should be done by all organizations. This contributes to employees developing on their resilience and self-reliance which are key skills which are required for leadership (Wooll, 2021). This further implies that an autonomous environment is responsible for the creation of the future leaders in the company.
DeleteReference
Wooll, M., 2021. Autonomy at work is important: Here are 9 ways to encourage it. [Online]
Available at: https://www.betterup.com/blog/autonomy-in-the-workplace
Yes, The pursuit of autonomy is often linked to increased job satisfaction, innovation, and overall organizational effectiveness.
ReplyDeleteThis is due to the fact that through autonomy organizational goals can be effectively achieved in a manner which is beneficial to both the organization and the employee who contributes to the success of the organisation. As you have mentioned this is a level of satisfaction brought about by having an autonomous environment which encourages them to think outside the box and come up with innovative solutions to complex problems due to the degree of freedom bestowed upon them.
DeleteWorkplace autonomy is a two-edged sword that, in the right hands, can boost creativity, productivity, and employee satisfaction. To avoid potential negative effects like diminished accountability and internal conflicts within autonomous work groups, it is crucial to find the correct balance. Organizations that place a high priority on autonomy in their job designs typically observe higher levels of employee engagement and meaningful work experiences. Job design and autonomy are closely related.
ReplyDeleteAgreed, too much of anything is not good. Autonomy should be provided to a certain extent by leaders or mangers however, never bestow excessive autonomy as it would have major repercussions. As per (Zhou, 2020), highlights that high levels of autonomy result in unhappiness amongst employees which is also directly linked to a decrease in work efficiency. Especially when it comes to working in teams, excess autonomy can result in the reduced dependence on colleagues which affects tasks which require team collaboration.
DeleteReference
Zhou, E., 2020. The “Too-Much-of-a-Good-Thing” Effect of Job Autonomy and Its Explanation Mechanism. Psychology.