Job Analysis Part 3

• Observation - Three Main Forms
• Direct Observation
• Behavior Observation
• The Observation Interview
• Direct Observation
• Choose the Job Category that you wish to analyses
• Record Everything
• Direct Observation
• Advantages
• Provides a moderate overview to what a job involves
• Reference Documentation
• Disadvantages
• No indication of the importance of any task
• Not informative on the level of task difficulty
• Behavior Observation
• More specific than direct observation in that it primarily designed to examine the behavior of the jobholder than particular content areas
• Checklist driven outlining critical behaviors to be observed by the analyst
• Behavior Observation - The Checklist
• Categories of behavior to include:
• Meaningfulness to the jobholder being observed
• Degree of Differentiation - distinct behavior categories
• Potential for Change - the extent to which the behavior can be changed in the future through interventions
• Observability - the ability to reliably observe the behavior
• End-driven - the behavior observed should directly relate to the achievement of the purpose of the task performed
• Behavior Observation - Advantages
• Provides a moderate overview to what a job involves
• Reference Documentation
• Behavior Observation - Disadvantages
• No indication of the importance of any task
• Not informative on the level of task difficulty
• The Observation Interview
• Mix between direct observation and interview
• Analyst takes notes or directly asks the jobholder for more information  or clarification on aspects of the task that they are performing
• The Observation Interview
• Advantages
• Provides a more detailed overview to what a job involves
• Better indication of the importance of any task and level of task difficulty
• Disadvantages
• Analyst may require training
• Switching between approaches may limit the quality of the data being collected

Until next time...

 




Sheryl Tuchman, SPHR, SHRM-SCP
http://tools2succeed.com/