Job Crafting

by Benjamin Laker, Lebene Soga, Yemisi Bolade-Ogunfodun, Adeyinka Adewale

Overview

A practical and timely guide that shows employees how to craft the jobs they want and managers how to shape their organizations in ways that are conducive to such job crafting.

Job Crafting is a rigorous, modern take on job redesign that empowers workers to transform the jobs they have into the ones they want. Through the process of job crafting, a worker proactively alters their job to emphasize tasks that better align with their skills or that allow opportunities to learn new skills, with the help of executives who are willing to transform their organizations into supportive work environments. Offering practical guidance grounded in empirical evidence, British researcher Benjamin Laker and coauthors Lebene Soga, Yemisi Bolade-Ogunfodun, and Adeyinka Adewale describe the steps necessary for businesses and organizations to facilitate that support.
Rather than passively receive job titles and role descriptions, job crafters harness meaning at work through three primary avenues:

• exercising greater control over tasks,
• determining the way tasks are perceived, and
• shaping social context.

Based on data from a previous study in which structured interviews were conducted with one thousand business leaders and two thousand of their workers around the world, the authors’ clear, four-step framework shows managers how to maximize staff engagement and productivity by building the systems, structures, and processes that empower workers to job craft. As new principles of stewardship, authenticity, and empowerment redefine the old command-and-control leadership approach, and generations Y and Z seek autonomy and purpose at work, job crafting offers a potential silver bullet to many workforce problems. Aimed at managers, executives, scholars, and executive education students, Job Crafting rejuvenates discussions of job design, leaving readers informed and ready to discuss how to improve their performance and satisfaction in all sectors.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780262378031
Publisher:	MIT Press
Publication date:	04/23/2024
Series:	Management on the Cutting Edge
Sold by:	Penguin Random House Publisher Services
Format:	eBook
Pages:	160
Sales rank:	829,374
File size:	718 KB

About the Author

Benjamin Laker is a former government adviser turned scholar who is currently serving as Professor of Leadership at Henley Business School, University of Reading, and Visiting Fellow at Birkbeck, University of London.

Lebene Richmond Soga is Professor of Entrepreneurship and Management Practice at Leeds Business School, Leeds Beckett University; a Senior Fellow of the UK Higher Education Academy and a multi-award-winning academic. His research interests include technology-mediated practices, entrepreneurship ecosystems and leadership. He publishes in high-ranking academic journals and has delivered his insights to government agencies as well as managers at a Fortune-200 organization. His research is featured in the Wall Street Journal, the Financial Times, Forbes, the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants Global, and the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development, among others. 

Yemisi Bolade-Ogunfodun is Associate Professor in Organisational Behaviour at the Global Business School for Health, University College London, as well as a Senior Fellow of the UK Higher Education Academy. Her research interests take a cultural perspective of organizations and focus on contexts of diversity and change, exploring interactions in values and meaning systems, social aspects of work, as well as effects of cultural incongruence on the experience of work. Her work has been published in leading journals such as Organizational Research Methods, Journal of Business Research, MIT Sloan Management Review, and Harvard Business Review. She also frequently contributes to published volumes with major publishing houses such as Emerald Publishing and Edward Elgar Publishing.

Adeyinka Adewale is Associate Professor of Leadership Ethics and Entrepreneurship and Director of Studies in the department of Leadership Organisations and Behaviour at the Henley Business School. He is an award-winning researcher, keynote speaker, and global leadership development consultant whose body of work continues to impact organizations, societies, and nations around the world. He is published in both academic and practitioner outlets on themes around Leadership, Entrepreneurship and Ethics. Adeyinka is a member of global think-tanks and continues to serve on the board of exciting start-ups and charities. He has a strong passion to leverage his research and knowledge for building the people that will build enterprises that will change the world for better.

Table of Contents

Series Foreword vii
Preface: Why This Book? ix
1 Why Job Crafting? 1
2 Cognitive Crafting, Task Crafting, and Relational Crafting 17
3 Readiness for Job Crafting 35
4 Permission to Craft 53
5 Creating a Safe Climate for Job Crafting 71
6 Tools for Job Crafting 81
7 Capacity to Job Craft 101
8 Conclusion 111
Notes 125
Index 139

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

“The art of job crafting is not new—yet it is more important than ever in the era of AI and hybrid working. This fascinating book revisits one of the most important human levers in organization and explores its crucial ramifications.”
—Thomas Roulet, Professor of Leadership at the University of Cambridge; author of The Power of Being Divisive
 
“Global research at McKinsey Health Institute has shown there is a strong business case for organizations to integrate true care for employee health and well-being into their organizational operating models. Leveraging job crafting is an important way of making that integration happen in a sustainable way. In this book, the authors will  describe the what and why of job crafting as an intervention that matters. An interesting and recommended read!” 
—Jacqueline Brassey, Co-leader at the McKinsey Health Institute
 
“Job crafting is a powerful tool for finding meaning at work. This book should be essential reading for managers who want to create an environment where their employees would be happier and more fulfilled.”
—Amit Nigam, Professor of Management, Bayes Business School, City, University of London
 
“Job Crafting offers a groundbreaking perspective that would be crucial especially in this era of artificial intelligence and associated transformations. I strongly recommend this landmark book and convey heartfelt gratitude to the authors for sharing this invaluable knowledge with the world.”
—Muthu De Silva, Professor in Innovation and Entrepreneurship, Head/Associate Dean (Research, Innovation and Knowledge Exchange), Faculty of Business and Law, Birkbeck, University of London
 
“Job crafting is a powerful new approach to engaging your employees, and this book lays out the key ideas behind it, and how to implement it in your firm. An essential read for today’s leaders.”
—Nick Lee, Warwick Business School