Productivity and Quality of Working Life for Office Principals and the Implications for Office Automation

Abstract

In the first part of this article models for productivity and the quality of working life are developed that show that there are a number of common elements, particularly those related to motivation. On the basis of a review of the published literature of case histories, as well as those cases with which we are familiar from our own experience, it seems clear that job satisfaction is the most significant sociological factor in enhancing productivity, and the quality of working life, especially for professional and management workers. In addition, it seems clear that a sense of autonomy and achievement are probably the most significant elements of job satisfaction and that, at least for this category of workers, productivity and the quality of working life are complementary objectives whose realisation may best be achieved together. We support this theme by analysing a number of case histories on the basis of the job satisfaction model. Finally, we suggest that careful attention should be paid, in the earliest stages of setting objectives, and later in planning for office automation, to identifying the types and levels of job satisfaction needs that are important for the staff to be supported with technology. It is important that management's objectives in this respect should be explicitly stated so that the technology may be specified and designed in such a way that the desired objectives are met.

Impact of automation technology on gender parity in maritime industry

“…The introduction of autonomy in ship operations has the potential to restructure majority of the work processes. Research studies have examined the impact of autonomy on general workplaces and highlighted a positive effect of automation on wellbeing, life and job satisfactions (Kaye & Sutton, 1985). The present study echoes the opinion of this line of studies and argues that the increased autonomy will improve the quality of work and wellbeing of seafarers.…”

Individual Adjustment to Information-Driven Technologies: A Critical Review

“…The results of these studies suggest that a supportive climate and thorough planning facilitate individual adjustment and that managerial objectives may work to facilitate or to constrain individual productivity (Buchanan and Boddy, 1982;. Several conceptual papers have proposed other factors related to organizational climate as potential influences on innovation success, including organizational politics (Cheney, et al, 1986), institutional leadership (Van de Ven, 1986), trust and confidence in management (Kaye and Sutton, 1985), and a general organizational culture conc ept (Morieux and Sutherland, 1988).…”

“…Two commonly sug-gested factors are flexibility (Blackler and Brown, 1986;Tushman and Nadler, 1986) and environmental scanning capability (Aaker and Mascarenhas, 1984;Delbecq and Mills, 1985). Other factors related to structure and thought to contribute to individual adjustment include reward systems (Kaye and Sutton, 1985) and number hierarchical levels in the structure (Amick and Ostberg, 1987).…”

The challenge of new workplace technology for psychology.

“…Many observers suggest that limited success in this area, which is restricted to a relatively small class of well-structured (usually technical) problems, has resulted from a lack of understanding of the true nature of managerial work (e.g., Luconi, Malone, & Scott-Morton, 1984). Overall, decision support systems that truly support decision making while leaving final decisions up to the user are successful, whereas systems that substitute machine decisions for human decisions or significantly curtail the user’s freedom of action are troublesome, and loss of productivity often results (Kaye & Sutton, 1985).…”