The Impact of Automation on Job Characteristics: New Horizons

In an investigation of the impact of automation on job characteristics, we found that coordination, job autonomy, and work pace were reinforced by automation, while new skill requirements, job security and exertion remained unaffected. Job satisfaction correlates revealed the existence of elements that were both reinforced by automation and unrelated to job satisfaction. These elements are of paramount importance to supervisors as they represent sources of operator indifference to the benefits of automation, or satisfaction gaps. The elements include interdepartmental task coordination, discretion in making production decisions, confidence to complete tasks without supervision, the achievement of career goals, perceptual skills, security of records, and longer work hours in the post-automation period. We consider the sealing of these satisfaction gaps to be a major supervisory challenge.