Organisational Structure as Illustrated in the Movie by Referring to the Ants Colony

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The Organic model – which is more like the boundaryless model is “a structure that is flat, uses cross – hierarchical and cross – functional teams, has low formalization, and processes a comprehensive information decision making.” (A.Judge, why do structures differ, 2013). The organic model represents the structure of Insectopia where there are no formalities and individuals have the freedom to do what they wish. Individuals are involved in the decision making and have a say in the aspects of the organization.

Zee is clearly very unhappy under the Generals structure as he wishes to be more creative and independent. He does not enjoy his job and feels like he is wasting his life doing it. The structure of Insectopia attracts Zee because he is free to think and act in the manner he wishes to do so, his creative and innovative ideas are accepted and he feels happier in an environment like that. The new colony after the flooding of the old colony has a structure more like Insectopia and less like the structure the General enforced and this encourages Zee to be motivated he is also using his abilities in different fields and does not feel like he is bored and is wasting his life. Zee claims that he has found his place, it’s just like the old one but he chose this one.

- Discuss the job designs of the workers in the Antz movie and indicate the implications of the job designs on the motivation of the workers. During your discussion, you should indicate the relevant theory regarding motivation through job design and also indicate recommendations that could be made to improve the motivation of the workers.

Jobs design shows the way that the elements are organized in a job. The job characteristics model suggests that any job can be defined in terms of five core job dimensions being:

- Skill variety: refers to the way to which a job involves different activities, which therefore needs different skills. The ants are divided into two groups at their larva stage, they can be either a soldier and given a helmet or a worker and be given a pick. Zee was placed into a worker position and felt that he wasn’t able to express himself fully which made him unhappy in his job. (A.Judge, Motivating by Job Design, 2013)

- Task identity: a job requires to be completed as a whole and be an identifiable piece of work. The worker ants of a colony dug through rocks to create a tunnel that increases the size of their ant hill. And the soldier ants kill oppositional pets to protect the colony. (A.Judge, Motivating by Job Design, 2013)

- Task significance: this type of task affects the lives or works of others. The general makes decisions on what job each ant is intended to do and the outcomes of those jobs, by doing so he effects the lives of the ants and their wellbeing. Zee spoke about bigger things and wanted to explore things greater than the colony like insectopia. He felt he was restricted in his current job. (A.Judge, Motivating by Job Design, 2013)

- Autonomy: the extent to which work offers freedom, independence and discretion in scheduling working and determining events. In the colony there is not much autonomy as the general does not leave any freedom to the ants of what they want to do. But there is freedom with the general as he does whatever he wants despite what the queen says. Zee did not have any freedom; he was limited to being a worker. (A.Judge, Motivating by Job Design, 2013)

- Feedback: work activities required by a jobs outcomes in the individual gaining direct and clear information about the efficiency of his or her performance. The working ants got clear information in what was expected of them but Zee felt that he had the potential to do so much more. (A.Judge, Motivating by Job Design, 2013)

Zee’s critical psychological state was influenced by his job and his feelings of what it entailed. He preferred to be more outrageous and take bigger risks than to be a worker ant hitting rocks all day. Zee’s job was shown to be very repetitive which made him unhappy; Zee could use two types of job design to try and fix this:

Job rotation

This type of redesigning a job can also be called cross-training and it refers to the periodic shifting from one task to another. When Zee swapped places with the soldier he was job shifting and experienced a different job. Strengths of job rotation can be it reduces boredom; Zee was defiantly not bored anymore when he got thrown into the battle field. It increases motivation; once Zee survived the war between the ant soldiers and the termites he came back a hero which increased his motivation in life and in the colony. It also helps employees better understand their work contributions.

Weakness of job rotation can include disruptions, extra time used to address questions, when Zee was pushed into battle he had many questions to which Barbatis had to answer. The training times are increased in which employees need training in their new positions. (A.Judge, Motivating by Job Design, 2013)

Job enrichment

“Job enrichment expands jobs by increasing the degree to which the worker controls the planning execution and evaluation of the work.” (A.Judge, Motivating by Job Design, 2013)A way to encourage job enrichment in respect to Zee’s situation would be a method in which is for improving the importance of work and could be increased by providing employees with mutual assistance programmes in which employees can help each other. The worker ants can help each other in more ways and not only in the forming of the giant ball to knock the rocks down. Encouraging job enrichment allows the workers to complete an activity and increase their freedom and independence. Zee can mention a few guidelines to management to encourage more of job enrichment, he could mention combining tasks together to form a larger model of work, he could also mention expanding the jobs vertically and by doing this more responsibilities are handed over to the employees. An open feedback channel could also work in Zee’s case as if the ants are informed about their performance they may be more motivated to keep up the good performance or improve poor performance. (A.Judge, Motivating by Job Design, 2013)

Employee involvement can be defined as the participative development that uses the workers inputs to increase their obligation to the organizations achievement. Employee involvement can be divided into two major forms being:

- Participative management

This form involves a joint decision making where subordinates share a great portion of the decision-making power with their direct seniors. This type of employee involvement can