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design requires changes in supporting systems to be effective. However, to date, we have
not been particularly effective at systematically documenting or analyzing these comple-
mentaryandsupportingchangesthatoftenoccurinparallelwithchangesinworkcontent.

CONCLUSION

We started the chapter by describing how work design initiatives are currently very
popular, at least nominally, because it is believed there will be dramatic performance
benefits. Our analysis suggests that there is no clear cut or definitive case that work
enrichment enhances performance. However, there is sufficient evidence to suggest that
work enrichment promotes better performance in some cases, and for some individuals.
Indeed, given that most organizations are becoming more dynamic and uncertain as a
result of technological and market forces, and that uncertainty appears to be a conducive
context for work design-related performance benefits, it is likely that the role of work
design as a driver of performance will become more salient. Some of the ways enriched
work design can promote performance include that it increases employee motivation
to work harder and to be more proactive, promotes the acquisition and development
of knowledge and skills, and provides the opportunity for employees to apply existing
knowledge, skill, and motivation. Moving the area forward now requires both more
detailed theory and more systematic rigorous empirical work. To this end, we have
proposed a model to guide future inquiry that has an expanded performance criterion
and that specifies mechanisms by which work design might affect performance and some
contingency factors that might mitigate or enhance this relationship.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

We would like to thank Julian Barling, Mark Griffin, Toby Wall, and Helen Williams for construc-
tive feedback on earlier drafts of this chapter. We also wish to acknowledge the financial support
of the Australian AGSM Centre for Corporate Change, the UK Health and Safety Executive, and
the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

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