Why people work and the nature of work

Why people work

• Pay: can be a motivation factor (so some people may work in order to provide money for a specific purpose.– Depending on a person’s situation, they may

work full-time or part-time or take temporary or seasonal work.

• Job Satisfaction: some people choose to work even when they do not obviously need the income. This could be because of:– The social aspect of the job– The enjoyment of a job

Important tip:

• Don’t confuse the motivation for working in the first place with what motivates someone who is currently working – they could well be different. Money is more of a motivator to get someone into work, while other factors (such as promotion opportunities) become more important once someone has a job.

Why people may not work

• Education

• Child care

• Retirement

Patterns of UK employment

• Growth in SERVICES:– Employment in manufacturing and other

secondary industries has been decline, while employment in the service sector grows.

– In the UK, many of the manufactured goods previously produced here are now imported, meaning that there is less need for manufacturing jobs.

Specialisation

• Also known as the Division of Labour

• Where each worker concentrates on only one small aspect of the entire production process.

• As a result, workers become interdependent – they depend on each other for completing their own part of the production process

SpecialisationBenefits Limitations

•Workers can become more skilled •Output can be produced more quickly as workers become more familiar with the reduced number of tasks that they are required to do•Businesses can produce output at lower cost due to faster and more skilled workers•Workers concentrate on the tasks that they are most skilled at.

•Workers depend on each other in order to complete the overall output, which may cause problems if one area of production fails•Jobs will become boring •Morale in the workplace may fall as jobs become more repetitive and absenteeism and labour turnover may rise•May be hard to arrange cover a worker if workers are untrained in jobs other than their own.•Workers are less flexible and it will be harder to adapt if new types of goods need to be produced

Information Communication Technology (ICT) and work

• ICT has changed how people work:– Internet – changed how many businesses

operate (reduces the need for as many people to be employed in shops)

– E-mail – changed how we communicate at work (reduces some of the need for telephone calls or letters)

– Home Working – being able to access work-based computer networks from home (allows flexible working and helps businesses to reduce costs as they may not have to provide as many facilities at their main offices)