4.3. CAREER PATHS
In designing jobs, it is also desirable to think of the total career path of the scientists. One of the problems in a research and development setting is that there are not sufficient opportunities to reach the top of the organization in terms of pay and prestige for those engaged in purely technical activities. The jobs are designed in such a way that administrators receive higher compensation, but this is inconsistent with many of the values and needs of technically gifted individuals. To the extent that the engineer or the scientist is dissatisfied with the job definition, he or she is more likely to turn to other sources of satisfaction—for example, family or civic matters. There is evidence (Bailyn and Lynch, 1983) that indicates that this is exactly what happened to those engineers who were less satisfied with their careers. Keenan (1980) reports a study by Gorstel and Hutton that indicates that many engineers who became part of the management team did so rather reluctantly and because of the absence of sufficient opportunities for technical careers, rather than because they enjoyed the management position.
In other words, we have a situation in which the role a person really wants (a top-level technical job) is not available in the organization. Furthermore, only the managerial jobs pay well. This situation results in low morale and inefficiency. It is a problem that most organizations must face squarely and try to solve. It is often necessary to design jobs to fit the needs of employees to some extent.
When thinking about job design we should also realize that engineers go through various stages in the development of their careers. For example, Thompson and Dalton (1976) interviewed over 200 scientists, engineers, and managers and identified several stages for the development of an engineer's career. They argue that in order to perform well an engineer should go through four different stages.
The engineer should work with a mentor, who can teach him or her how to design and carry out projects and how to be successful in relating to clients and upper management. During this stage, the mentor obtains the projects, designs the broad outline of the project, and fits the project into the activities of the organization. The apprentice does the detailed work, makes sure that everything is accurate, and follows up on all details. It is obvious that during this stage the definition of the job makes the apprentices appendages of their mentors, and so they must be physically located very close to one another in order to develop the proper interpersonal relationships.
The engineer assumes responsibility for a definable portion of a project or process, works independently, and produces results that are significantly identifiable with him or her. The professional begins to develop credibility and a reputation as a person who knows a great deal about a particular area. The professional now manages more of his or her own time and accepts more responsibility for the outcomes. Relationships with peers and fellow professionals now become very important, while the relationships with the supervisor or mentor are less significant. This requires a different kind of job definition and a different kind of physical arrangement. For example, the professional, in this case, could be located far away from the supervisor.
In general, organizations consider Stage 2 valuable, but not especially desirable. If a person stays in Stage 2 for a very long time, the chances are that he or she will be fired or moved to some other job that is not very important. In other words, the expectation is that the engineer will get out of Stage 2 and into Stage 3 if he or she is going to be considered "successful."
This stage is somewhat different. Here the engineers apply their technical skills to several areas rather than to a specific project. They get involved in external relationships with suppliers, with clients, and with new business ventures, and they begin to do things that benefit others and the organization in general. They become involved in the development of other people. Many engineers stop at this point, and are considered very successful.
In Stage 4 the manager exercises a significant influence over the future direction of a major portion of the organization. He or she tends to engage in wide and varied interactions both outside and inside the organization; he or she is also involved in sponsoring and developing promising people who might fill future key roles in the organization. Generally, people in Stage 4 spend their time in three ways: (1) They are innovators who contribute to the future of the organization by supplying innovative and original ideas that might shape the organization; (2) they are internal entrepreneurs who bring together resources, money, people, and ideas in order to pursue new developments (for example, new research projects), and (3) they are upper-level managers who form policy, initiate programs, and monitor the progress of the organization.
It appears clear from this discussion that there is an increasing managerial component in the activities of the engineer as he or she moves from Stage 1 to Stage 4. However, it is important to remember that the technical side of the activities can remain a very substantial component of the engineer's total activity. It seems appropriate, then, to reward people who do purely technical work in spite of the fact that they are not supervising a large number of people. In other words, the managerial career and the technical career should not be viewed as inconsistent. On the contrary, sometimes professional employees in a managerial position can take better care of their interests as professionals by increasing their decision-making latitude concerning research and by their control over resources relevant to their scientific work.
Roberts (1978, p. 6) asserts that "even with academic scientists, some of our own studies here at MIT show that faculty are more productive when they have a mix of work activities. There's even a finding that mixing research with administrative work helps increase creativity and idea generation!"
It would seem, therefore, that technical competence and management responsibilities are not inconsistent. Nonetheless, in job design and in structuring an organization, the problem still remains of providing promotion opportunities for technical personnel, who may not want management responsibilities at higher levels where they can no longer contribute directly to R&D. A mechanism—using multiple hierarchies—for addressing this problem is discussed in the next section.