Employee management using behavioral developmental theory.

Lack of employee engagement and productivity due to job misfit is a problem faced by many managers. Improving job fit plays a significant role in increasing employee engagement, productivity, and engagement. The instruments reported here are effective in providing a better method of assessing job fit. The model of hierarchical complexity (Commons & Richards, 1984; Commons, Trudeau, Stein, Richards, & Krause, 1998) offers a standard method of assessing employee behavior. The instruments developed with the model as a basis are (a) Decision-Making Instrument and (b) PerspectiveTaking Instrument. In addition, a behavioral version of the Holland Occupational Interests scale is introduced. Decision-making or problem-solving scores help assess how difficult a task an employee successfully completes. Perspective-taking scores reflect how well an employee understands social situations and people’s actions. Our behavioral version of the Holland scale identifies the relative reinforcement value of engaging in different categories of work activities These three scores give companies comprehensive knowledge of the hierarchical complexity stage of job performance and occupational interests. This should help companies better manage human resources, hire and develop employees, and shape the future organizational structure.