Class Assignment

On
Job Analysis

Aim: To conduct job analysis and preparation of job

description.

Submitted by:
Vanessa D’silva

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Contents:

1) Selection of job
2) Job description
3) Job analysis according to PAQ method
4) Job analysis through observation method
5) Advantages and disadvantages
6) Criticality and career graph
7) Bibliography

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 1) Selection of the job:
 Accounts Officer

 Job description :

“Analyze financial information & prepare financial reports to determine

or maintain record of assets, liabilities, profit and loss, tax liability or
other financial activities within the organization”.

 Summary of responsibilities of an accounts officer

 Analyze the prepared the monthly profit and loss statements and cost
accounting reports

 Compile and analyze the financial reports t prepare entries to accounts such
as general ledger accounts and document business transactions.

 Establish maintain and co ordinate the implementation of accounting and

accounting control procedures

 Analyze and review budgets and expenditure for local, state federal , and
private funding , and contracts and grants.

 Monitor and review system related expense and pay roll entries, invoices and
other accounting documents

 Analyze revenue and expenditure trends and recommend appropriate budget

levels and ensure expenditure control.

 Explain billing invoices and accounting policies to the staff , vendors and
clients

 Resolve accounting discrepancies.

 Recommend develop and maintain financial data bases ,computer softeware

systems and manual filling systems

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  Supervise the input and handling of financial data and reposrts for the
company’s automated financial report systems.

 Interact with internal and external auditors in completing audits

 Other assigned duties

 Knowledge and skills required

 Knowledge of finance, accounting, budgeting and cost control principles

including the GAAP ( generally accepted accounting principles) and accounting
software applications.
 Knowledge of federal and state financial regulations
 Ability to analyze financial data and prepare financial reports ,statemenrts and
projections.
 This is normally required for a normally acquired through a successful
completion of bachelors degree in accounting and three to five years of
experience and successful completion of CPA exams
 Work requires willingness to work in a flexible schedule

 Working conditions

 Working conditions are normal for a work office enviournment, work may require
occasional weekend or /and evening work.

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 PAQ JOB ANALYSIS
(POSITION ANALYSIS QUESTIONNAIRE)
The PAQ is a standard job analysis questionnaire containing 194 items. These items
represent work behaviors, work conditions and job characteristics that can be generalsied
across a wide variety of jobs; they are recognized in the following six sections

 Information input – where and how a worker gets information needed to

perform and information needed to perform the job.
 Mental processes – the reasoning, decision making, panning and information
processing activities that are involved in performing the job.
 Work output – the physical activities, tools and devices needed or used by the
worker to perform the job
 Relationship with the workers /other persons— the relationships with other
people required while performing the job
 Job context – the physical and social contexts where work is performed.
 Other characteristics— the activities, conditions and characteristics other than
those previously described that are relative to the job.

The job analyst is asked to determine whether each item applies to the job being
analyzed. The analyst then rates the item on six scales: extent , amount of time,
importance to the job , possibility of occurrence ,applicability and special code (special
rating scales used with a particular item).

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Interview conducted on the basis PAQ job analysis
questions:

Name of the person holding job title: Mr. Srenivas

Position: Accounts officer
At XYZ company, (an asset management company at its HQ in Dubai

Company information: the company is an asset management company and has its head
quarters in Dubai n various branches spread over the emirates. The company has a capital
of 140million and was begun in 2002)

1) Where and how does the worker get information needed to perform the
work?
Ans: The employees are provided with a job description and on n off job training in
form of documentation etc

2) What is the mental process or job activity process?

Ans: The person should be qualified to perform mathematical calculations,
preparation and analaysation of various financial records etc. accurately.

3) What are the work outputs?

Ans: Various ERP software’s are highly recommended in the accounting field. There is
a growing demand for professionals we versed with the functioning of this software’s.
Besides the accounting software’s an accountant should be a pioneer in mathematical
calculations required for the accounting based work, which included various formulae
And statistics.

4) Importance of business communication.

Ans: It is very important to get the work competed on time, since the company has to
work with compliance with the Central Bank. Hence continuous motivation and
scheduled tasks known as the Task Based Management is provided.

5) The job context of the employee

Ans: An accountant has to work in an official enviournment.Provided with an essential
computer and accounting software. Timely training is provided to the accountant with
modification the software’s to ease the accounting burden.

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Quick questions:
1) general responsibilities
 Finalization of accounts ,preparation of reports, licensing with the banks
and co ordination with the banks, also with the company’s internal
collections and operation departments etc

2) regular day schedule versus the other work schedules

 Task based activities are performed. Hence activities are performed according to
time and priority basis. If the job cannot be completed on time due to valid reasons the
employee can request for the parking of activity.

3) supervising and coordination with other department

 Supervision is done in an amicable manner, since the accountant is the customer
to every department of the organization it has to co ordinate well with al the departments.

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Conclusions based on PAQ job analysis:
 Advantages

PAQ job analysis is a very excellent method for analysation of jobs. Since it provides
a selected number of questions which are very useful for analyzing the duties in every
job.

The significant database has linked scores on certain dimensions to scores on subtests
of the General Aptitude Test Battery(GATB).Thus knowing the dimension scores
provides some guidance regarding the types of abilities that are necessary to perform
the job.

 Disadvantages :

To fill out the test an employee has to have a reading level of a college graduate this
disqualifies some job incumbents from the PAQ

It is general standardized format that leads to rather abstract characterization of jobs.

Thus it does not lend itself well to describing the specific, concrete task activities that
compromise the actual job.

It is not ideal for developing job descriptions or redesigning jobs. Methods that do npt
focus n the aspect of the above work are needed if this is the goal.

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OBSERVATION METHOD OF JOB ANALYSIS

Direct observation

Direct Observation is a method of job analysis to observe and record

behavior / events / activities / tasks / duties while something is happening.

 Summary of the job analysis :

 Direct Observation of incumbents performing their jobs enables the trained job
analyst to obtain first-hand knowledge and information about the job being
analyzed. The Observation method of Job Analysis is suited for jobs in which the
work behaviors are 1) observable involving some degree of movement on the part
of the incumbent, or 2) job tasks are short in duration allowing for many
observations to be made in a short period of time or a significant part of the job
can be observed in a short period of time, or 3) jobs in which the job analyst can
learn information about the job through observation.

 Graphical representation of functions of an accountant

based on the observation

13% 13%

17%

57%

The pie chart representation of the priorities given to various functions of the
accountant according to function prioritization:
1) Major 57% of the job done by the accounts officer is analysation of the various
accounting statements which involves series of checking of the inputs of data to
the resultant output.
2) Both the duties of accessing subordinates , their work n timely checks into their
work process has to be equally timed that is 13% of their time is devoted to it.

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3) 17% of the time is given to preparation of various budgets, timey analyzation of
various documents that need licensing.

 Diagrammatic representation of job specification of

accounts officer :

Analysation of
financial
statements

Forecasting and
Budget preparation meeting of goals

Accountants
Officer

Training and
Moderation of
orientation
documents

Supervising of
accounting
subordinates

The above diagram shows the function specifications of an accounts officer

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 Advantages
With direct Observation, the trained job analyst can obtain first-hand knowledge
and information about the job being analyzed. Other Job Analysis methods (such
as the interview or questionnaire) only allow the job analyst to indirectly obtain
this information. Thus, with other methods of Job Analysis, sources of error
(omissions or exaggerations) are introduced either by the incumbent being
interviewed or by items on the questionnaire. With direct observation of the
incumbent, these sources of error are eliminated.

 Direct Observation allows the job analyst to see (and in some cases experience)
the work environment, tools and equipment used, interrelationships with other
workers, and complexity of the job.

 Direct Observation of incumbents may be necessary to support testimony if the

incumbent or applicant for the job has sued the employer. A Job Analysis is
necessary to support personnel actions that were taken. However, the job analysis
may be of limited value if the job analyst has not seen the incumbent perform the
job. In other words, relying solely on the incumbent's description of their job may
not withstand scrutiny in a court of law

 Disadvantages
One problem with the direct Observation method of Job Analysis is that the
presence of an observer may affect the incumbent causing the incumbent to alter
their normal work behavior. It is important for the analyst to be unobtrusive in
their observations. Incumbents may alter their work behavior if they know they
are being observed.
 This method is not appropriate for jobs that involve significant amounts of time
spent in concentration or mental effort.

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Criticality of error in the task:
• The job of an accountant requires a lot of mental work. The learning curve in this
category of job develops slowly and with a grater margin.
• Every single transaction recorded should be done with thorough and accurate
calculations.
• Hence if there is even a minor mistake in any of the transactions there will be a
possibility of major mishap , which my lead to consequences such as
transactional errors, wrong estimates, and sometimes even frauds etc.
• Every provided financial statements should be analysed properly because the
forecasts and budgets depend in the proper estimates done with the provided
statistics .
• Many others.

Since accountant performs a his tasks related to the monetary transactions directly and
indirectly, it is a very subtle job which tests one mental ability in performing the job
precisely.

Successful career graph in accountancy:

 For having to achieve great height in the field of accountancy one has to struggle
from the very beginning paying close attention to all the monetary tasks
performed in his enviournment.
 One has to build a very strong base in the accounting methods and various
financial statement analysation
 A post graduate degree in accountancy is always very useful eg CMA CPA CIMA
etc.
 One should be flexible in learning various accounting software that are updated in
their firms and keep them updated with various trends in the industry.

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Bibliography:
1) Human Resources Management (Noe/Hollenback/Gerhart/Wright)
2) Google ( MBA @coolavenue, HR guide to internet,etc.)

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