Job, a Position, and a Class Description

¶ … Job, a Position, and a Class Description

A position refers to the range of duties and responsibilities carried out by an individual employee, at a particular point in time (Henderson, 2006). Taking the example of a health facility; the clinical officer, the pharmacist, the cashier, the laboratory technician, and the nurse, are serving in their respective individual positions. The positions in an organization need to be divided, and classified in order to assist the management realize, among other things, the proper levels of compensation, and the required standards of employee performance (Khan, 2008). Classification of positions is made possible through a "job analysis, which involves collecting information about the tasks performed, and the required qualifications for the job" (Khan, 2008, p.109). Once job analysis is complete, a position description is generated, stating the set of responsibilities attached to a given position (Khan, 2008). Therefore, a position description is simply an employer's recruitment guide.

A set of positions, tasked with similar responsibilities forms a job (Henderson, 2006). Using the health facility example above; the cashier position in the outpatient section, and another cashier position in the inpatient section, could be serving within the same job. Jobs, like positions, are classified into a number of job classes. The number of job classes depends on, among other things, the size of the organization, and its structural organization. Job classification is an important component of various personnel activities, including, compensation, employee training, and generation of job descriptions. A job description, in the words of Henderson (2006), is simply "a statement of facts that describe the job" (p.141).

It is important to note, at this point, that there exists no specified format for a job description. However, most of them "contain at least five sections: identification, summary, definition, accountabilities, and specifications" (Henderson, 2006, p.146). There exists minor differences between the job, and position descriptions. These differences occur in the 'title,' and the 'definition' segments. Contrary to the job description, the position description uses 'a working title', due to its specific nature (Henderson, 2006). Additionally, a position description does not rank "the statements in the position definition section" (Henderson, 2006, p.161). This, according to the author, seeks to ensure that the differences in the duties of employees serving in different positions within the same job, are clearly defined.