ABSTRACT
Managers responsible for the design of work organization in Germany are more and more making use of group work as a basic principle of work organization (Antoni, 1994). Stimulated by the Japanese competitors, managers in car production and the machine construction industry started in the beginning of this decade to introduce group work in combination with increased efforts to improve productivity. One of the reasons they had in mind for such a change in work organization, from individual to group organization, was to design conditions for a better work motivation of their organizational members. They perceived work motivation as an inuential factor for increasing exibility and productivity of work. Although most of the managers had no conceptual knowledge of the psychological background for their interventions, they persistently stuck to their belief in the advantages of group work. In many cases they were deeply convinced that group work would help them to overcome their difculties to stand the challenges arising from worldwide competition.
