Read Ebook: The Psychology of Management The Function of the Mind in Determining Teaching and Installing Methods of Least Waste by Gilbreth Lillian Moller

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The name "scientific" while in some respects not as appropriate as are any of the other names, has already received the stamp of popular approval. In derivation it is beyond criticism. It also describes exactly, as has been said, the difference between the older forms of management and the new. Even its "fringe" of association is, or at least was when first used, all that could be desired; but the name is, unfortunately, occasionally used indiscriminately for any sort of system and for schemes of operation that are not based on time study. It has gradually become identified more or less closely with

We may summarize by saying that:

For the purpose of this book, Scientific Management is, then, the most appropriate name. Through its use, the reader is enabled to utilize all his associations, and through his study he is able to restrict and order the content of the term.

RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE THREE TYPES OF MANAGEMENT.--From the foregoing definitions and descriptions it will be clear that the three types of management are closely related. Three of the names given bring out this relationship most clearly. These are Traditional , Interim, and Ultimate. These show, also, that the relationship is genetic, i.e., that the second form grows out of the first, but passes through to the third. The growth is evolutional.

Under the first type, or in the first stage of management, the laws or principles underlying right management are usually unknown, hence disregarded.

In the second stage, the laws are known and installed as fast as functional foremen can be taught their new duties and the resistances of human nature can be overcome.

In the third stage the managing is operated in accordance with the recognized laws of management.

PSYCHOLOGICAL SIGNIFICANCE OF THIS RELATIONSHIP.--The importance of the knowledge and of the desire for it can scarcely be overestimated. This again makes plain the value of the psychological study of management.

POSSIBLE PSYCHOLOGICAL STUDIES OF MANAGEMENT.--In making this psychological study of management, it would be possible to take up the three types as defined above, separately and in order, and to discuss the place of the mind in each, at length; but such a method would not only result in needless repetition, but also in most difficult comparisons when final results were to be deduced and formulated.

It would, again, be possible to take up the various elements or divisions of psychological study as determined by a consensus of psychologists, and to illustrate each in turn from the three types of management; but the results from any such method would be apt to seem unrelated and impractical, i.e., it would be a lengthy process to get results that would be of immediate, practical use in managing.

PLAN OF PSYCHOLOGICAL STUDY USED HERE.--It has, therefore, seemed best to base the discussion that is to follow upon arbitrary divisions of scientific management, that is--

ADVANTAGES OF THIS PLAN OF STUDY.--In this way the reader can gain an idea of

UNDERLYING IDEAS AND DIVISIONS OF SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT.--These underlying ideas are grouped under nine divisions, as follows:--

It is here only necessary to enumerate these divisions. Each will be made the subject of a chapter.

DERIVATION OF THESE DIVISIONS.--These divisions lay no claim to being anything but underlying ideas of Scientific Management, that embrace varying numbers of established elements that can easily be subjected to the scrutiny of psychological investigation.

The discussion will be as little technical as is possible, will take nothing for granted and will cite references at every step. This is a new field of investigation, and the utmost care is necessary to avoid generalizing from insufficient data.

DERIVATION OF SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT.--There has been much speculation as to the age and origin of Scientific Management. The results of this are interesting, but are not of enough practical value to be repeated here. Many ideas of Scientific Management can be traced back, more or less clearly and directly, to thinkers of the past; but the Science of Management, as such, was discovered, and the deduction of its laws, or "principles," made possible when Dr. Frederick W. Taylor discovered and applied Time Study. Having discovered this, he constructed from it and the other fundamental principles a complete whole.

OUTLINE OF METHOD OF INVESTIGATION.--In the discussion of each of the nine divisions of Scientific Management, the following topics must be treated:

These topics will be discussed in such order as the particular division investigated demands. The psychological significance of the appearance or non-appearance of the idea, and of the effect of the idea, will be noted. The results will be summarized at the close of each chapter, in order to furnish data for drawing conclusions at the close of the discussion.

CONCLUSIONS TO BE REACHED.--These conclusions will include the following:--

a. increases output and wages and lowers costs. b. eliminates waste. c. turns unskilled labor into skilled. d. provides a system of self-perpetuating welfare. e. reduces the cost of living. f. bridges the gap between the college trained and the apprenticeship trained worker. g. forces capital and labor to co?perate and to promote industrial peace.

INDIVIDUALITY

DEFINITION OF INDIVIDUALITY.--"An individual is a single thing, a being that is, or is regarded as, a unit. An individual is opposed to a crowd. Individual action is opposed to associate action. Individual interests are opposed to common or community interests." These definitions give us some idea of the extent of individuality. Individuality is a particular or distinctive characteristic of an individual; "that quality or aggregate of qualities which distinguishes one person or thing from another, idiosyncrasy." This indicates the content.

INDIVIDUALITY AS TREATED IN THIS CHAPTER.--The recognition of individuality is the subject of this chapter. The utilization of this individuality in its deviation from class, is the subject of the chapter that follows, Functionalization.

With the day of experimental psychology has come the importance of the individual self as a subject of study, and psychology has come to be defined, as Calkins defines it, as a "science of the self as conscious."

The psychology which interested itself particularly in studying such divisions of mental activity as attention, will, habit, etc., emphasizes more particularly the likenesses of minds. It is necessary to understand thoroughly all of these likenesses before one can be sure what the differences, or idiosyncrasies, are, and how important they are, because, while the likenesses furnish the background, it is the differences that are most often actually utilized by management. These must be determined in order to compute and set the proper individual task for the given man from standard data of the standard, or first-class man.

In any study of the individual, the following facts must be noted:--

INDIVIDUALITY SELDOM RECOGNIZED UNDER TRADITIONAL MANAGEMENT.--Under Traditional Management there was little or no systematized method for the recognition of individuality or individual fitness. The worker usually was, in the mind of the manager, one of a crowd, his only distinguishing mark being the amount of work which he was capable of performing.

SELECTING WORKERS UNDER TRADITIONAL MANAGEMENT.--In selecting men to do work, there was little or no attempt to study the individuals who applied for work. The matter of selection was more of a process of "guess work" than of exact measurement, and the highest form of test was considered to be that of having the man actually tried out by being given a chance at the work itself. There was not only a great waste of time on the work, because men unfitted to it could not turn it out so successfully, but there also was a waste of the worker, and many times a positive injury to the worker, by his being put at work which he was unfitted either to perform, to work at continuously, or both.

In the most progressive type of Traditional Management there was usually a feeling, however, that if the labor market offered even temporarily a greater supply than the work in hand demanded, it was wise to choose those men to do the work who were best fitted for it, or who were willing to work for less wages. It is surprising to find in the traditional type, even up to the present day, how often men were selected for their strength and physique, rather than for any special capabilities fitting them for working in, or at, the particular line of work to be done.

OUTPUT SELDOM SEPARATED UNDER TRADITIONAL MANAGEMENT.--Under Traditional Management especially on day work the output of the men was not usually separated, nor was the output recorded separately, as can be done even with the work of gangs.

LITTLE INDIVIDUAL TEACHING UNDER TRADITIONAL MANAGEMENT.--Not having a clear idea either of the present fitness and the future possibilities of the worker, or the requirements of the work, no intelligent attempt could be made at efficient individual teaching. What teaching was done was in the form of directions for all, concerning the work in general, the directions being given by an overworked foreman, the holding of whose position often depended more upon whether his employer made money than upon the way his men were taught, or worked.

SELDOM AN INDIVIDUAL REWARD UNDER TRADITIONAL MANAGEMENT.--As a typical example of disregard of individuality, the worker in the household may be cited, and especially the "general housework girl." Selected with no knowledge of her capabilities, and with little or no scientific or even systematized knowledge of the work that she is expected to do, there is little or no thought of a prescribed and definite task, no teaching specially adapted to the individual needs of the taught, and no reward in proportion to efficiency.

CAUSE OF THESE LACKS UNDER TRADITIONAL MANAGEMENT.--The fault lies not in any desire of the managers to do poor or wasteful work, or to treat their workers unfairly,--but in a lack of knowledge and of accurate methods for obtaining, conserving and transmitting knowledge. Under Traditional Management no one individual knows precisely what is to be done. Such management seldom knows how work could best be done;--never knows how much work each individual can do. Understanding neither work nor workers, it can not adjust the one to the other so as to obtain least waste. Having no conception of the importance of accurate measurement, it has no thought of the individual as a unit.

INDIVIDUALITY RECOGNIZED UNDER TRANSITORY MANAGEMENT.-- Recognition of individuality is one of the principles first apparent under Transitory Management.

This is apt to demonstrate itself first of all in causing the outputs of the workers to "show up" separately, rewarding these separated outputs, and rewarding each worker for his individual output.

BENEFITS OF THIS RECOGNITION.--The benefits of introducing these features first are that the worker, seeing his individual output, is stimulated to measure it, and receiving compensation in accordance with his output, is satisfied; and observing that records are necessary to determine the amount of output and pay, is glad to have accurate measurement and the other features of Scientific Management introduced.

INDIVIDUALITY A FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLE OF SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT.--Under Scientific Management the individual is the unit to be measured. Functionalization is based upon utilizing the particular powers and special abilities of each man. Measurement is of the individual man and his work. Analysis and synthesis build up methods by which the individual can best do his work. Standards are of the work of an individual, a standard man, and the task is always for an individual, being that percentage of the standard man's task that the particular individual can do. Records are of individuals, and are made in order to show and reward individual effort. Specific individuals are taught those things that they, individually, require. Incentives are individual both in the cases of rewards and punishments, and, finally, it is the welfare of the individual worker that is considered, without the sacrifice of any for the good of the whole.

INDIVIDUALITY CONSIDERED IN SELECTING WORKERS.--Under Scientific Management individuality is considered in selecting workers as it could not be under either of the other two forms of management. This for several reasons:

VARIABLES OF THE WORKER.--This list now includes at least 50 or 60 variables, and shows the possible elements which may demand consideration. When it is remembered that the individual selected may need a large or small proportion of most of the variables in order to do his particular work most successfully, and that every single one of these variables, as related to the others, may, in some way affect his output and his welfare in doing his assigned work, the importance of taking account of individuality in selection is apparent.

SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT NEEDS SUPPORT IN STUDYING WORKERS.--The best of management is by no means at its ultimate stage in practice in this field. This, not because of a lack in the laws of management, but because, so far, Scientific Management has not received proper support from other lines of activity.

PRESENT LACK OF KNOWLEDGE OF APPLICANTS.--At present, the men who apply to the Industries for positions have no scientifically determined idea of their own capabilities, neither has there been any effort in the training or experience of most of those who apply for work for the first time to show them how fit they really are to do the work which they wish to do.

SUPPLEMENTS DEMANDED BY SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT.--Before the worker can be scientifically selected so that his individuality can be appreciated, Scientific Management must be supplemented in two ways:--

WHENCE THIS HELP MUST COME.--This study must be made

a. In the Vocational Guidance Work. b. In the Academic Work,

and in both fields psychological and physiological investigations are called for.

WORK OF VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE BUREAUS.--Vocational Guidance Bureaus are, at present, doing a wonderful work in their line. This work divides itself into two parts:

WORK OF ACADEMIC WORLD.--The Academic World is also, wherever it is progressive, attempting to study the student, and to develop him so that he can be the most efficient individual. Progressive educators realize that schools and colleges must stand or fall, as efficient, as the men they train become successful or unsuccessful in their vocations, as well as in their personal culture.

NEED FOR PSYCHOLOGICAL STUDY IN ALL FIELDS.--In both these complementary lines of activity, as in Scientific Management itself, the need for psychological study is evident. Through it, only, can scientific progress come. Here is emphasized again the importance of measurement. Through accurate measurement of the mind and the body only can individuality be recognized, conserved and developed as it should be.

PREPAREDNESS OF EXPERIMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY.--Experimental psychology has instruments of precision with which to measure and test the minds and bodies brought to it, and its leading exponents are so broadening the scope of its activities that it is ready and glad to plan for investigations.

METHOD OF SELECTION UNDER ULTIMATE MANAGEMENT.--Under Ultimate Management, the minds of the workers,--and of the managers too,--will have been studied, and the results recorded from earliest childhood. This record, made by trained investigators, will enable vocational guidance directors to tell the child what he is fitted to be, and thus to help the schools and colleges to know how best to train him, that is to say, to provide what he will need to know to do his life work, and also those cultural studies that his vocational work may lack, and that may be required to build out his best development as an individual.

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