Shop Management, Frederick Winslow Taylor [most important books of all time .txt] 📗

out, and some of them will

take advantage of this and keep much of the time close to the limit. In

laying a man off, also, the employer is apt to suffer as much in many

cases as the man, through having machinery lying idle or work delayed.

The fourth remedy is also objectionable because some men will

deliberately take close to their maximum of “bad marks.”

 

In the writer’s experience, the fining system, if justly and properly

applied, is more effective and much to be preferred to either of the

others. He has applied this system of discipline in various works with

uniform success over a long period of years, and so far as he knows,

none of those who have tried it under his directions have abandoned it.

 

The success of the fining system depends upon two elements:

 

First. The impartiality, good judgment and justice with which it is

applied.

 

Second. Every cent of the fines imposed should in some form be returned

to the workmen. If any part of the fines is retained by the company, it

is next to impossible to keep the workmen from believing that at least a

part of the motive in fining them is to make money out of them; and this

thought works so much harm as to more than overbalance the good effects

of the system. If, however, all of the fines are in some way promptly

returned to the men, they recognize it as purely a system of discipline,

and it is so direct, effective and uniformly just that the best men soon

appreciate its value and approve of it quite as much as the company.

 

In many cases the writer has first formed a mutual beneficial

association among the employees, to which all of the men as well as the

company contribute. An accident insurance association is much safer and

less liable to be abused than a general sickness or life insurance

association; so that, when practicable, an association of this sort

should be formed and managed by the men. All of the fines can then be

turned over each week to this association and so find their way directly

back to the men. Like all other elements, the fining system should not

be plunged into head first. It should be worked up to gradually and with

judgment, choosing at first only the most flagrant cases for fining and

those offenses which affect the welfare of some of the other workmen. It

will not be properly and most effectively applied until small offenses

as well as great receive their appropriate fine. The writer has fined

men from one cent to as high as sixty dollars per fine. It is most

important that the fines should be applied absolutely impartially to all

employees, high and low. The writer has invariably fined himself just as

he would the men under him for all offenses committed.

 

The fine is best applied in the form of a request to contribute a

certain amount to the mutual beneficial association, with the

understanding that unless this request is complied with the man will be

discharged.

 

In certain cases the fining system may not produce the desired result,

so that coupled with it as an additional means of disciplining the men

should be the first and second expedients of “lowering wages” and

“laying the men off for a longer or shorter time”

 

The writer does not at all depreciate the value of the many

semi-philanthropic and paternal aids and improvements, such as

comfortable lavatories, eating rooms, lecture halls, and free lectures,

night schools, kindergartens, baseball and athletic grounds, village

improvement societies, and mutual beneficial associations, unless done

for advertising purposes. This kind of so-called welfare work all tends

to improve and elevate the workmen and make life better worth living.

Viewed from the managers’ standpoint they are valuable aids in making

more intelligent and better workmen, and in promoting a kindly feeling

among the men for their employers. They are, however, of distinctly

secondary importance, and should never be allowed to engross the

attention of the superintendent to the detriment of the more important

and fundamental elements of management. They should come in all

establishments, but they should come only after the great problem of

work and wages has been permanently settled to the satisfaction of both

parties. The solution of this problem will take more than the entire

time of the management in the average case for several years.

 

Mr. Patterson, of the National Cash Register Company, of Dayton, Ohio,

has presented to the world a grand object lesson of the combination of

many philanthropic schemes with, in many respects, a practical and

efficient management. He stands out a pioneer in this work and an

example of a kindhearted and truly successful man. Yet I feel that the

recent strike in his works demonstrates all the more forcibly my

contention that the establishment of the semi-philanthropic schemes

should follow instead of preceding the solution of the wages question;

unless, as is very rarely the case, there are brains, energy and money

enough available in a company to establish both elements at the same

time.

 

Unfortunately there is no school of management. There is no single

establishment where a relatively large part of the details of management

can be seen, which represent the best of their kinds. The finest

developments are for the most part isolated, and in many cases almost

buried with the mass of rubbish which surrounds them.

 

Among the many improvements for which the originators will probably

never receive the credit which they deserve the following may be

mentioned.

 

The remarkable system for analyzing all of the work upon new machines as

the drawings arrived from the drafting-room and of directing the

movement and grouping of the various parts as they progressed through

the shop, which was developed and used for several years by Mr. Wm. II.

Thorne, of Wm. Sellers & Co., of Philadelphia, while the company was

under the general management of Mr. J. Sellers Bancroft. Unfortunately

the full benefit of this method was never realized owing to the lack of

the other functional elements which should have accompanied it.

 

And then the employment bureau which forms such an important element of

the Western Electric Company in Chicago; the complete and effective

system for managing the messenger boys introduced by Mr. Almon Emrie

while superintendent of the Ingersoll Sargent Drill Company, of Easton,

Pa.; the mnemonic system of order numbers invented by Mr. Oberlin Smith

and amplified by Mr. Henry R. Towne, of The Yale & Towne Company, of

Stamford, Conn.; and the system of inspection introduced by Mr. Chas. D.

Rogers in the works of the American Screw Company, at Providence, R. I.

and the many good points in the apprentice system developed by Mr.

Vauclain, of the Baldwin Locomotive Works, of Philadelphia.

 

The card system of shop returns invented and introduced as a complete

system by Captain Henry Metcalfe, U. S. A., in the government shops of

the Frankford Arsenal represents another such distinct advance in the

art of management. The writer appreciates the difficulty of this

undertaking as he was at the same time engaged in the slow evolution of

a similar system in the Midvale Steel Works, which, however, was the

result of a gradual development instead of a complete, well thought out

invention as was that of Captain Metcalfe.

 

The writer is indebted to most of these gentlemen and to many others,

but most of all to the Midvale Steel Company, for elements of the system

which he has described. The rapid and successful application of the

general principles involved in any system will depend largely upon the

adoption of those details which have been found in actual service to be

most useful. There are many such elements which the writer feels should

be described in minute detail. It would, however, be improper to burden

this record with matters of such comparatively small importance.

 

End of Project Gutenberg’s Shop Management, by Frederick Winslow Taylor

 

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