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Scientific Management Scientific Management (Also Called Taylorism or The Taylor System) Is A Theory of
Scientific Management Scientific Management (Also Called Taylorism or The Taylor System) Is A Theory of
Scientific Management Scientific Management (Also Called Taylorism or The Taylor System) Is A Theory of
General approach
1. Shift in decision making from employees to managers
2. Develop a standard method for performing each job
3. Select workers with appropriate abilities for each job
4. Train workers in the standard method previously developed
5. Support workers by planning their work and eliminating interruptions
6. Provide wage incentives to workers for increased output
Elements
Labor is defined and authority/responsibility is legitimised/official
Positions placed in hierarchy and under authority of higher level
Selection is based upon technical competence, training or experience
Actions and decisions are recorded to allow continuity and memory
Management is different from ownership of the organization
Managers follow rules/procedures to enable reliable/predictable behavior
Criticisms
Did not appreciate the social context of work and higher needs of workers.
Did not acknowledge variance among individuals.
Tended to regard workers as uninformed and ignored their ideas and suggestions.
Taylor's own name for his approach was scientific management. Taylor's methods began
from his observation that, in general, workers forced to perform repetitive tasks work at the
slowest rate that goes unpunished. This slow rate of work (which he called "soldiering", but
might nowadays be termed by those in charge as "loafing" or "malingering" or by those on the
assembly line as "getting through the day"), he opined, was based on the observation that,
when paid the same amount, workers will tend to do the amount of work the slowest among
them does: this reflects the idea that workers have a vested interest in their own well-being,
and do not benefit from working above the defined rate of work when it will not increase their
compensation. He therefore proposed that the work practice that had been developed in most
work environments was crafted, intentionally or unintentionally, to be very inefficient in its
execution. From this he posited that there was one best method for performing a particular
task, and that if it were taught to workers, their productivity would go up.
While scientific management principles improved productivity and had a substantial impact
on industry, they also increased the monotony of work. The core job dimensions of skill
variety, task identity, task significance, autonomy, and feedback all were missing from the
picture of scientific management.
While in many cases the new ways of working were accepted by the workers, in some cases,
they were not. The use of stopwatches often was a protested issue and led to a strike at one
factory where “Taylorism” was being tested. Complaints that Taylorism was dehumanizing
led to an investigation by the United States Congress. Despite its controversy, scientific
management changed the way that work was done, and forms of it continue to be used today.