Creative Impulse in Industry: A Proposition for EducatorsMarot, Helen
Science
Creative Impulse in Industry: A Proposition for Educators
Marot, Helen
Business and education -- United States; Technical education -- United States; Working class -- Education -- United States
The attitude of Mr. Taylor and his followers, however, differs from
that of the ordinary manager who maintains an irritated disregard of
the disturbing elements instead of accepting them and, as far as is
consistent with business principles, allaying or cajoling them. The
significant contributions which scientific management has made are in
line with the experiments originally introduced by Mr. Taylor. They
call for the study of each new task by the management, for discovering
the economy in the expenditure of labor energy before it is submitted
to the working force; the standardizing of the task in conformity with
the findings; the teaching of the approved methods to the working
force; the introduction of incentives which will insure the full
response of labor in the accomplishment of the task. Beside the
standardizing of tasks and the relating the wage to the fixed
standard, scientific management has made intensive experiments in
the scheduling of the various operations to be performed, which are
divided among the working force, so that no one operation is held up
awaiting the completion of another. It has shown in this connection
that work can be "routed" so that the time of workers is not lost. The
most successfully managed factories also plan their annual product
so that employment will be continuous. They have discovered that the
periods of unemployment seriously affect the personnel of a labor
force and they estimate that the turnover of the labor force which
requires the constant breaking in of new men is an item of serious
financial loss. The Ford Automobile Works at one time hired 50,000 men
in one year while not employing at any one time more than 14,000. They
estimated that the cost of breaking in a new man averaged $70.00. To
reduce this cost, they instituted profit sharing, as an incentive for
men to remain. Other factories have estimated the cost of replacing
men from $50.00 to $200.00. A rubber concern in Ohio has a labor
turnover of 150 per cent. In connection with the effort to reduce the
turnover in the labor force the management of well organized factories
takes great care to estimate a worker's value before employing him.
The policy of transferring a man from one department to another where
he is better suited yields evidently valuable results. In factories
where there is effort to hold labor, to make employment continuous,
the turnover has been reduced in some cases to as low as 18 per cent.
Generally, however, it is still high; frequently as high as 50 per
cent, and 50 per cent is still considered low, even in factories which
have given the subject much consideration.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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