Industrial Progress and Human EconomicsHartness, James
General
Industrial Progress and Human Economics
Hartness, James
Industrial efficiency; Personnel management
The value of experience, if acquired in an industry where such
fundamental principles have been recognized, should be given the
highest rating. Experience, however, in an industry where the
energies of men were not most effectively employed and where there
was not a recognition that the effective employment of man's
energies require a general development of mind and body up to the
man's capacity, cannot be counted as wholly good unless, through
force of purpose, there is the strength to adopt a new path.
[Footnote]INDUSTRIAL MANAGEMENT.
[Footnote text: A revision of material originally under title of
Human Factor in Works Management by James Hartness, published by
McGraw-Hill Publishing Co., New York.]
The navigator in preparing for a voyage carefully examines each of
his instruments. He must know the present error of his chronometer
and its rate of change, and its general reliability as indicated
by its past record. He must also know errors in his compasses for
each point, and he should have the fullest information regarding
the degree of reliability of every other means on which his
success depends; and, last but not least, he must accurately
determine his starting-point or point of departure.
In taking up the subject before us we will do well to follow his
example.
In doing so, our task will be to examine two principal elements:
one, the means on which we depend for interpreting the information
that is available; and the other, the source and character of the
information.
The means may be considered analogous to the navigator's
instruments, and is no less a thing than the brain or mental
machinery; and the information is simply the world about us as
seen in the existing things, such as machinery, methods, popular
notions, textbooks, etc., all of which may be classed as
environments, and may be considered as analogous to the charts and
other publications of our worthy example.
Like the mariner, we must determine the degree of reliability of
all these sources of information and our means for interpreting
observed facts.
When we have ascertained this we will know what allowance to make
from the "observed" to get the actual facts. With this knowledge
we will be able to accurately determine both our starting-point
and best course.
The importance of considering our own minds will be seen when we
realize that every new fact taken in must in a measure conform to
the previous ideas. If some of these old ideas are erroneous, the
mind must be more or less ready to discard them. It is very
difficult to dislodge deep-seated convictions. Contradictory ideas
are not assimilated. Only one of them is actually accepted. Even
when to the objective reasoning they seem false, they frequently
continue to control our actions.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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