Shop Management by Frederick Winslow Taylor (top books to read .TXT) 📕

involving at the same time more brain work and less monotony. The type

of man who was formerly a day laborer and digging dirt is now for

instance making shoes in a shoe factory. The dirt handling is done by

Italians or Hungarians.

After the planning room with functional foremanship has accomplished its

most difficult task, of teaching the men how to do a full day’s work

themselves, and also how to get it out of their machines steadily, then,

if desired, the number of non-producers can be diminished, preferably,

by giving each type of functional foreman more to do in his specialty;

or in the case of a very small shop, by combining two different

functions in the same man. The former expedient is, however, much to be

preferred to the latter. There need never be any worry about what is to

become of those engaged in systematizing after the period of active

organization is over. The difficulty will still remain even with

functional foremanship, that of getting enough good men to fill the

positions, and the demand for competent gang bosses will always be so

great that no good boss need look for a job.

Of all the farces in management the greatest is that of an establishment

organized along well planned lines, with all of the elements needed for

success, and yet which fails to get either output or economy. There must

be some man or men present in the organization who will not mistake the

form for the essence, and who will have brains enough to find out those

of their employees who “get there,” and nerve enough to make it

unpleasant for those who fail, as well as to reward those who succeed.

No system can do away with the need of real men. Both system and good

men are needed, and after introducing the best system, success will be

in proportion to the ability, consistency, and respected authority of

the management.

In a book of this sort, it would be manifestly impossible to discuss at

any length all of the details which go toward making the system a

success. Some of them are of such importance as to render at least a

brief reference to them necessary. And first among these comes the study

of unit times.

This, as already explained, is the most important element of the system

advocated by the writer. Without it, the definite, clear-cut directions

given to the workman, and the assigning of a full, yet just, daily task,

with its premium for success, would be impossible; and the arch without

the keystone would fall to the ground.

In 1883, while foreman of the machine shop of the Midvale Steel Company

of Philadelphia, it occurred to the writer that it was simpler to time

with a stop watch each of the elements of the various kinds of work done

in the place, and then find the quickest time in which each job could be

done by summing up the total times of its component parts, than it was

to search through the time records of former jobs and guess at the

proper time and price. After practicing this method of time study

himself for about a year, as well as circumstances would permit, it

became evident that the system was a success.

The writer then established the time-study and rate-fixing department,

which has given out piece work prices in the place ever since.

This department far more than paid for itself from the very start; but

it was several years before the full benefits of the system were felt,

owing to the fact that the best methods of making and recording time

observations, as well as of determining the maximum capacity of each of

the machines in the place, and of making working tables and time tables,

were not at first adopted.

It has been the writer’s experience that the difficulties of scientific

time study are underestimated at first, and greatly overestimated after

actually trying the work for two or three months. The average manager

who decides to undertake the study of unit times in his works fails at

first to realize that he is starting a new art or trade. He understands,

for instance, the difficulties which he would meet with in establishing

a drafting room, and would look for but small results at first, if he

were to give a bright man the task of making drawings, who had never

worked in a drafting room, and who was not even familiar with drafting

implements and methods, but he entirely underestimates the difficulties

of this new trade.

The art of studying unit times is quite as important and as difficult as

that of the draftsman. It should be undertaken seriously, and looked

upon as a profession. It has its own peculiar implements and methods,

without the use and understanding of which progress will necessarily be

slow, and in the absence of which there will be more failures than

successes scored at first.

When, on the other hand, an energetic, determined man goes at time study

as if it were his life’s work, with the determination to succeed, the

results which he can secure are little short of astounding. The

difficulties of the task will be felt at once and so strongly by any one

who undertakes it, that it seems important to encourage the beginner by

giving at least one illustration of what has been accomplished.

Mr. Sanford E. Thompson, C. E., started in 1896 with but small help from

the writer, except as far as the implements and methods are concerned,

to study the time required to do all kinds of work in the building

trades. In six years he has made a complete study of eight of the most

important trades—excavation, masonry (including sewer-work and paving),

carpentry, concrete and cement work, lathing and plastering, slating and

roofing and rock quarrying. He took every stop watch observation himself

and then, with the aid of two comparatively cheap assistants, worked up

and tabulated all of his data ready for the printer. The magnitude of

this undertaking will be appreciated when it is understood that the

tables and descriptive matter for one of these trades alone take up

about 250 pages. Mr. Thompson and the writer are both engineers, but

neither of us was especially familiar with the above trades, and this

work could not have been accomplished in a lifetime without the study of

elementary units with a stop watch.

In the course of this work, Mr. Thompson has developed what are in many

respects the best implements in use, and with his permission some of

them will be described. The blank form or note sheet used by Mr.

Thompson, shown in Fig. 2 (see page 151), contains essentially:

[Transcriber’s note — Figure 2 omitted]

(1) Space for the description of the work and notes in regard to it.

(2) A place for recording the total time of complete operations—that

is, the gross time including all necessary delays, for doing a whole job

or large portions of it.

(3) Lines for setting down the “detail operations, or units” into which

any piece of work may be divided, followed by columns for entering the

averages obtained from the observations.

(4) Squares for recording the readings of the stop watch when observing

the times of these elements. If these squares are filled, additional

records can be entered on the back. The size of the sheets, which should

be of best quality ledger paper, is 8 3/4 inches wide by 7 inches long,

and by folding in the center they can be conveniently carried in the

pocket, or placed in a case (see Fig. 3, page 153) containing one or

more stop watches.

This case, or “watch book,” is another device of Mr. Thompson’s. It

consists of a frame work, containing concealed in it one, two, or three

watches, whose stop and start movements can be operated by pressing with

the fingers of the left hand upon the proper portion of the cover of the

note-book without the knowledge of the workman who is being observed.

The frame is bound in a leather case resembling a pocket note-book, and

has a place for the note sheets described.

The writer does not believe at all in the policy of spying upon the

workman when taking time observations for the purpose of time study. If

the men observed are to be ultimately affected by the results of these

observations, it is generally best to come out openly, and let them know

that they are being timed, and what the object of the timing is. There

are many cases, however, in which telling the workman that he was being

timed in a minute way would only result in a row, and in defeating the

whole object of the timing; particularly when only a few time units are

to be studied on one man’s work, and when this man will not be

personally affected by the results of the observations. In these cases,

the watch book of Mr. Thompson, holding the watches in the cover, is

especially useful. A good deal of judgment is required to know when to

time openly, or the reverse.

FIGURE 3. -WATCH BOOK FOR TIME STUDY

[Transcriber’s note — Figure 3 omitted]

The operation selected for illustration on the note sheet shown in Fig.

2, page 151, is the excavation of earth with wheelbarrows, and the

values given are fair averages of actual contract work where the

wheelbarrow man fills his own barrow. It is obvious that similar methods

of analyzing and recording may be applied to work ranging from unloading

coal to skilled labor on fine machine tools.

The method of using the note sheets for timing a workman is as follows:

After entering the necessary descriptive matter at the top of the sheet,

divide the operation to be timed into its elementary units, and write

these units one after another under the heading “Detail Operations.” If

the job is long and complicated, it may be analyzed while the timing is

going on, and the elementary units entered then instead of beforehand.

In wheelbarrow work as illustrated in the example shown on the note

sheet, the elementary units consist of “filling barrow,” “starting”

(which includes throwing down shovel and lifting handles of barrow),

“wheeling full,” etc. These units might have been further

subdivided—the first one into time for loading one shovelful, or still

further into the time for filling and the time for emptying each

shovelful. The letters a, b, c, etc., which are printed, are simply for

convenience in designating the elements.

We are now ready for the stop watch, which, to save clerical work,

should be provided with a decimal dial similar to that shown in Fig. 4.

The method of using this and recording the times depends upon the

character of the time observations. In all cases, however, the stop

watch times are recorded in the columns headed “Time” at the top of the

right-hand half of the note sheet. These columns are the only place on

the face of the sheet where stop watch readings are to be entered. If

more space is required for these times, they should be entered on the

back of the sheet. The rest of the figures (except those on the

left-hand side of the note sheet, which may be taken from an ordinary

timepiece) are the results of calculation, and may be made in the office

by any clerk.

FIGURE 4. -STOP WATCH WITH DECIMAL FACE

[Transcriber’s note — omitted]

As has been stated, the method of recording the stop watch observations

depends upon the work which is being observed. If the operation consists

of the same element repeated over and over, the time of each may be set

down separately; or,