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

wages of those who in the past were getting more than $2.50, thus

pulling down the better workers in order to raise up the poorer men. Men

are not born equal, and any attempt to make them so is contrary to

nature’s laws and will fail.

Some of the labor unions have succeeded in persuading the people in

parts of this country that there is something sacred in the cause of

union labor and that, in the interest of this cause, the union should

receive moral support whether it is right in any particular case or not.

Union labor is sacred just so long as its acts are fair and good, and it

is damnable just as soon as its acts are bad. Its rights are precisely

those of nonunion labor, neither greater nor less. The boycott, the use

of force or intimidation, and the oppression of nonunion workmen by

labor unions are damnable; these acts of tyranny are thoroughly

un-American and will not be tolerated by the American people.

One of the most interesting and difficult problems connected with the

art of management is how to persuade union men to do a full day’s work

if the union does not wish them to do it. I am glad of the opportunity

of saying what I think on the matter, and of explaining somewhat in

detail just how I should expect, in fact, how I have time after time

induced union men to do a large day’s work, quite as large as other men

do.

In dealing with union men certain general principles should never be

lost sight of. These principles are the proper ones to apply to all men,

but in dealing with union men their application becomes all the more

imperative.

First. One should be sure, beyond the smallest doubt, that what is

demanded of the men is entirely just and can surely be accomplished.

This certainty can only be reached by a minute and thorough time study.

Second. Exact and detailed directions should be given to the workman

telling him, not in a general way but specifying in every small

particular, just what he is to do and how he is to do it.

Third. It is of the utmost importance in starting to make a change that

the energies of the management should be centered upon one single

workman, and that no further attempt at improvement should be made until

entire success has been secured in this case. Judgment should be used in

selecting for a start work of such a character that the most clear cut

and definite directions can be given regarding it, so that failure to

carry out these directions will constitute direct disobedience of a

single, straightforward order.

Fourth. In case the workman fails to carry out the order the management

should be prepared to demonstrate that the work called for can be done

by having some one connected with the management actually do it in the

time called for.

The mistake which is usually made in dealing with union men, lies in

giving an order which affects a number of workmen at the same time and

in laying stress upon the increase in the output which is demanded

instead of emphasizing one by one the details which the workman is to

carry out in order to attain the desired result. In the first case a

clear issue is raised: say that the man must turn out fifty per cent

more pieces than he has in the past, and therefore it will be assumed by

most people that he must work fifty per cent harder. In this issue the

union is more than likely to have the sympathy of the general public,

and they can logically take it up and fight upon it. If, however, the

workman is given a series of plain, simple, and reasonable orders, and

is offered a premium for carrying them out, the union will have a much

more difficult task in defending the man who disobeys them. To

illustrate: If we take the case of a complicated piece of machine work

which is being done on a lathe or other machine tool, and the workman is

called upon (under the old type of management) to increase his output by

twenty-five or fifty per cent there is opened a field of argument in

which the assertion of the man, backed by the union, that the task is

impossible or too hard, will have quite as much weight as that of the

management. If, however, the management begins by analyzing in detail

just how each section of the work should be done and then writes out

complete instructions specifying the tools to be used in succession, the

cone step on which the driving belt is to run, the depth of cut and the

feed to be used, the exact manner in which the work is to be set in the

machine, etc., and if before starting to make any change they have

trained in as functional foremen several men who are particularly expert

and well informed in their specialties, as, for instance, a speed boss,

gang boss, and inspector; if you then place for example a speed boss

alongside of that workman, with an instruction card clearly written out,

stating what both the speed boss and the man whom he is instructing are

to do, and that card says you are to use such and such a tool, put your

driving belt on this cone, and use this feed on your machine, and if you

do so you will get out the work in such and such a time, I can hardly

conceive of a case in which a union could prevent the boss from ordering

the man to put his driving belt just where he said and using just the

feed that he said, and in doing that the workman can hardly fail to get

the work out on time. No union would dare to say to the management of a

works, you shall not run the machine with the belt on this or that cone

step. They do not come down specifically in that way; they say, “You

shall not work so fast,” but they do not say, “You shall not use such

and such a tool, or run with such a feed or at such a speed.” However

much they might like to do it, they do not dare to interfere

specifically in this way. Now, when your single man under the

supervision of a speed boss, gang boss, etc., runs day after day at the

given speed and feed, and gets work out in the time that the instruction

card calls for, and when a premium is kept for him in the office for

having done the work in the required time, you begin to have a moral

suasion on that workman which is very powerful. At first he won’t take

the premium if it is contrary to the laws of his union, but as time goes

on and it piles up and amounts to a big item, he will be apt to step

into the office and ask for his premium, and before long your man will

be a thorough convert to the new system. Now, after one man has been

persuaded, by means of the four functional foremen, etc., that he will

earn more money under the new system than under the laws of the union,

you can then take the next man, and so convert one after another right

through your shop, and as time goes on public opinion will swing around

more and more rapidly your way.

I have a profound respect for the workmen of the United States; they are

in the main sensible men—not all of them, of course, but they are just

as sensible as are those on the side of the management There are some

fools among them; so there are among the men who manage industrial

plants. They are in many respects misguided men, and they require a

great deal of information that they have not got. So do most managers.

All that most workmen need to make them do what is right is a series of

proper object lessons. When they are convinced that a system is offered

them which will yield them larger returns than the union provides for,

they will promptly acquiesce. The necessary object lessons can best be

given by centering the efforts of the management upon one spot. The

mistake that ninety-nine men out of a hundred make is that they have

attempted to influence a large body of men at once instead of taking one

man at a time.

Another important factor is the question of time. If any one expects

large results in six months or a year in a very large works he is

looking for the impossible. If any one expects to convert union men to a

higher rate of production, coupled with high wages, in six months or a

year, he is expecting next to an impossibility. But if he is patient

enough to wait for two or three years, he can go among almost any set of

workmen in the country and get results.

Some method of disciplining the men is unfortunately a necessary element

of all systems of management. It is important that a consistent,

carefully considered plan should be adopted for this as for all other

details of the art. No system of discipline is at all complete which is

not sufficiently broad to cover the great variety in the character and

disposition of the various men to be found in a shop.

There is a large class of men who require really no discipline in the

ordinary acceptance of the term; men who are so sensitive, conscientious

and desirous of doing just what is right that a suggestion, a few words

of explanation, or at most a brotherly admonition is all that they

require. In all cases, therefore, one should begin with every new man by

talking to him in the most friendly way, and this should be repeated

several times over until it is evident that mild treatment does not

produce the desired effect.

Certain men are both thick-skinned and coarse-grained, and these

individuals are apt to mistake a mild manner and a kindly way of saying

things for timidity or weakness. With such men the severity both of

words and manner should be gradually increased until either the desired

result has been attained or the possibilities of the English language

have been exhausted.

Up to this point all systems of discipline should be alike. There will

be found in all shops, however, a certain number of men with whom talk,

either mild or severe, will have little or no effect, unless it produces

the conviction that something more tangible and disagreeable will come

next. The question is what this something shall be.

Discharging the men is, of course, effective as far as that individual

is concerned, and this is in all cases the last step; but it is

desirable to have several remedies between talking and discharging more

severe than the one and less drastic than the other.

Usually one or more of the following expedients are adopted for this

purpose:

First. Lowering the man’s wages.

Second. Laying him off for a longer or shorter period of time.

Third. Fining him.

Fourth. Giving him a series of “bad marks,” and when these sum up to

more than a given number per week or month, applying one or the other of

the first three remedies.

The general objections to the first and second expedients is that for a

large number of offenses they are too severe, so that the disciplinarian

hesitates to apply them. The men find this