Frank B. Gilbreth Concept

Frank Gilbreth was one of the main followers of Taylor and the theory of labor scientific organization. Together with his wife Lillian M. Gilbreth, performed several statistic studies about the effects of fatigue in the employees productivity, through which concluded that fatigue predisposes the employees for productivity and work quality decrease. To avoid productivity losses were stated several principles of economy movements’ referent to the use of the human body, referent to the storage of materials in the work place and referent to the development of tools and equipment. Another conclusion of the Gilbreth’s was that all hand-made work can be reduced to elementary movements (or fundamental work unit). Knowing these elementary movements could be decomposed and analyzed any task and chose the most efficient way of performing it.     

 

 

Translated from Portuguese by Susana Saraiva, Portuguese-English and English-Portuguese translation specialist. Contact: spams@sapo.pt.