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Taylorism Concept
Taylorism is an expression created to
designate a group of ideas and management principles created in the end
of the 19th century and beginning of the 20th century by the North
American engineer Frederick Taylor. Taylorism, that was also known as
Scientific Management Theory or Work Scientific Organization, has as
great goal to increase productivity through a system of differentiated
rates and through the application of scientific methods, placing the
emphasis in the use of science and the creation of group harmony. The
application of science to management had as basic instrument the
exhaustive study of times and movements which allowed the work methods
rationalization and the setting of standard-times for the tasks
performance.
Were still defined, either by Taylor
either by his followers, several management principles that, according
to its authors, should be followed by the managers as a way to increase
productivity and, consequently, the efficiency, from which stand out:
- Each task should be decomposed in
elementary operations, whose should after be redefined, changed or
suppressed in order that the work be made in the less time possible –
this is the basic principle of the Work Scientific Organization.
- For each type of tasks, each worker
should be correctly selected and trained in order that his work is made
to “the best rhythm possible”.
- The salary should be calculated based on
a differentiated rates system and according to the obtained performance;
should grow to the “optimum rhythm”, decreasing from there as a way to
avoid the occurrence of quality breaks.
- Supervisors and their subordinates
should perform in the most perfect coordination for the benefit of all.
- Each worker and each organization
manager should be placed in the task in which obtains better results.
Main limitation: The fact of basing in the
assumption that people are motivated only by the satisfaction of basic
needs (economic and physical needs), when in reality exist many other
needs such as the satisfaction at work and the social and personal well
being, is appointed as the main deficiency of “Taylorism” and the main
reason for its current discredit. One of the more visible consequences
of this limitation was the emerging of violent strike movements and
workers riots especially in United States. However, and despite this
limitation, it should be noted its significant contribution for the
amazing entrepreneurial development in the beginning of the 20th
century, mainly through the implementation of methods of serial
production and consequently the productivity increase; still today the
tasks “atomistic” division is applied in many productive processes,
although more and more limited to automated processes and performed by
sophisticated equipments.
Followers: Some of the most significant
Taylor’s followers and who gave continuation to the development of the
scientific management theory were Henry L. Gantt, Harrington Emerson,
Frank B. Gilbreth and Lillian M. Gilbreth and still the famous
industrial of the automotive industry, Henry Ford.
- Henry L. Gantt, mechanical engineer like
Taylor, placed emphasis in the work planning and work control. Was known
for the creation of the famous Gantt graphic, which shows the relations
between the several phases of a production program and originated PERT
(Program Evaluation and Review Technique) a more sophisticated technique
still used today in the projects planning and control and productive
programs which include multiple phases and inter-related and
interdependent activities.
- Harrington Emerson, also engineer, was
one of Taylor’s assistants and responsible for the popularization of the
Scientific Administration Theory. His main works were the simplification
of study methods developed by Taylor and the development of the first
jobs about employees’ selection and recruitment.
- Frank B. Gilbreth and Lillian M.
Gilbreth, performed several statistic studies about the effects of
fatigue in the workers’ productivity, through which concluded that
fatigue predisposes the workers for the decrease of productivity and
work quality. To avoid productivity losses were listed several economy
principles of movements’ referent to the use of human body, referent to
the storage of materials in the workplace and referent to the tools and
equipment performance. Another conclusion of the Gilbreths was that all
hand work can be reduced to elementary movements (or fundamental work
unit). Knowing those elementary movements could decompose and analyze
any task and chose the most efficient way of performing it.
- Henry Ford was known for the
idealization of the assembly line and application of the serial
production method in his Ford automobile factories. The success obtained
at the productivity and efficiency level with the application of these
methods was so expressive that Ford Motors Co. became, in few years, one
of the giants of the North American industry, thus becoming, a more
suggestive example of the practical application of the Scientific
Management Theory.
Translated from Portuguese
by Susana Saraiva, Portuguese-English and English-Portuguese translation
specialist. Contact: spams@sapo.pt.
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