The Psychology of Management Part 14

STANDARDS DERIVED FROM ACTUAL PRACTICE.--Management derives its standards not from theories as to best methods, but from scientific study of actual practice.[2] As already shown, the method of deriving a standard is--

1. to a.n.a.lyze the best practice known into the smallest possible elements, 2. to measure these elements, 3. to adopt the least wasteful elements as standard elements, 4. to synthesize the necessary standard elements into the standard.

THE STANDARD IS PROGRESSIVE.--A standard remains fixed only until a more perfect standard displaces it. The data from which the standard was derived may be reviewed because of some error, because a further subdivision of the elements studied may prove possible, or because improvements in some factor of the work, i.e., the worker, material, tools, equipment, etc., may make a new standard desirable.

The fact that a standard is recognized as not being an ultimate standard in no wise detracts from its working value. As Captain Metcalfe has said: "Whatever be the standard of measurement, it suffices for comparison if it be generally accepted, if it be impartially applied, and if the results be fully recorded."[3]

CHANGE IN THE STANDARD DEMANDS CHANGE IN THE TASK AND IN THE INCENTIVE.--Necessarily, with the change in the standard comes a change in the task and in the reward. All parts of Scientific Management are so closely related that it is impossible to make a successful progressive step in one branch without simultaneously making all the related progressions in other branches that go with it.

For example,--if the material upon which a standard was based caused more care or effort, a smaller task must be set, and wages must be proportionately lowered. _Proportionately_, note, for determining that change would necessitate a review and a redistribution of the cost involved.

In the same way, if an improvement in equipment necessitated a new method, as does the packet in laying brick, a new task would become imperative, and a reconsideration of the wage. The wage might remain the same, it might go down, it might go up. In actual practice, in the case of bricklayers, it has gone up. But the point is, it _must_ be restudied. This provides effectually against cutting the rate or increasing the task in any unjust manner.

SIMILARITY BETWEEN THE STANDARD AND THE "JUDGMENT" OF PSYCHOLOGY.--There are many points of similarity between the "Standard," of management, and the "judgment" of psychology. Sully says, in speaking of the judgment,[4]--"This process of judging ill.u.s.trates the two fundamental elements in thought activity, viz., a.n.a.lysis and synthesis." "To judge is clearly to discern and to mark off as a special object of thought some connecting relation." "To begin with, before we can judge we must have the requisite materials for forming a judgment." "In the second place, to judge is to carry out a process of reflection on given material." "In addition to clearness and accuracy, our judgments may have other perfections. So far as our statements accord with known facts, they should be adhered to,--at least, till new evidence proves them untrue."

PSYCHOLOGY A FINAL APPEAL AS TO PERMANENT VALUE OF ANY STANDARD.--The standard under management, even under Scientific Management, can lay no claim to being perfect. It can never nearly approach perfection until the elements are so small that it is practicable to test them psychologically and physiologically. The time when this can be done in many lines, when the benefit that will directly accrue will justify the necessary expenditure, may seem far distant, but every a.n.a.lysis of operations, no matter how rudimentary, is hastening the day when the underlying, permanently valuable elements can be determined and their variations studied.

COoPERATION WILL HASTEN THE DAY OF PSYCHOLOGICAL AND PHYSIOLOGICAL STUDY OF STANDARDS.--Cooperation in collecting and comparing the results of motion study and time study everywhere will do much to a.s.sist toward more ultimate determination of elements. At the present time the problems that management submits to psychology are too indefinite and cover too large a field to be attacked successfully. Cooperation between management standardizers would mean--

1. that all management data would be available to psychologists and physiologists.

2. that such data, being available also to all standardizers, would prevent reduplication of results.

3. that savings would result.

4. that, from a study and comparison of the collected data a trained synthetic mind could build up better standards than could be built from any set of individual data.

5. Savings would result from this.

6. Inventions would also result.

7. Savings would again result from these.

8. All of these various savings could be invested in more intensive study of elements.

9. These more valuable results would again be available to psychologists and physiologists.

This cycle would go on indefinitely. Meantime, all would benefit with little added cost to any. For the results of the psychological and physiological study would be available to all, and investigators in those lines have shown themselves ready and glad to undertake investigations.

PURPOSE OF STANDARDIZATION.--The purpose of standardizing is the same under all types of management; that is, it is the elimination of waste.

STANDARDIZATION FREQUENTLY ATTEMPTED UNDER TRADITIONAL MANAGEMENT.--In much progressive Traditional Management there is an appreciation of the necessity of standardizing tools and equipment, that is to say, of having these on the "duplicate part system," that a.s.sembling may be done quickly, and repairs made without delay.

The manager notices some particularly successful man, or method, or arrangement of tools, equipment, or the surroundings, and decides to have a record made thereof that the success may be repeated.

These records, if made in sufficient detail, are very valuable. The difficulty is that so often the man making the records does not observe all the variables. Hence the very elements which caused the success may be overlooked entirely.

VALUE OF STANDARDIZATION NOT APPRECIATED UNDER TRADITIONAL MANAGEMENT.--It is surprising, under Traditional Management, to note, in many cases, the years that elapse before any need for standardization is felt. It is also surprising that, even when some standardization has been done, its importance is seldom realized.

The new standard becomes a matter of course, and the management fails to be impressed enough with its benefits to apply the principle of standardization to other fields.

UNDER TRANSITORY MANAGEMENT STANDARDIZATION BECOMES CONSTANTLY MORE IMPORTANT.--Not until Motion Study and Time Study have been introduced can the full benefits of standardization be attained. But as soon as the Transitory Stage of Management appears, the importance of standardization is realized. This is brought about largely through the records of individual outputs, which constantly call attention to the necessity of making available to all the methods, tools and equipment of the most successful workers.

RECORDS OF SUCCESSES BECOME MORE PROFITABLE.--The rules which embody successful practice become more profitable as the necessity for more detailed recording of all the variables becomes possible.

An appreciation of what scientific motion study and time study will ultimately do affects the minds of the management until the workers are given directions as to methods to be used, and the incentive of extra pay for following directions.

"SYSTEMS" SHOW AN APPRECIATION OF PSYCHOLOGY.--The "Systems,"

standing orders or collections of written directions, that are evolved at this stage have a permanent value. This is especially true when the directions, often called "rules," contain the reason for the rule. There is a decided awakening to the importance of Psychology in this appeal to the reason of the worker. He is not affronted by being forced to follow directions for which he is given no reason and which he has no reason to believe have been scientifically derived. These rules, in a certain typical case, are stated in simple language, some in the form of commands, some in the form of suggestions, and are obviously so prepared as to be understood and obeyed by the workers with the least possible amount of effort, opposition and time. As ample opportunity is given for suggestions, the worker's attention and interest are held, and any craving he may have for self-expression is gratified.

SYSTEMS PERMANENTLY USEFUL.--These systems, collections of rules, directions or standing orders are useful even when Ultimate Management is completely installed--

1. for use as records of successful methods which may be scientifically studied for elements.

2. for use by the instruction card clerk in explaining to the men why the rules on the instruction card are given.

RELATION OF SYSTEMS TO STANDARDS SHOULD BE EMPHASIZED.--The worker is too often not made to understand the relation of Systems to Standards. The average worker does not object to Systems, because he realizes that the System is a collection of his best, least wasteful methods of doing work. When he can be convinced that standards are only efficient elements of his own methods scientifically studied and combined, any opposition to them will disappear.

THE PERSONAL NOTE OF THE "SYSTEM" SHOULD BE PRESERVED.--Perhaps one thing that makes the typical "Systems" so attractive is the personal note that they contain. Ill.u.s.trated with pictures of successful work that the workers themselves have done, often containing pictures of the men themselves that ill.u.s.trate successful methods, with mention of the names of men who have offered valuable suggestions or inventions, they make the worker feel his part in successful results. They conserve the old spirit of cooperation between the master and his apprentices.

The conditions of modern industry make it extremely difficult to conserve this feeling. Scientific Management is successful not only because it makes possible a more effective cooperation than has ever existed since the old "master-and-apprentice" relation died out, but also because it conserves in the Systems the interim channel for personal communication between the various members of the organization.

SYSTEMS A VALUABLE a.s.sISTANCE IN TRANSITION TO SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT.--One great problem which those introducing Scientific Management have to face is exactly how to make the worker understand the relation of the new type of management to the old. The usefulness of the written system in use in most places where it is planned to introduce Scientific Management as a means of making the worker understand the transition has, perhaps, not been appreciated.

The development of the standard from the system is easy to explain. This being done, all parts of Scientific Management are so closely related that their interrelation can be readily made apparent.

It is the worker's right as well as privilege to understand the management under which he works, and he only truly cooperates, with his will and judgment as well as with his hands, when he feels that his mind is a part of the directing mind.

STANDARDIZATION UNDER SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT ELIMINATES WASTE SCIENTIFICALLY.--Under Scientific Management the elimination of waste by the use of standards becomes a science. Standards are no longer based on opinions, as under Traditional Management, but are based upon scientific investigation of the elements of experience.

As James says, in the "Psychology, Briefer Course," page 156, paragraph 4,--"It is obvious and palpable that our state of mind is never precisely the same. Every thought we have of a given fact is, strictly speaking, unique and only bears a resemblance of kind with our other thoughts of the same facts. When the identical fact recurs we must think of it in a fresh manner, see it under a somewhat different angle, apprehend it in different relations from those in which it last appeared."

THE STANDARD THE RESULT OF MEASUREMENT.--It is obvious, therefore, that a scientifically derived standard can never be the outcome of an opinion. Whenever the opinion returns, the different thoughts with which it would be accompanied would so color it as to change it, and the standard with it. It is obvious, therefore, that a standard must be the result of definite mathematical and other measured proof, and not of an opinion, and that the standard must be in such physical shape that the subject-matter will always be clearly defined, otherwise the ultimate losses resulting from dependent sequences of the standard schedule and time-tables would be enormous.

SUCCESSFUL STANDARDIZATION DEMANDS COMPLETE CONFORMITY TO STANDARDS.--The laws for establishment of standards; the laws of achieving them; the laws for preventing deviations from those paths that will permit of their achievement; the dependent sequences absolutely necessary to perform the complete whole; these have been worked out and given to the world by Dr. Taylor, who recognized, as James has said, page 157, that, "a permanently existing 'Idea' which makes its appearance before the footlights of consciousness at periodic intervals, is as mythological an ent.i.ty as the Jack of Spades." The entire organization from the highest to the lowest must conform to these standards. It is out of the question to permit the deviations resulting from individual initiative. Individual initiative is quite as objectionable in obtaining the best results,--that is, high wages and low production cost,--as service would be on a railroad if each locomotive engineer were his own train despatcher, determining at what time and to what place he would go.

INITIATIVE PROVIDED FOR.--There is a distinct place for initiative in Scientific Management, but that place is not outside of the planning department, until the planning department's method has been proved to be fully understood by achieving it. The standards must be made by the men to whom this work is a.s.signed, and they must be followed absolutely by the worker. He is willing to follow them, under Scientific Management, because he realizes that a place for his suggestions is supplied, and that, if his suggestions are accepted, they will be incorporated into the new standards which must then be followed by all thereafter.

STANDARDIZATION APPLIES TO THE WORK OF ALL.--It is important to note that standardizing is applied to the work of all. This, if understood by all, will do away with all question of discrimination or the lack of a "square deal." It will make the worker feel ready to follow his standard exactly, just as he knows the manager is following his. So, also, the worker should be made to realize that the very fact that there is a standardization means, under Scientific Management, that that applies to every man, and that there is no discrimination against him in any possible way.

STANDARDIZATION CONSERVES AND DEVELOPS INDIVIDUALITY.-- Standardization conserves individual capacity by doing away with the wasteful process of trial and error of the individual workman. It develops individuality by allowing the worker to concentrate his initiative upon work that has not before been done, and by providing incentive and reward for inventions.

WASTE ELIMINATED IS ELIMINATED PERMANENTLY.--Scientific Management not only eliminates waste, but provides that waste shall be eliminated for all time in the future.

The standard once written down, there can be no slipping back into the old methods based upon opinions of the facts.

STANDARDIZATION UNDER SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT RESEMBLES STANDARDIZATION OF SPELLING.--The need for standardization has already been emphasized, but might further be ill.u.s.trated by the discussions, pro and con, of the question of simplified spelling.

Before the days of dictionaries, our spelling was not standardized-- it was the privilege of any good writer to spell much as he desired; but the creation of written standards of spelling, that is to say the making of dictionaries, fixed the forms of spelling at that time, that is, created standards. The Simplified Spelling Board is now endeavoring to make some new standards, their action being based upon sufficient reasons for making a change, and also for not changing the spelling of any word until it is determined that the suggested spelling is more advisable than the old spelling.

Just so, under Scientific Management, the best known standards are used continuously until better have been discovered. The planning department, consisting of the best men available, whose special duty it is to create new standards, acts as does the Simplified Spelling Board, as a court of appeals for new standards, which must pa.s.s this court before they can hope to succeed the old, and which must, if they are to be accepted, possess many elements of the old and be changed only in such a way that the users can, without difficulty, s.h.i.+ft to the new use.

UNDER SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT NOMENCLATURE IS STANDARDIZED.--Under Standardization in Scientific Management the standardization of the nomenclature, of the names and of the terms used must be noted. The effect of this upon the mind is excellent, because the use of a word very soon becomes a habit--its a.s.sociations become fixed. If different names are used for the same thing,--that is to say, if different names are used indiscriminately, the thing itself becomes hazy, in just such a degree as it possesses many names. The use of the fixed term, the fixed word, leads to definiteness always. Just so, also, the Mnemonic Symbol system in use by Scientific Management, leads to swift identification of the subdivision of the cla.s.sification to which it is applied, and to elimination of waste in finding and remembering where to find any particular thing or piece of information desired. By it may be identified "the various articles of manufacture and papers relating to it as well as the operations to be performed on each piece and the various charges of the establishment."

MNEMONIC SYMBOLS SAVE TIME AND EFFORT.--These Mnemonic Symbols save actual motions and time in speaking and writing, and save time in that they are so designed as to be readily remembered. They also save time and effort in that the mind accustomed to them works with them as collective groups of ideas, without stopping to elaborate them into their more detailed form.

STANDARD PHRASEOLOGY ELIMINATES WASTE.--As typical of the savings effected by standardization, we may cite a lineman talking to the Central Telephone Office:--

"John Doe--1234 L. Placing Extension Station," This signified-- "My name is John Doe, I am telephoning from number 1234, party L.

I have finished installing an extension station. Where shall I go next?"